When the universe shifted three inches to the left, John and I stared at each other for a moment. The penny had dropped. Mutually. Then he swiftly crossed the room and kissed me. And kissed me. And kissed me some more. When we came up for air, he said simply, “I’ve been in love with you since the day I met you.”
“Wait...what?” I said. “Has this been under my nose the whole time? Have I been completely oblivious for fourteen years?”
“I never said anything because you were always with someone, and you seemed happy. What could I have done? The timing wouldn’t have been right, anyway. I’m a little pissed I had to pine away for fourteen years before the timing was right, but now it is.”
I had to agree. The timing was right, and although I couldn’t explain why, we both just knew. That was the universe shifting.
“I...wait. This is...something serious is happening here,” I said. “Are you sure?”
“I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life,” he replied.
I considered this for a moment.
“Pockets has a crush on you,” I said. “Is that weird? I mean, would that affect--“
“I’m in love with you,” he said. “If you were dead, Pockets still wouldn’t have a chance.”
“We’ve been good friends for a long time, John. I don’t want to get into anything with you if it’ll spoil that. I mean, I don’t want this to just be a Vegas fling. And what if, God forbid, the sex is bad? Or everything turns awkward? Or--“
There was some more kissing.
“Are you really worried that the sex will be bad?” he said.
“Stranger things have happened. And, seriously, I’d rather keep you as a friend than ruin it if this isn’t going to work out.”
“It will work out.”
“You don’t know that, anything could--“
“Stop. Wait,” he said. “This is right. We can both feel it. You know this is right.”
He had me there. I was never a romantic. I always laughed at people who claimed love at first sight, claimed that you could just know about a person, claimed they had an emotional connection before a physical one. Suckers, I thought. Fools. For me, love had always started long after the initial sexual attraction; only after a certain physical and mental compatibility had been tested and confirmed could I begin to let myself be vulnerable. But now, here I was, falling in love in a matter of minutes.
Well, “falling” wasn’t quite the right word. “Falling” belonged to my last serious relationship, in which I was almost literally consumed. Love in that case was like being dropped into a vat of warm baby oil; it felt wonderful at first, but then became suffocating and was almost impossible to climb out of. And when I did, it clung to me, despite all my best efforts to shake it off. But with John...something opened up. There was no falling, no fear, no second-guessing. I turned a corner and there it was. The whole world, and him, just waiting for me.
There's a scene in “Sex in the City” where Miranda is bitching to Carrie about her ongoing drama with Steve, and she says that she always hoped that one day, all her bullshit would fall away and she would just know. Later, Steve enters, holding a “1” birthday candle. And lo, all her bullshit fell away, and she knew him to be The One. I never thought it was possible to just know, like that, that my usual anxious bullshit would magically disappear, but it seems I’ve been (happily) proven wrong.
*
This is the part where I lose my best friend.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Every Day You Play by Pablo Neruda
Every day you play with the light of the universe.
Subtle visitor, you arrive in the flower and the water.
You are more than this white head that I hold tightly
as a cluster of fruit, every day, between my hands.
You are like nobody since I love you.
Let me spread you out among yellow garlands.
Who writes your name in letters of smoke among the stars of the south?
Oh let me remember you as you were before you existed.
Suddenly the wind howls and bangs at my shut window.
The sky is a net crammed with shadowy fish.
Here all the winds let go sooner or later, all of them.
The rain takes off her clothes.
The birds go by, fleeing.
The wind. The wind.
I can contend only against the power of men.
The storm whirls dark leaves
and turns loose all the boats that were moored last night to the sky.
You are here. Oh, you do not run away.
You will answer me to the last cry.
Cling to me as though you were frightened,
Even so, at one time a strange shadow ran through your eyes.
Now, now too, little one, you bring me honeysuckle,
and even your breasts smell of it.
While the sad wind goes slaughtering butterflies
I love you, and my happiness bites the plum of your mouth.
How you must have suffered getting accustomed to me,
my savage, solitary soul, my name that sends them all running.
So many times we have seen the morning star burn, kissing our eyes,
and over our heads the grey light unwind in turning fans.
My words rained over you, stroking you.
A long time I have loved the sunned mother-of-pearl of your body.
I go so far as to think that you own the universe.
I will bring you happy flowers from the mountains, bluebells,
dark hazels, and rustic buckets of kisses.
I want
to do with you what spring does with the cherry trees.
Subtle visitor, you arrive in the flower and the water.
You are more than this white head that I hold tightly
as a cluster of fruit, every day, between my hands.
You are like nobody since I love you.
Let me spread you out among yellow garlands.
Who writes your name in letters of smoke among the stars of the south?
Oh let me remember you as you were before you existed.
Suddenly the wind howls and bangs at my shut window.
The sky is a net crammed with shadowy fish.
Here all the winds let go sooner or later, all of them.
The rain takes off her clothes.
The birds go by, fleeing.
The wind. The wind.
I can contend only against the power of men.
The storm whirls dark leaves
and turns loose all the boats that were moored last night to the sky.
You are here. Oh, you do not run away.
You will answer me to the last cry.
Cling to me as though you were frightened,
Even so, at one time a strange shadow ran through your eyes.
Now, now too, little one, you bring me honeysuckle,
and even your breasts smell of it.
While the sad wind goes slaughtering butterflies
I love you, and my happiness bites the plum of your mouth.
How you must have suffered getting accustomed to me,
my savage, solitary soul, my name that sends them all running.
So many times we have seen the morning star burn, kissing our eyes,
and over our heads the grey light unwind in turning fans.
My words rained over you, stroking you.
A long time I have loved the sunned mother-of-pearl of your body.
I go so far as to think that you own the universe.
I will bring you happy flowers from the mountains, bluebells,
dark hazels, and rustic buckets of kisses.
I want
to do with you what spring does with the cherry trees.
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Last Love by Mary Kerr
For years I chose the man to suit the instant,
from good guy to goat boy.
Not one could bridal me. In place of lace veil,
I peered from bandage gauze.
And if, in rage, some suitor tore that off, the red sun
was a scald, and I felt scalped
and rocket-shot onto the nearest flight. So everyone
I kissed left hurt. One man
broke the table I served him bread on.
Another claimed my heart
was arsenic at its core. When my last love came,
he slid a palm across
mine eyes, lent me his mouth (a bitten
plum), lay his head
in the middle of me, bent me
to that. Nights now,
my face rests on the meadow of his chest—
so I’m a loose-petalled poppy
blown open, a girl again, for the last time
hearing the earth’s heartbeat.
from good guy to goat boy.
Not one could bridal me. In place of lace veil,
I peered from bandage gauze.
And if, in rage, some suitor tore that off, the red sun
was a scald, and I felt scalped
and rocket-shot onto the nearest flight. So everyone
I kissed left hurt. One man
broke the table I served him bread on.
Another claimed my heart
was arsenic at its core. When my last love came,
he slid a palm across
mine eyes, lent me his mouth (a bitten
plum), lay his head
in the middle of me, bent me
to that. Nights now,
my face rests on the meadow of his chest—
so I’m a loose-petalled poppy
blown open, a girl again, for the last time
hearing the earth’s heartbeat.
Friday, February 26, 2010
My Husband's Back by Susan Minot
Sunday evening.
Breakdown hour. Weeping into
a pot of burnt rice. Sun dimmed
like a light bulb gone out
behind a gray lawn of snow.
The baby flushed with the flu
asleep on a pillow.
The fire won’t catch.
The wet wood’s caked
with ice. Sitting
on the couch my spine
collides with all its bones
and I watch my husband
peer past the glass grate
and blow.
His back in a snug plaid shirt
gray and white
leaning into the woodstove
is firm and compact
like a young man’s back.
And the giant world which swirls
in my head
stopping most thought
suddenly ceases
to spin. It sits
right there, the back I love,
animal and gamine, leaning
on one arm.
I could crawl on it forever
the one point in the world
turns out
I have traveled everywhere
to get to.
Breakdown hour. Weeping into
a pot of burnt rice. Sun dimmed
like a light bulb gone out
behind a gray lawn of snow.
The baby flushed with the flu
asleep on a pillow.
The fire won’t catch.
The wet wood’s caked
with ice. Sitting
on the couch my spine
collides with all its bones
and I watch my husband
peer past the glass grate
and blow.
His back in a snug plaid shirt
gray and white
leaning into the woodstove
is firm and compact
like a young man’s back.
And the giant world which swirls
in my head
stopping most thought
suddenly ceases
to spin. It sits
right there, the back I love,
animal and gamine, leaning
on one arm.
I could crawl on it forever
the one point in the world
turns out
I have traveled everywhere
to get to.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
The Adventure, part 2: Love, Or, What Happens in Vegas, Does Not Stay in Vegas
The possibility had been lurking in the back of my mind, but never really in a conscious way. It was there in the way that you casually wonder about all your heterosexual opposite-sex friends, trying once or twice to picture them naked and then getting weirded out and banishing those thoughts to some dusty and unused part of your head. Somehow the road trip was pushing the idea back into my conscious brain, but still, I hadn’t seriously entertained the idea of John and I together.
And here you think, “Then you laid eyes on him and everything fell into place.” Which is not quite what happened--it took a day.
T and I had spent the week traversing the dusty highways and byways of Utah and the Grand Canyon. We arrived in Vegas about mid-day on Friday. Because John was there for a convention, he was sharing a hotel room with a co-worker, and we spent the afternoon negotiating with the hotel for a new room, with two beds. Romance was far from my mind. I was hot and dusty from the week in Utah, tired of driving, and hungering for a civilized experience. T and I showered, changed into pretty dresses, and dragged John to Bouchon for dinner.
One of the things I love most about fine dining is the theatre of it. The ebb and flow of service, the multiple waiters, the various intricate pieces that, if done correctly, add up to more than the sum of their parts. The wine, the water, the courses, the crumbing of the table, the discussion of after-dinner drinks, the subtle exchange of silverware. After all, isn’t that why we go out? To have someone else prepare the food, bring it to us, and then clean up after us? I’ve dined alone many times and had a ball, but dining with close friends is always better. Especially in the pre-ordering negotiations, when we all got drawn into a long discussion of who was going to have what, in what order, and what wine would go best with all our various selections. Choices were eventually made, and we feasted. It was one of the finer meals in my life. I had veal cheeks, and sturgeon, and white burgundy. It was a far cry from our week of road food, beef jerky and instant oatmeal and barbecue potato chips.
Nothing happened that first night. How could it? T was there, in the next bed. And quite honestly, even if she hadn’t been, I would have fallen promptly asleep anyway. I was too tired and too happily drunk from the wine at dinner. John spent most of the night and the next day at the convention. So I drove T to the airport in the morning, and spent the rest of the afternoon catching up on my blogging and plotting the next part of the trip.
Then John returned.
He walked into the room, and we looked at each other.
And the universe shifted three inches to the left.
Like I said, not quite love at first sight, but close enough.
*
We met in undergrad, in either my junior or senior year. I confess I have no memory of our meeting, or our early friendship. Too many years have passed, and too many brain cells have been killed off in various ways, for me to have retained a completely clear memory of college. He claims it was in Tom Allen’s Shakespeare class, which sounds about right. I was dating, and then living with, and then engaged to, someone else, so I never thought of John as any sort of a romantic possibility. I do remember that when John and I started hanging out on a regular basis, we had a great time together. He had (and still has) a wonderfully wry and quirky sense of humor, and we bonded over “Mystery Science Theater 3000” and “Kids in the Hall.” When I got engaged, I wanted to include him in the wedding--doing his spot-on impression of the minister in The Princess Bride, doing the infamous “Mawwiage” speech.
Life intervened, of course. I graduated and moved two states away for an internship. He met someone and moved to Seattle to start a new life with her. My engagement fell apart and I started a new life elsewhere. We stayed in contact over the years, not necessarily close friends, but retaining the warm camaraderie of college days.
Fourteen years passed in this way. I moved to New York and went through a series of boyfriends, some serious, some not, while John got married, had a child, divorced, moved back to the East Coast, then moved back to the West Coast. We saw each other a few times in the intervening years, all on the East Coast; he even flew to New York for one of my parties. In all those years, we were never both single at the same time.
Until Vegas, that is.
And here you think, “Then you laid eyes on him and everything fell into place.” Which is not quite what happened--it took a day.
T and I had spent the week traversing the dusty highways and byways of Utah and the Grand Canyon. We arrived in Vegas about mid-day on Friday. Because John was there for a convention, he was sharing a hotel room with a co-worker, and we spent the afternoon negotiating with the hotel for a new room, with two beds. Romance was far from my mind. I was hot and dusty from the week in Utah, tired of driving, and hungering for a civilized experience. T and I showered, changed into pretty dresses, and dragged John to Bouchon for dinner.
One of the things I love most about fine dining is the theatre of it. The ebb and flow of service, the multiple waiters, the various intricate pieces that, if done correctly, add up to more than the sum of their parts. The wine, the water, the courses, the crumbing of the table, the discussion of after-dinner drinks, the subtle exchange of silverware. After all, isn’t that why we go out? To have someone else prepare the food, bring it to us, and then clean up after us? I’ve dined alone many times and had a ball, but dining with close friends is always better. Especially in the pre-ordering negotiations, when we all got drawn into a long discussion of who was going to have what, in what order, and what wine would go best with all our various selections. Choices were eventually made, and we feasted. It was one of the finer meals in my life. I had veal cheeks, and sturgeon, and white burgundy. It was a far cry from our week of road food, beef jerky and instant oatmeal and barbecue potato chips.
Nothing happened that first night. How could it? T was there, in the next bed. And quite honestly, even if she hadn’t been, I would have fallen promptly asleep anyway. I was too tired and too happily drunk from the wine at dinner. John spent most of the night and the next day at the convention. So I drove T to the airport in the morning, and spent the rest of the afternoon catching up on my blogging and plotting the next part of the trip.
Then John returned.
He walked into the room, and we looked at each other.
And the universe shifted three inches to the left.
Like I said, not quite love at first sight, but close enough.
*
We met in undergrad, in either my junior or senior year. I confess I have no memory of our meeting, or our early friendship. Too many years have passed, and too many brain cells have been killed off in various ways, for me to have retained a completely clear memory of college. He claims it was in Tom Allen’s Shakespeare class, which sounds about right. I was dating, and then living with, and then engaged to, someone else, so I never thought of John as any sort of a romantic possibility. I do remember that when John and I started hanging out on a regular basis, we had a great time together. He had (and still has) a wonderfully wry and quirky sense of humor, and we bonded over “Mystery Science Theater 3000” and “Kids in the Hall.” When I got engaged, I wanted to include him in the wedding--doing his spot-on impression of the minister in The Princess Bride, doing the infamous “Mawwiage” speech.
Life intervened, of course. I graduated and moved two states away for an internship. He met someone and moved to Seattle to start a new life with her. My engagement fell apart and I started a new life elsewhere. We stayed in contact over the years, not necessarily close friends, but retaining the warm camaraderie of college days.
Fourteen years passed in this way. I moved to New York and went through a series of boyfriends, some serious, some not, while John got married, had a child, divorced, moved back to the East Coast, then moved back to the West Coast. We saw each other a few times in the intervening years, all on the East Coast; he even flew to New York for one of my parties. In all those years, we were never both single at the same time.
Until Vegas, that is.
Habitation by Margaret Atwood
Marriage is not
a house or even a tent
it is before that, and colder:
the edge of the forest, the edge
of the desert
the unpainted stairs
at the back where we squat
outside, eating popcorn
the edge of the receding glacier
where painfully and with wonder
at having survived even
this far
we are learning to make fire
a house or even a tent
it is before that, and colder:
the edge of the forest, the edge
of the desert
the unpainted stairs
at the back where we squat
outside, eating popcorn
the edge of the receding glacier
where painfully and with wonder
at having survived even
this far
we are learning to make fire
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
The Ache of Marriage, by Denise Levertov
The ache of marriage:
thigh and tongue, beloved,
are heavy with it,
it throbs in the teeth
We look for communion
and are turned away, beloved,
each and each
It is leviathan and we
in its belly
looking for joy, some joy
not to be known outside it
two by two in the ark of
the ache of it.
thigh and tongue, beloved,
are heavy with it,
it throbs in the teeth
We look for communion
and are turned away, beloved,
each and each
It is leviathan and we
in its belly
looking for joy, some joy
not to be known outside it
two by two in the ark of
the ache of it.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
We interrupt this thread to bring you some shameless self-promotion
Broke Foodie now has a Facebook page! And is on Twitter! If you'll be my fan, I'll be yours.
The Adventure, part 1
In one year, I lost a job, a home, my unemployment benefits, my savings, a best friend, and all vestiges of my previous life. I gained a husband, a stepson, a whole new family, another (completely different) home, and my freedom. All of this because of that crazy-ass road trip.
“But you’re getting married,” you say. “No more hitting the open road on a whim, no more vacationing by yourself in Jamaica. How are you gaining your freedom?”
Getting married is going to be my new adventure, my new declaration of personal independence. I don’t really mourn the loss of my single life. All those years in New York, all those thousands of dates I went on, didn’t yield one worthwhile boyfriend. Not one. (Although there were plenty of worthless ones.) It was hard justifying a slow, sensual life, in which spontaneous travel, long drawn-out meals cooked over many hours, and gardening figured prominently, in a city which prized ruthless speed and ambition over all else. I was tired of being stared down across the table from a date, being judged unfavorably because I wasn’t on the fast track to becoming CEO by 35, because I didn’t work 100 hours a week and make six figures, because I didn’t want to work 100 hours a week.
I was also getting tired of my married/attached girlfriends turning to me for entertainment value. They were living vicariously through my dating adventures, and while I was glad someone was getting some enjoyment out of it, there were some truly terrifying moments. There was the time I woke up to the current man du jour having unprotected sex with me; I never heard from him again, prompting several emergency gynecological visits. There was the lawyer who announced to me, on our second date, that he wanted to fist me. There was the actor who refused to leave my apartment until I gave him a hand job. There were all the now-nameless garden-variety perverts, men who wanted to wear my lingerie or pimp me out, the men who broke my heart in a million different ways, by treating me like shit or breaking up with me via text message or who called me names and laughed at me when they learned I was from the South or who simply disappeared, never to be heard from again.
I won’t miss any of it.
While I know now that the road trip was my elegy to my single life, I didn’t know that at the time. It was an act born of desperation and an irrational fear of stasis. It made no sense at the time to anyone but me. It especially made no financial sense--it cost me over $14,000, during a time when I had no income, no health insurance, and six figures of student loans and credit card debt.
But it brought me everything. America, the love of my life, and me.
(“Oh, there I am! Hello me! I missed you. Where were you all this time?” “Who, me? I was hiding in the open places. All you had to do was look.”)
“But you’re getting married,” you say. “No more hitting the open road on a whim, no more vacationing by yourself in Jamaica. How are you gaining your freedom?”
Getting married is going to be my new adventure, my new declaration of personal independence. I don’t really mourn the loss of my single life. All those years in New York, all those thousands of dates I went on, didn’t yield one worthwhile boyfriend. Not one. (Although there were plenty of worthless ones.) It was hard justifying a slow, sensual life, in which spontaneous travel, long drawn-out meals cooked over many hours, and gardening figured prominently, in a city which prized ruthless speed and ambition over all else. I was tired of being stared down across the table from a date, being judged unfavorably because I wasn’t on the fast track to becoming CEO by 35, because I didn’t work 100 hours a week and make six figures, because I didn’t want to work 100 hours a week.
I was also getting tired of my married/attached girlfriends turning to me for entertainment value. They were living vicariously through my dating adventures, and while I was glad someone was getting some enjoyment out of it, there were some truly terrifying moments. There was the time I woke up to the current man du jour having unprotected sex with me; I never heard from him again, prompting several emergency gynecological visits. There was the lawyer who announced to me, on our second date, that he wanted to fist me. There was the actor who refused to leave my apartment until I gave him a hand job. There were all the now-nameless garden-variety perverts, men who wanted to wear my lingerie or pimp me out, the men who broke my heart in a million different ways, by treating me like shit or breaking up with me via text message or who called me names and laughed at me when they learned I was from the South or who simply disappeared, never to be heard from again.
I won’t miss any of it.
While I know now that the road trip was my elegy to my single life, I didn’t know that at the time. It was an act born of desperation and an irrational fear of stasis. It made no sense at the time to anyone but me. It especially made no financial sense--it cost me over $14,000, during a time when I had no income, no health insurance, and six figures of student loans and credit card debt.
But it brought me everything. America, the love of my life, and me.
(“Oh, there I am! Hello me! I missed you. Where were you all this time?” “Who, me? I was hiding in the open places. All you had to do was look.”)
Monday, February 22, 2010
It's the one-year anniversary of the start of the adventure
That is, the one-year anniversary of getting laid off. (Roughly.) Which is what prompted all the soul-searching and eventually the road trip, which is what got me here today. It's also the minus-3 month anniversary of our wedding date. Oh, and I got my engagement/wedding ring this weekend. So naturally, all of this has snowballed in my brain to produce various thoughts on marriage.
So, the next few posts, I'll be sharing those, along with the story of how all this got started (excerpted from the rough draft of my book about it all).
So, the next few posts, I'll be sharing those, along with the story of how all this got started (excerpted from the rough draft of my book about it all).
Sunday, February 21, 2010
I have a ring, part 2
It's weird showering with jewelry on.
I took it off to knead bread this morning, but then I forgot to put it back on.
Last night in my sleep, I stabbed myself in the eye with it. I'm not used to sleeping with jewelry, either.
But these aren't complaints. I feel all official and stuff. I've never had a ring before, and I've never worn my own jewelry on that finger, either. (That would have jinxed it.) For that matter, I don't think I've ever worn rings on my left hand. This is going to take some getting used to.
But I'm official! Hee...
I took it off to knead bread this morning, but then I forgot to put it back on.
Last night in my sleep, I stabbed myself in the eye with it. I'm not used to sleeping with jewelry, either.
But these aren't complaints. I feel all official and stuff. I've never had a ring before, and I've never worn my own jewelry on that finger, either. (That would have jinxed it.) For that matter, I don't think I've ever worn rings on my left hand. This is going to take some getting used to.
But I'm official! Hee...
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Menu changes
I spent the morning analyzing the wedding menu and making it a little more streamlined. I originally wanted to do a big crawfish boil for the rehearsal dinner on Friday, but the logistics of overnighting 200 pounds of live crawfish, then finding two 80-pound boiling pots to cook them in, plus providing all the fixin's for 75 people, were proving difficult. Not to mention that overnighting 200 pounds of crawfish would cost me about $1000, and who knows whether the FedEx guy could find our little house way up in the mountains in time? So I eliminated the cost and the panic factor by cutting the menu back to crawfish gumbo. I can use frozen crawfish for that, and I don't have to find an 80-pound boiling pot to cook them in.
Same process for the pig roast on Saturday--I was having a hard time finding a caterer willing (and able) to roast a whole hog and then deliver it. Either I had to get the pig with all the trimmings, which I didn't want, or I'd have to drive three hours to pick it up myself, which I didn't want either. So I'm going to roast several huge pork shoulders instead. Same great taste, no "ewwwww" factor from guests unfamiliar with picking through a hog carcass, and significantly cheaper. I'm hoping to channel all the saved money into more beer purchases.
Same process for the pig roast on Saturday--I was having a hard time finding a caterer willing (and able) to roast a whole hog and then deliver it. Either I had to get the pig with all the trimmings, which I didn't want, or I'd have to drive three hours to pick it up myself, which I didn't want either. So I'm going to roast several huge pork shoulders instead. Same great taste, no "ewwwww" factor from guests unfamiliar with picking through a hog carcass, and significantly cheaper. I'm hoping to channel all the saved money into more beer purchases.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
The underground foodie scene in Pamplin, VA
Well, I'm just gobsmacked. The teeny-tiny town I grew up in (Pamplin, VA: population 200) has finally developed a few links to the outside world. Yesterday, while reading Serious Eats (one of my favorite foodie blogs) I discovered an old article about Frog Bottom Farm, an organic CSA farm in Pamplin. My reaction ran the gamut between "WTF? In PAMPLIN?!" and "That's so (expletive deleted) cool," and "Why didn't anyone tell ME about this?" I checked out Frog Bottom's website and discovered that although I don't know the owners (they moved down from Northern Virginia), they're the sort of people I want to know. Small, locally-owned, organic CSA farms are exactly what I was searching for all those years I lived in New York, and now here's one in my (former) backyard. What are the odds?
So I did some more Googling and discovered a wealth of local wineries, small organic free-range pig/poultry/lamb/goat farms (here's one), local apiaries, microbreweries, and even more CSA farms. There's a WINERY. In PAMPLIN. (Until about a year ago, Appomattox County was completely dry.) There's even an off-the-grid modern Danish kit house in Pamplin now, complete with solar panels and recycled insulation. The community of food outliers I'd always sought in New York, hanging out in the wilds of Central Virginia.
I was appalled that no one had bothered to tell me of these new developments, so I called my parents and asked them why they hadn't told me. "Well, you don't live here anymore," my mom helpfully pointed out. Apparently these small farms are struggling--the locals are notoriously wary of outsiders, and an organic CSA farm will win no favor with them, the vast majority of whom already maintain their own extensive vegetable gardens. In New York, when your options are 1) buy organic from the farmer's market or 2) go to the corner deli and pay $3 for a head of lettuce that's doused in pesticides, shrinkwrapped in plastic, and flown in from Chile, it's no wonder that people are increasingly turning to #1. But out in the country, where people already grow their own vegetables, there's no incentive to pay the premium for "organic" at either the grocery store or the farmer's market. I get that. I'm sure Frog Bottom's customers all come from the bigger cities in Virginia.
But it still warms my heart to see a burgeoning community of people who share my passions about food right in my own hometown. Now I want to locally source the food for the wedding, featuring the local organic veggies and pork and maybe even some local wines/microbrews. I realize I'll be the only person at the wedding that cares. But that's what the locavore movement is about, right? Supporting the farmers around you? I hope these ventures take root and become successful. I'm having pleasant daydreams of living in Appomattox Country again, surrounded by fresh-grown organic fruits and veggies, free-range chickens and pork, local wines and microbrews, sitting on the back porch after a good meal talking about all those things with fellow foodies. And trust me, never ever before this did I ever have a pleasant daydream about living in Appomattox County again. If they manage to conjure up a good cheese store, all hope may be lost for me.
So I did some more Googling and discovered a wealth of local wineries, small organic free-range pig/poultry/lamb/goat farms (here's one), local apiaries, microbreweries, and even more CSA farms. There's a WINERY. In PAMPLIN. (Until about a year ago, Appomattox County was completely dry.) There's even an off-the-grid modern Danish kit house in Pamplin now, complete with solar panels and recycled insulation. The community of food outliers I'd always sought in New York, hanging out in the wilds of Central Virginia.
I was appalled that no one had bothered to tell me of these new developments, so I called my parents and asked them why they hadn't told me. "Well, you don't live here anymore," my mom helpfully pointed out. Apparently these small farms are struggling--the locals are notoriously wary of outsiders, and an organic CSA farm will win no favor with them, the vast majority of whom already maintain their own extensive vegetable gardens. In New York, when your options are 1) buy organic from the farmer's market or 2) go to the corner deli and pay $3 for a head of lettuce that's doused in pesticides, shrinkwrapped in plastic, and flown in from Chile, it's no wonder that people are increasingly turning to #1. But out in the country, where people already grow their own vegetables, there's no incentive to pay the premium for "organic" at either the grocery store or the farmer's market. I get that. I'm sure Frog Bottom's customers all come from the bigger cities in Virginia.
But it still warms my heart to see a burgeoning community of people who share my passions about food right in my own hometown. Now I want to locally source the food for the wedding, featuring the local organic veggies and pork and maybe even some local wines/microbrews. I realize I'll be the only person at the wedding that cares. But that's what the locavore movement is about, right? Supporting the farmers around you? I hope these ventures take root and become successful. I'm having pleasant daydreams of living in Appomattox Country again, surrounded by fresh-grown organic fruits and veggies, free-range chickens and pork, local wines and microbrews, sitting on the back porch after a good meal talking about all those things with fellow foodies. And trust me, never ever before this did I ever have a pleasant daydream about living in Appomattox County again. If they manage to conjure up a good cheese store, all hope may be lost for me.
Monday, February 8, 2010
Finances hurt my brain.
For the past couple of weeks, I've been trying to clean up the household finances. You know, all that grown-up stuff you have to do when you get married: plan a budget. Make a will. Get life insurance. Et cetera. It's proving more difficult than I thought it would be, for various reasons--and most of these reasons are outside my purview, meaning I get to spend a lot of time beating my head against the wall, wondering why the universe keeps throwing up so many stumbling blocks. All these years I thought I was the fiscally irresponsible one--I didn't have kids, or a mortgage, or a car, I had a lot of credit card and student loan debt, I had a fetish for international travel and expensive shoes. Turns out I'm a lot more financially savvy than I thought (debt load aside). I'm hoping that once the combining process is finally complete, then it will just be a matter of maintaining the whole thing--that I won't have to spend every month, in perpetuity, beating my head against the wall.
The first priority, of course, is paying off the debt. I think I'm going to get a second job, waiting tables or something, to help expedite that. If my new stepson is going to live with us, we need a bigger apartment and a second car, and right now we can't afford either one.
The good news is that a dry run of my taxes will yield enough of a return to pay back all the money I owe the IRS. So that's one debt crossed off the list. I guess that's the good part of not making any money--you don't owe any to the government!
Lots of weird dreams last night. I dreamed Pockets was coming after me with a knife, and then I dreamed another close friend of mine was dead, and then the old I'm-being-forced-to-go-back-to-high-school recurring nightmare cropped up. Good times.
The first priority, of course, is paying off the debt. I think I'm going to get a second job, waiting tables or something, to help expedite that. If my new stepson is going to live with us, we need a bigger apartment and a second car, and right now we can't afford either one.
The good news is that a dry run of my taxes will yield enough of a return to pay back all the money I owe the IRS. So that's one debt crossed off the list. I guess that's the good part of not making any money--you don't owe any to the government!
Lots of weird dreams last night. I dreamed Pockets was coming after me with a knife, and then I dreamed another close friend of mine was dead, and then the old I'm-being-forced-to-go-back-to-high-school recurring nightmare cropped up. Good times.
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
I have a job!
That is, a permanent one! My temp job was officially made perm today--the financial firm I've been working for is finally extending an offer. Pro: they're offering more money than I'm currently making as a temp. Plus benefits. Con: that amount is more than $20K less than what I was making in New York, in essentially the exact same position. More con: I could make that NY amount in LA or San Francisco. San Diego's labor force seems to be retardedly underpriced.
But there's not really anything I can do about it--the high-priced jobs don't really exist here and the salary offer they made was firm (non-negotiable; and yes, I asked). So I'm taking it, and breathing a sigh of relief. Now I can go to the dentist, start my 401k back up, and not have to worry about my paycheck disappearing.
(Well, sort of. If this past year has taught me anything, it's that you can't assume anything. So I find it helpful to assume two completely contradictory things at once, i.e., I will have this job for the next year, and, I could lose my job tomorrow. But hopefully not.)
But there's not really anything I can do about it--the high-priced jobs don't really exist here and the salary offer they made was firm (non-negotiable; and yes, I asked). So I'm taking it, and breathing a sigh of relief. Now I can go to the dentist, start my 401k back up, and not have to worry about my paycheck disappearing.
(Well, sort of. If this past year has taught me anything, it's that you can't assume anything. So I find it helpful to assume two completely contradictory things at once, i.e., I will have this job for the next year, and, I could lose my job tomorrow. But hopefully not.)
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