he's fine -- just bloody & needs stitches
November 2007 Archives
My good friend the actor, who waited tables with me. Had a small part in a film where he got to serve Robert De Niro a cup of coffee. Robert fuckin De Niro, Jen! He said, Wow, so cool.
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Today I learned that doing yoga when I can't breathe in all the way because my lungs are filled with crap (well, ok, phlegm and not really crap, but in this one instance, crap sounds way less gross) makes me feel really weak (like a kitten!) and sort of high. But, dude, I'm not a stoner and so I just got dizzy, my muscles turned to butter and I felt sorta barfy and sorta like I wanted to eat biscotti without dunking them first. And I kept thinking, heh -- it's Sickram-Bikram yoga, and laughing to myself.
Clearly, I was out of my mind.
I forgot flipflops and so I walked out to the van barefoot and was almost knocked on my ass by the beautiful yellow full-a-couple-of-days-ago moon. Even the clouds knew to cooperate and arranged themselves all gorgeous in the sky. And, mmmmm, cold pavement under your feet after being in a 105 degree room with 43 people for 90 minutes is yummy.
Sunday morning we got up early and went for a mini-hike (two miles, three? I dunno, but in a beautiful spot) before meeting up with John's family for a Thanksgiving get together. We don't do that enough. The getting together, I mean. I may have to throw a big-ass party for Willow when she turns five and invite everyone. Lee? are you game?
I dreamed the other night that I had a tiny little puppy. I was shopping (at whole paycheck for some reason) for a leash and food and a water dish while carrying the puppy in my arms. Ever since I woke up, I've been seriously missing this little dog. I think it may have to do with Willow not being a baby anymore. Or, it could be because Willow watched Lady and the Tramp twice the other night while I was working late in the living room (and, um, drinking sake). Hell if I know. But I am haunted by this little dream puppy.
Bed. Srsly. 5:30 gets earlier every single day.
I ordered my latte (soy milk) from you and couldn’t remember if I should ask for large or double or what. So, I just held up my hands to show BIG. We both cracked up. Love. You.
I'm participating in x365 -- and so should you
You said “His eardrum’s red from crying so much,” and then proceeded to tell me all the ways that I’d spoiled my eighteen month old. Your back to me, I flipped you the bird. You saw. HA
I'm participating in x365 (but in a half-assed way)
One row of knitting last night. One. Then I was bombarded with children wanting to learn to knit and practice their sewing. Nathan is sewing this very ambitious hand pieced and stitched quilt and I taught the girls to finger knit. I'm not the right person to teach them to knit with needles. Sophie really picked it up, and I've got her working on a ball of bright red yarn so we can have a long chain to wrap around the tree this year.
Today I helped the boys clean out their bedroom while John took the girls to the park. Good grief. So disgusting. I turned in my resignation as their maid several months ago, and they haven't taken up the slack. I tried SO hard to let it be their problem and not help them, but I cracked a few days after stepping (barefoot) into a completely green, fuzzy sandwich seeping from a ziplock baggie on their floor. Luckily, the sandwich (possibly PB&J) was on top of a cloth dartboard that had fallen off the wall, so the damage was contained. I hopped to the kitchen, swearing loudly, and washed the gick from between my toes, and picked today as the day we'd deal with it.
A day of thankfulness followed by a day of seething resentment! How very balanced.
On Thanksgiving morning I made a couple of dishes to take over to my mom's house. This one, and this one. I printed the recipes out and magneted them to the vent hood over the stove. The kids wanted to help me cook, and since I feel like I don't see them much lately and because we had plenty of time, I let them. They all pulled up little chairs and the girls got their aprons on. Nathan saw that one of the dishes needed cinnamon, and he asked if he could smash up a cinnamon stick in my marble mortar and pestle. I got him all set up, and he ground up a bunch of fresh cinnamon for me. It smells a hundred times better than the already ground stuff (even the chi-chi organic pricey kind in the pretty jar) and has way more of a firey scent. This is embarrassing to admit, but the fresh cinnamon smelled just like cinnamon gum just like the way that real concord grapes smell and taste like purple grape flavored HubbaBubba. Everyone helped peel and slice the apples and pears, they measured sugar and cranberries and gluten free pancake mix. It was nearly fun. There was too much bickering over who got to measure and pour and chop what for it to be called fun. Close though. Give me a few days to gloss it over, and we'll have had a fabulous time!
Now I'm slightly less fabulous, because I have a rotten cold. I haven't had one in a long time, so I guess I'm due. It's been maybe almost a year. A record, anyway. I'm at that obnoxious part with the fever and the stingy throat and lips and drippy nose. For supper I had mango, and tangerine juice with berry flavored emergenC. Then, hot apple cider. Now I'm going to grab some tylenol and heat up some sake. Eventually I'll feel better. Or not care. At this point, I'm open to either.
Oh! How could I almost forget? I hurt myself the other night laughing at this with Jenny. It's one of the funniest things on the internet. I promise you won't be sorry.
You were a great landlord. When you finally bought yourself that new (modest) car to replace your twenty year old monster lots of the tenants griped. I was happy for you, though-- you should’ve bought a porche!
This is part of x365
I drove Sophie to school this morning and as we were walking to her class we had this conversation:
Sophie: Hey Mom! Do you know what the smallest number of the alphabet is?
Me: Hmmm. I think that is a trick question.
Sophie: Yeah, it is. The answer is minus camping!
You always called me Tilly Lipshitz (I have no idea why) and you were an architect. There’s a restaurant I drive by all the time that you designed, but it’s changed names and themes dozens of times.
This is part of x365
Hmm. Was trying to make a funny twist on NaBloPoMo, but kept coming up with versions that were either not funny or insulted me. Unfortunately, the other night I fell asleep when I was putting the girls down and when I woke up it was 5:30 the next day and I hadn't blogged.
I'm astoundingly sad.
Instead of cheating, I just fell into a slump and didn't blog at all. So, I am completely and totally out.
I had a different teacher at yoga tonight and she is awesome, even though I think she is trying to kill people. I am so very proud of myself for sticking it out through her class. At the end, she invited us to come to Thursday's class (thanksgiving day here in the US) and i could see the glee in her eyes from the back row as she said, It will be HARDER!
I sort of want to go if it's in the morning.
The girls have been singing this little snippet of annoyance lately and I cannot figure out where it came from. Does anyone know?
OhMiGosh (breath) I think I broke a nail.
It's super singsongy and they push a hip out to the side when they sing it.
Anyone? (I won't type Bueller, but I'm totally thinking it)
My vaccum cleaner is back home after a nearly 30 stay in the repair shop. When I went in to get it today, I was scoping out the used espresso machines and wondering if I should make that happen in my microkitchen. Do we really need a microwave and toaster? Not if an espresso machine could use that space.
They sell parts at the appliance repair shop, of course. The whole time I couldn't help but think of the Brave Little Toaster. I looked on you tube for a link to the scene where the blender is shivering and hiding from the shop guy and then gets gutted and used for parts, but instead I found this fascinating (and brief) expose.
But, hey! the blender scene is listed in this parental guide for the movie. Parental guides for movies = very funny reading. Especially for films like Night of the Living Dead ( We see a girl zombies butt for a very short amount of time. Rad!) and Pulp Fiction ( 265 uses of the f-word and its derivatives Impressive!) and Goodfellas (300 uses of the f-word and its derivatives WINNER!) Or one of my favorite movies, The Goonies (A dead body continuously falls on top of a child, who is trapped in a freezer. Numerous skeletons discovered during movie, including one with daggers int its eye sockets. All typos courtesy of original reviewers.) No one has warned parents about the seriously frightening monkeys in the Wizard of Oz yet, (I still have nighmares sometimes about them. *shiver*) but they do have this warning on the link to the hidden plot synopsis warning! may contain spoilers.
I'm lucky to be so easily entertained.
you wrote the best stories in our short fiction writing class. All of them tense, set in cramped apartments complicated by drugs, bikers, conflicts and redemption. They were good because you’d lived them. Not fiction at all.
this is a part of x365
So, I'm away on a business trip and staying in a hotel with Jenny. I am maybe three towns over from where I actually live, but since we had to be here tonight and early tomorrow I'm crashing Jenny's room. My boys are crushed that I am away. You see, I brought my personal laptop along with my work one, and now they have to wait a whole day to play runescape.
I'm not popular at home right now.
I ate so much and laughed so hard at dinner (no, NOT drunk, just seated across from Jenny) that I hurt from my hips to my armpits.
In second grade you sponsored me for my school’s reading fundraiser. I think you signed on for a dollar a book. I read stacks of them but when I went collecting, you’d moved away. How could you?
go and check out x365
I scored again! Tonight while I did dishes, the girls cleaned the kitchen table and then fought over who was going to clean the cupboard doors. Nathan asked if he could mop again, but I told him I'd rather he have a bath and wash his hair. He was disappointed.
I am expecting to wake up any second now.
The other day John and I stopped by Hole Foods to get me some vitamins. I am apparently deficient, vitaminically. The kids needed bath soap, so I bought them a bar of the yummy smelling Burt's Bees baby soap that I used on all of them as babies. It has a little bee logo stamped into it and Willow really loved that. Tonight in the bath, she looked at the soap and got sad because the bee was gone. Oh no! I said, Did it fly away? She laughed a little and said, Naw, it just melted off. She was so Sad -- through and through. I felt really bad for her with her now plain bar of soap. She didn't cry, but she kinda sighed and sniffed the soap again before putting it back. Why did that stick with me all night?
I babysat your kids, maybe only once. You were so kind. Authentically kind, not just because you’re supposed to be. My mom said that yesterday your entire family got up and sang for you at your funeral.
I'm participating in x365
You grabbed me in the parking lot and wouldn’t let me go. It hurt. I’d been sure not to meet you alone. It was that damn Kundera you were reading when we met, it clouded my judgment.
I'm participating in x365
Continue reading 34/37x365: Tom.
I was sweeping the kitchen floor when a totally revolutionary idea came to me. I called out to Nathan, who was playing the Wii, Hey -- wanna mop in here after I finish sweeping?
He said he would, and then the girls d e m a n d e d chores to do, too. Fair's fair. I gave them a spray bottle of Mrs.Meyers and a couple of rags and had them clean the cabinet doors, walls, and trash can in their bathroom. Then, they cleaned the kitchen table (it was already clean, but I wasn't about to tell them no) and they mopped a little more, which resulted in a really puddly, but clean! kitchen floor.
Um. This is what normal people do, isn't it? I totally want to spy on other families and see how they do things. I think I'd be amazed.
You worked a lot of crossword puzzles. I remember you describing your girlfriend’s breakfast one day while we had lunch; something like oatmeal with wheat germ and molasses. Food is fuel to her, you said totally dumbfounded.
I'm participating in x365
Continue reading 33/37x365: Tony.
Sometimes people ask me how old I am (usually when they find out I have four kids Ohmigodyoudon'tlookOLDenoughtohaveFOURKIDS is the standard phrasing) and when I answer, the number surprises me. Not too long ago I made the mistake of saying that I felt "old" to a bunch of stoned twenty something year old hippies at a party and I had to listen to earnest speeches about how age is all in your mind. Well, maybe. Also, fuck off and call me in fifteen years.
Anywho.
I've got a running start on my old lady status: grey hair, wrinkles, lots of prescriptions, arthritis, squinting to read small print, difficulty staying awake at night, difficulty falling asleep, stretch marks, wacked out veins, and experiences like I had tonight, shopping at Ikea to the then semi-alternative music of my teenage years (Depeche Mode, Adam Ant, Roxy Music, Dexy's Midnight Runners, INXS).
But, you know what trumps all that? Not appreciating the slang that my kids use. Hearing it and thinking that it is really idiotic sounding. Sick? Really, guys? You like something, and so you say Ooooooooh, s i c k. Only, I think it may be sik or sic. I'm too goddamned old to know which.
I spent some time tonight looking for a webpage where I could plug in the abnormal lab tests I have been spitting out, you know, just for kicks and giggles, and see what they might mean. Is there such a thing? A doctor's cheat sheet? I was hoping to find one before midnight, but I haven't. I was kinda thinking that it was the one cool thing I could understand calling sick.
You took me on my first ever date: The Winchester Mystery House, your parents and younger siblings our chaperones. Things were okay until that bit at the end where you told me how big my nose is.
I'm participating in x365 and feeling really glad I kicked Tom to the curb.
Heather B will understand this.
A few minutes ago I was still asleep and dreaming. I'd been back to Barcelona for a short trip, and while there I'd been to a shop run by a man and his family. They sold vases and bowls and plates -- gorgeous ones. Oversized stone tiles made up the floor, the ceilings were high, and there were lots of open doors so it was light and breezy inside. They were doing some kind of construction, drilling holes into two ancient stone walls that faced each other, so they could add in new shelves. Little bits of something like styrofoam, like the oldest ever popcorn packing material, spilled from the wall as they worked. I played with pieces of it that I picked up off of the floor.
Then, in that folded-time way dreams have, I was back home, trying to get Willow to nap on the couch. She finally fell asleep and I picked up the phone to call the shop. I needed to buy a bowl for a gift (I think for my mom). The man answered. He remembered me and told me he'd look around to see what they had. While he looked, I held the phone to my ear and listened to the construction and the voices. I could barely hear music playing. I looked down at sleeping Willow and listened to the sounds coming from so far away. He came back to the phone, "No. No I don't have anything like that. But, maybe I will next time you come in."
When I woke up this morning, I was still trying to budget cash for plane fare to Spain (I was counting the kids, too, so you know I was dreaming) and I was still hearing the sounds coming from the phone. That moment, between when he said goodbye and hung up the phone, that moment where I could hear the sounds all around him while I watched my daughter sleeping. That moment has given me such travel lust. I want to go hear those noises without the help of phones or dreams.
You drove your ice cream truck down our street every summer afternoon. You lost your arm above the elbow in World War Two. Did you come home and find the gentlest job there is? Did it help?
join me at x365
miss willow
This weekend is the last weekend of soccer. I don't mind watching the kids play their games -- I like it, really. But I won't miss having every Saturday already scheduled for me. Now that I'm working full time, weekends are precious. I have Shit To Do, you know?
But, maybe because I have so much Shit To Do, I have Not Much To Say. I will tell you that Trader Joe's sells this dark chocolate drizzled, peppermint candy mixed in, caramel kettle corn that is making me really happy to have taste buds. (gluten AND dairy free y'all)
It's 8:20, and Willow and I are about to go to bed. Oh, yeah. It's definately Friday night.
that title was for soccer -- not willow!
There’s something right there, you said, your eyes on my lips. Embarrassed, I wiped my mouth on my sleeve. Your fingers touched my lips, I see. It’s two magnets, you said, bringing your mouth to meet mine.
I'm participating in x365
Sophie, looking up toward the ceiling: Santa, please bring me a unicorn!
Me: Santa doesn't bring unicorns honey.
S: Yes, yes he does! A MenOnIck one! With a golden horn that hits people, and it can go zero-one speed super fast and can get us to school. And, there's even a seat belt! Say if I was a bird, and sofast you couldn't see me. There's two buttons on the side of the tummy. The unicorn tummy. One is red, one is green. The green button can make it go, the red button can make it stop. The other button, which is purple, it makes her land down.
This may just be the year I tell her.
Sophie is snoring next to me (we're in my bed) and I am wearing headphones so I can listen to music and watch the last six minutes of Six Feet Under on You Tube. My bed started to shake a little, and for a moment I thought it was another earthquake. I took off my headphones to listen for that rumble, but just heard Sophie and saw that she was moving around a little.
I guess I'm still a little skittish.
I was in the 1989 earthquake. I was in a teensy little pantry at the restaurant where I worked doing a wine inventory. I was lucky to escape before everything came crashing down. Running in an earthquake is not wise, and I fell onto the black and white tile floor, which was curiously rippling. Tables fell over. Permanent bulges were left behind in the tile.
I'm looking forward to Sunday. I'm going to go to the Farmer's Market for veggies and more rosemary olive oil and then I'm going to make soup and try to bake some gluten free bread. Smells good already.
We spent a couple of semesters hanging out together at SFSU, comfortable, good friends. I think you lived in Napa? Waited tables at Thomas Keller’s restaurant? That sounds right. I see you did become an attorney. Congratulations!
I'm participating in x365
Once, maybe fifteen years ago, I was driving on the freeway with my former husband. It was quiet, late at night. We drove past an accident that had likely just happened. No paramedics were there yet. The two cars were in the shoulder of the fast lane, up against the center divider. I saw a suitcase, burst open, clothes making their own path along the roadway. The fabric flapped around a little in the breeze, illuminated by the street lamp. It made me so sad to see.
We didnt' stop because it was the middle of the freeway and neither of us had real medical training. After a quiet minute, I said something about all the clothes and how that really struck me as we went past. He didn't see any clothes. Or suitcases. Just the people, who seemed to be okay. The suitcase wasn't there, he said.
I can still shut my eyes and picture what I saw.
I'm so intrigued by that moment. How we saw two totally different scenes.
True, you had that cliché obscenely wealthy thing going on (the red Ferrari, the clothes, the gorgeous girlfriends) but I thought you were okay anyway. I believed you were secretly down to earth underneath all that money.
I'm participating in x365
I found myself at the vacuum repair place this morning a scootch before 9 a.m. hoping to pick up my new Dyson that needed some warrantied fixin after gracing my house for about a week. (Is it wrong that I want to send lovey postcards to my vacuum while it sits in the shop? I guess if it is, then I don't care about being right.)
They'd had it for sixteen days already and the estimate had a delivery date of Sunday, but they are closed Sundays and so I just showed up Monday, expecting. The owner of the shop sort of reminds me of Nikolai, or maybe one of his friends. (And, must say that I am still missing Six Feet Under. *sigh*)
Did we CALL you?
To SAY it was READY?
um. no. but i was driving by and the slip said yesterday, so. . .
>exasperated sigh<
I will look in back for you.
>more sighing<
We have to order parts.
Will be ten more days.
wow. ten. huh. ten. ten? ten days? ten? really? i guess i'll borrow my mom's vacuum?
We will CALL you SOON as it is READY? OKAY?
okay.
thanks.
bye.
see you in ten days! (did i smile and wave? yes. yes i did! even though i was far from happy!)
I walked out the door, crushed. If you think I'm joking then you have never been vacuumless when your carpet was dirty enough to successfully hide Rhesus monkeys. Not that they would live in such a nasty, filthy environment. Click that link. They're so damn cute.
I went to my van, completely deflated. You know how when you're already glum things like the vacuum (the new, four times more than I've ever paid for a vacuum, object of all my nesty affections vacuum) not being fixed and ready can seem so tragic? Okay, you can just pretend you know. I don't care. I was in that zone. Or I was, that is, until I saw the old guys.
First one came toward me as I was walking. He had one of those little suitcases on wheels with a telescoping handle and was making his way to the sidewalk from the parking lot. I figured he had some appliance in there that needed to be fixed and I wanted to tell him that HEY GO SOMEPLACE ELSE. THIS SHOP IS SLLLOOOOWWWWW.
But, then, I saw two more guys with wheely suitcases headed my way. And, could it be? Coming up the sidewalk, another? And, more, arriving here and there in the parking lot?
Know what they were doing at just about 9 a.m. on a Monday, pulling their suitcases behind them?
Bowling! Or, waiting outside for the bowling alley to open up anyway. And, that made me really, really, super happy. Because how great is that? A bunch of old guys, meeting up at the bowling alley to hang out and drink coffee and bowl while the rest of the world is going to work? On a Monday!
I thought about them a lot today. It was nice to imagine them getting strikes, dancing around in their not-rented shoes.
Coke-bottle glasses, skinny, jittery, fried. You made me a necklace and gave me a tank top that said Skateboarding Is Not A Crime. You wrote me poems that would have left David Lynch scratching his head.
I'm participating in x365
I have this weird muscley headache. It hurts and feels like someone has wrapped an ace bandage around my head. I need a scalp muscle relaxer. Or food that I don't have to work so hard to chew. Or something.
I made a quick run to Tarjay tonight because all of a sudden all the pants in the girls' dresser are either too small or the knees are torn out. I can't tell you how sad I am to see the disco, split bell bottom, red star embroidered, Hello Kitty jeans finally give it up after their third set of little girl legs. They were hand-me-downs from Soph's friend, and she grudgingly let Willow wear them.
By the time I got to the check out, I had jeans (4), stretch pants (3), velvet pants (1), sweat pants (1), size 6 footed pajamas, a sweatshirt, and six long sleeved tee shirts. Oh, and four little headbands. Also, a set of flannel penguin sheets for Nathan (he has a double bed and exactly zero sets of matched sheets), a plastic bin for the photos I've been keeping in a cloth bag for far too long, and a thing to hang in my shower so we can quit balancing all the shampoo bottles along the handle thing inside the glass shower door. And rechargeable batteries for the four Wii remote controllers. (The WiiMotes. I feel like Elmer Fudd: I bwought battawees for yowr WiiMotes, Kids!) All that is neither here nor there, but the kid working the register was new. He was being watched, ever so closely, by a supervisor as he rung up my stuff. Most things he could hold over the little glass panel in the counter top in front of him, and *beep* they'd ring right up. Other things caused him to tiptoe or bend his knees or swivel his hips while concentrating intently until he found the right angle *beep* But some things, some things just wouldn't scan. And then he'd get all excited and quickly pull open the drawer under the register and say time for the gun! and scan my stuff with a little hand held scanner like he was shooting it. I found it very entertaining. When he got to Sophie's footed pajamas he held them up and said, Aw, I didn't know they still MADE these! All I could think was that it couldn't have been too long since he last sat around in a pair on cold mornings, warming his hands over the heat register.
Jenifer! Come Here, I Need You, you shrieked from the back of the store. I discovered you, holding a broom, and expecting me to hold the dustpan. I already thought you were horrible, that sealed the deal.
I'm participating in x365 and it's daylight savings time adjustment so i didn't exactly miss a day.
Driving home from Santa Cruz I saw that it was 11:30 and thought that I'd already crashed and burned and lost my NaBloPoMo-ness. BUT! I remembered that it's the end of daylight savings time, and even though the clocks don't really go back for another two hours, I'm going to claim my extra hour now.
Because, I totally would have been home in time if Nathan didn't barf in the van.
I'm reading a book my friend D brought to me -- Everybody Into the Pool by Beth Lisick. It's fascinating to me partly because she is the same age as I am and grew up really close to where I did. I keep waiting for one of her stories to sound familiar because I was there. I would enjoy it even if it weren't sort of parallel to my life, but there's this extra suspense thrown in now. I keep studying her teeny little photo on the back cover.
Tomorrow John will take a big old test to see if he can get his teaching credential. He's still got more than a year of coursework ahead of him, but he's hoping to get the test part out of the way now. While he is doing that, the kids and I will busy ourselves with the next-to-last soccer games, two birthday parties (one for twins) and an end of the season soccer pizza party. Something will have to give, most likely it will be me. Apparently, I've got this groovy kind of anemia that is the result of a folic acid/B-12 deficiency. My red blood cells are too big. I am tired. And crabby. And sad (not because of my misshapen blood cells -- I mean, who knows? maybe because of them, but not about them).
eek! 11:59 must publish
ack!
You tell my kids (always in Italian) how gorgeous they are, and you tell me that I work hard and look beautiful. I treasure your kindness, how you always take the time to visit and say hello.
This is part of x365
You danced with the San Francisco ballet before you became a mother. I wanted to be just like you. Lessons five days a week, babysitting reduced my tuition. Pregnant with your third child, your plies looked effortless.
I'm participating in x365
It's November!
Posting! Every day! All month!
I'm tired already, but I'll soldier on.
So, the other night, we had an earthquake, a first for the small fry around here. It was just after 8 when the rumble and rattling started. It wasn't a rolling, wavy quake, but a Hollywood movie style, dinosaur stomp type, up and down, fast staccato SHA A A A A A A A KE.
I was up to my elbows in pumpkin guts at the kitchen table with Willow, Sophie and Lex. We were finishing up the pumpkins while Nathan took a bath. The girls had already finished their pumpkins and bathed, so they were hanging out in their underpants. I was standing (with my bare feet on the floor) to get the best leverage on the pumpkin insides (it was a big ass pumpkin) and so I caught on to what was happening quickly. I heard and felt it all at once. I'm sort of an EARTHQUAKE! oh, heh, false alarm, nevermind! kinda girl (especially in tall buildings and parking garages) but I knew this was one. I rounded up the kids (without using my hands, because they were slimy) and told them we needed to step outside. Then I yelled to Lex, YOUR BROTHER -- TELL HIM TO GET OUT OF THE TUB NOW!
By the time we all stood huddled together near the front door, Willow in an oversized coat belonging to her brother, Sophie in a sweatshirt and Nathan in a towel, the earthquake was long over with. We stayed in the entryway, in our odd huddle, hearts pounding. I got the unclothed kids into warm pjs and thought about sleeping in the van.
We finally cooled off a little and came back to the kitchen. I was pretty surprised that nothing even fell off the shelves. I turned on the local radio station and we listened to a (drunk! he was so so drunk!) caller going on and on about how that must've been a 7.9.
Uh, dude. NO. Not even. I guessed 5.5, so I was only a scootch off. (Look -- it's already on Wikipedia!)
The station kept taking these calls and I couldn't help but laugh. People were all, I FELT SHAKING. IT WAS AN EARTHQUAKE! And the radio guy would ask DID ANYONE GET HURT? IS YOUR HOUSE OK? and the callers were all WE'RE FINE! NO DAMAGE!
and that went on and on and I found it weird that SO many people were compelled to share their tale of, non drama. Lex, however, was riveted. He decided that even though our phones were out (all circuits busy) he was going to be on the radio.
He did it, too. I don't know how long he tried, but in the middle of calming Willow, who was hysterical and made me laugh by asking between sobs Is our food okay? and talking about aftershocks with Nathan, I heard Lex recounting our evening. I didn't get a chance to hear him on the radio, but as his voice came to me down the hall I heard him say that his mom was screaming at him to get his brother out of the bath. There was a pause. Then he said that his brother had hit his head. Oh, he's okay. Thanks.
I think being on the radio was the very most exciting part of the night for him. It was pretty awesome.
Everyone piled in to bed with me, though Lex did end up sleeping in his room. I didn't really sleep, very aware that between me and my babies and the only exits is that stupid gas furnace heater thing in the hall. All I could think of was that if we had a really big quake, it would blow up and trap us in my room and I'd have to push the kids out the broken windows to the sidewalk and the fact that I hung my purse (with my maglite and wallet and keys and medicines) by the front door wouldn't help us at all. I can be really morbid and doomish when I apply myself.
48 hours later and the only shaking is coming from sugar overdoses. I have such mixed feelings about living here sometimes. It's gorgeous and fun and I am not interested in moving the older kids away from their dad (by the way, John was at work and that's why he wasn't in my story), but one day there is going to be a devastating quake here. It's a when more than an maybe. My brother and I used to look at maps, planning to find a place to live with no natural disasters. We'd felt earthquakes in California, gone through hurricanes in Texas and seen enough lightening and tornadoes and fire ants to make us want a safe spot. Our search was pointless, as one or the other of us would always point out something that would disqualify all the places we considered. Floods, quakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, locusts, electrical storms, quicksand, scorching heat, blizzards. . . we never did find a totally safe spot. And, where I am now is sure very nice when it's still.
