Archive: June 2007

So. It’s been a year. A whole year since I wrote shaky-handed e-mails to a couple of bloggers asking what the heck to name a blog and explaining nervously that I wasn’t sure about writing on the World Wide Web. A handful of ugly templates on a Blogger site and 160 posts later, here I am: I’ve got my own fancy-schmancy domain and functionality that seems wildly luxurious. It’s a little crazy. I’m a little speechless.

Oh, and welcome to the updated site! Yay! A few housekeeping notes:

• Now, I can respond to comments in the comment field, so that others can benefit from knowing what breed of dog JG is hunting, among other important information. Also, I can get back to people without scouring websites for an e-mail address – woo!
• Everything looks its best in the newest version of Firefox, so try updating if anything seems wacky. If you must use Internet Explorer, it’ll be okay, I guess.
• My next project is to update internal links so that they don’t redirect to the old site, but that might take a while.
• I’ve sold a bit of my soul to some hopefully-unobtrusive ad space in the sidebar.

When I wrote my very first post, I posed a series of questions to revisit a year later and see how this whole experience has felt to me. Here we go!

Did I update as regularly as I wanted to? Maybe 3 times a week?
I’m happy to check back to my obsessive spreadsheet tracker and note that, yes, I managed to write with an average of 2.30 days between posts. Of course, the standard deviation is 1.29, so that number probably needs a grain of salt to go with it.

Did anyone read this other than me and JG?
To my surprise, yes! More on that later.

How do I feel about writing in general?
I’m really pleased that I feel much more practiced in writing after having had this blog and I like to think that I write more and better than I had in the past. I was accustomed to building literary-type analyses in college, but this blog has challenged me to view my life through a story-telling lens. I enjoy the quest of showing, not telling, what’s going on in my life, and while I don’t think I do a great job all the time, but I really like having a forum to experiment and try different forms. Starting this site also opened up the opportunity to write for 451 Press and that experience was very constructive in my learning what my style is and how I best operate in writing structured pieces. I never thought I could make a living off of writing, but at least now I know I can have a good time with it.

Have I met anyone new?
Yes! I am always amazed at the interactive comments that funny, thoughtful folks leave on my posts. I went for so long without comments due to my feeling self-conscious about self-promotion that my first comment (thanks, Janet!) was quite the surprise. In a blundering way, I’m trying to say, “Thanks!” For commenting and conversing with me about so many different topics. For encouraging me to do things like join Indie Bloggers or giving me the thumbs-up when I started the job hunt. I may write to exercise myself, but I don’t do it without you in mind, and it means so much to hear that things I’ve written may have touched you or made you laugh. So, thank you.

And, if there is anyone out there who hasn’t said “hi” yet, I would love it if you would. I’m nice, I promise! Hi!

How often did I get writer’s block?
I can’t remember a specific incident, but I definitely started out with a slower rate of posts than where I am now. Although I’d like to keep up a good clip of posting, I don’t like to crank something out for the sake of it, so I’ve become more resigned to times when I’m just too busy. So maybe I’m just lazier, rather than less susceptible to writer’s block.

What’s my favorite part about blogging? Least favorite?
My favorite part of blogging is seeing a line that is exactly how I thought it in my head and actually represents what I intended. It’s an added and wonderful bonus when someone else lets me know that they feel the same way. My least favorite part of blogging is knowing that the only way to grow the site is self-promotion, but the thought of a conscious marketing effort makes me feel weird.

What have I learned?

• The internet makes the world much smaller.
• A blog can supplement a written journal, but shouldn’t replace it.
• I should be grateful that JG is such a willing subject of my posts. I am, by the way.

Am I looking back at these questions and thinking, “I can’t believe I thought that was a good idea…”?
Not at all! It’s interesting to me to look back at what I thought I might do or not do. After a year, I still enjoy keeping up with writing, I’ve made friends, and I’m going strong. Year #2 is looking pretty good, don’t you think?

I have to go to New York for the day tomorrow to visit a company for work, which means that my normal uniform of jeans and flip-flops isn’t going to cut it. I test-drove a few outfits and settled on a pin-striped dress and red sweater, but I realized sadly that my black heels had seen better days. They were a bargain $20 pair I picked up when I first started working about three years ago and they showed their age and, uh, bargain quality. Glancing at the clock, I assessed the damage. I couldn’t fix the ground-out heel, but the scuffs could be fixed with some polish. I rooted around for the can of black and laid out paper towels on the kitchen counter for a workspace.

As soon as I dabbed into the can of shoe polish, the pungent, waxy smell brought me back to my parents’ kitchen, where my dad would polish his shoes every so often. He had one of those carrier boxes with a handle down the middle to divide it into two sections. On one side, there would be saddle soap, black and brown polish, and a squirt bottle of water. On the other side, he stored clean, soft cloths and a soft-bristled brush for buffing. I viewed that shoe polish box as somewhat of a sacred relic because it was strictly off-limits for touching. I imagine that my parents were afraid that I’d accidentally get into the polish and start fingerprinting the house, which would not have been a stretch. Instead, I’d perch on a stool and watch Dad magically restore his shoes back to an even sheen.

Dad was and is really fastidious about certain things and shoe polishing was one of them. His left hand slid down into the toe of the shoe and his right hand skimmed the outside quickly and carefully. He applied the polish in tiny, round strokes, using the least amount of polish as possible to cover an area. Tilting the shoe this way and that, Dad checked to make sure that he hadn’t missed any spots; when he was satisfied, he laid the shoe down carefully and started on the mate as the first dried. My favorite step was buffing. The brush would fwip-fwip across the shoe, exposing a shiny, like-new surface. I sat, transfixed.

With that fwip-fwip sound echoing in my head, I finished shining my heels. They emerged somewhat battered, but much improved and it only took a little time and a dab of polish. And some magic, I think.

As the first order of business for his first day of summer vacation, JG made an appointment to switch from cable to satellite service in order to get high-definition service all the time instead of hoping for good weather and adjusting a giant antenna on our entertainment unit. Even though I was ecstatic about letting go of a bug-like presence in our living room, I pled to make sure that the dish wasn’t visible from the street, if at all possible.

JG called me at work to report on the progress:

JG: So, I just wanted to update you on what’s going on over here.
RA: Okay, cool.
JG: The guy came and had a look around. He climbed on the roof and stuff, but he feels like we have too many trees to put the dish on the roof.
RA: Oh.
JG: The only way he could do it was to put up an 8-foot pole in the middle of our yard. So, of course, I said, “Absolutely!”
RA: (sharp intake of breath)
JG: Hello?
RA: I suggest that we don’t joke about this.
JG: (quickly) Oh, sorry, joke over. I didn’t agree to it. We’re sticking with cable.
RA: Okay. No antenna on the TV?
JG: No antenna.
RA: Thank you.

Jokes are fine every once in a while, but if I was concerned about a little satellite dish on our roof, a pole sticking out of our yard is no laughing matter! Geez.

Saturday really made me feel like I got a weekend. Sometimes, the two days are packed full of chores and bustle so I don’t feel a significant difference between Sunday’s rest and Monday’s routine.

When I think back, it’s not that JG and I did anything spectacular; we just did a few things with the right mixture of activity and rest. The morning was free and lazy. We drifted around in our pajamas, watched The Soup and Best Week Ever, and caught breakfast when we felt like it. JG mowed the lawn before we left to meet a friend at the climbing gym that afternoon and I was intent on recovering from my less-than-stellar workout on Tuesday. Let’s just say that the ratio of falling to climbing was so high as to inspire the term “high-gravity night.” Apparently, gravity had lessened its hold because I finished two long-standing projects and we all had a much improved day of climbing.

Later that evening, JG and I sat at a laminate table in a local Italian restaurant, one of those neighborhood joints with vinyl seats, metal pizza-pan holders on each table, and gigantic menus. After sharing an order of fried mushrooms (every restaurant in Kennett Square has them and they’re always good), we settled into our respective entrees: vegetable primavera for me and a cheese steak Stromboli for him. Quiet fell over the table – the sound of people simply not talking because they were busy enjoying their food.

“Today was a really good day,” I said slowly, breaking the silence.

JG nodded. “Yeah. I feel like we got a lot done, but it wasn’t rushed or anything.”

I nodded along. I had a serene feeling that I was in exactly the right place with exactly the right person. I wanted to wrap up the sensation and save it for another day.

JG continued, “I don’t know what could make this day any better. Except maybe a doggie…”

Ah, yes. JG’s campaign to add a furry friend to our home has not gone unnoticed. I have started to run out of excuses as to why we aren’t ready to accommodate a dog and our friends have gone out of their way to show me their dogs’ most favorable sides. The fact that JG’s concession of naming privileges represented a considerable bargaining chip is not lost on me. It’s a clear indicator that JG’s picture of happiness is incomplete without a dog curled up at his feet.

In other words, we’re getting a dog.

(JG is doing a happy shimmy in the background.)

Today is JG’s last day of the school year. Tomorrow, he will start to apply to shelters, propose dogs from PetFinder, and research electric fences. That serene feeling I wish I had saved is no longer with me. I’m three-quarters through Marley & Me: Life and Love with the World’s Worst Dog, so visions of chewed furniture, soiled carpet, and a backyard full of land mines dance through my head. I’m trying to distract myself by finding really good name candidates. After all the negotiation and discussion we’ve had, maybe we should be frank and name the dog Compromise.