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Momentary Thought
Thanks to everyone who responded about whether or not I should keep Storyteller going. I think I will, but change the format a bit so the writing is freeform for those who like the freedom, and topic-centric for those who like structure. We shall see how that goes, yes?
High/Low
High: It's been so long since I've listened to the MP3's on my hard drive at work that it seems like they're all new again. Whee!
Low: Having to be at work, while Calvin plays hookey at home.
Current Obsession
Finding stuff to do during my sister's visit.
Grin Source
Jon Bon Jovi on Ally McBeal. There may be hope for the show yet.
Singing
I just can't get you outta my head
For your love is all I think about
Kylie Minogue - Can't Get You Outta My Head
A Year Ago
More or less
I fall for Tom Selleck.
Storyteller
Bio
Dramatis Personnae
Who I Read
Recipes
"Let's pretend we're trapeze artists in a circus." Any nearby pets became circus animals. The swing set became the trapeze. The sandbox became the center ring. One person "called" ringmaster, and orchestrated the rest of the kids. The poor patient dog was the elephant, horse, or tamed lion, depending on the act.
Other "let's pretend"s found this same intrepid group of children as spies, or cowboys and indians, or cops and robbers. And when all other imaginations were exhausted, the continued fascination with everything adult surfaced, and everyone was relegated to playing "House".
"I'll be the mom who stays home and takes care of the children, and you be the husband who works all day and comes home for dinner." Or, for the more suffregate-minded; "I'll be the wife who works all day in the law office, and you be the husband who stays at home with the kids." Mock-quarrels were enacted. Fussy children were reprimanded. Mud-pie dinners were served. Little girls dressed in their mother's cast-aside sun dresses and worn out pumps a hundred sizes too large. Little boys lugged around battered briefcases and made play pipes out of straws. The sandbox was now the children's playpen. The swing set was the trusty station wagon.
Almost every person knows what Playing House means. We all did it. We were all fascinated with that grown-up world. Nobody telling you what to do. Issuing orders to your own kids. Dressing up and looking important and going to work.
And now here I am, a full-fledged grown up, and I sometimes still feel like I'm playing house. My mom is going to call me to come home for dinner any minute, now.
Nobody told us, back then, what "Playing House" really means. The grown-ups just smiled at our blythe interpretation, and said to themselves, "Someday they'll know the truth of it."
They didn't tell us that having kids meant having a lot of worry.
They didn't tell us that owning a house meant paying a lot of bills.
They didn't say that going to work every day meant having a lot of stress.
They didn't fill us in on all of these things - or if they did, we weren't listening. Otherwise, we would have protested our maturity as it crept up on us. We would have put off wearing make-up and getting our licenses. We would have dreaded moving out of our parents' house, instead of it being the pinnacle of our goals.
So with the weight of these thwarted expectations, such a newfound surprise to all of us fledgling adults, we overlooked the good stuff that also comes with "playing house". Until there's a break, a breath, a moment where we can stand back and realize that this, this is all that we were assuming life would be, back when we were kids. The freedom that comes with the effective exercising of our responsibilities. The ability to rely on a good partner to support us through the tough spots. The pleasure whose foundation rests on the peaceful, loving home we come back to at the end of the day. The very creation of that home, and the satisfaction of knowing "I did this. All. By. My. Self."
I've been standing back quite a bit lately, and looking around me, and declaring life "good". Sure, sometimes I whine that I don't want to be grown up anymore - I want someone to tell me when bedtime is, and eat my peas, and do my homework. I certainly don't want to get up and go to work every morning. But things are running smoothly, and if the job I do is what enables me to have the life I have, than so be it. I can suck it up and do what needs to be done. Certainly there is no option to call it quits and state "I'm taking my ball and my bat and going home. Nyah."
This kind of Playing House doesn't end when the sun goes down and we're called to dinner.
********************
My weekend was full of moments where I stood back and took a look around me. Saturday morning Calvin and I got up early and went to the spa dealership to get the exact dimensions on what we're putting in our back yard. We went for brunch afterward, and I found myself staring at Calvin like I'd never seen him before. The way he talks and gestures, the way his mind works, and the intelligence he displays. I had a brief flash of wondering what my life would have been like if he and I hadn't met. To be sure, there were so many forks in the road, in his life and in mine, that it's got to be sheer divine intervention that we met at all. My relationship with him has taken on such a flavor of "pre-destined" and "meant to be" that I'm a firm believer in soul-mates.
I ended up sitting there at brunch, grinning like a damn fool at him, and he thinking I must surely have lost my mind. Sometimes my great good fortune strikes me like that.
Later, we had the measuring tape out and were discussing the layout of things in the back yard. I've lived in the house for seven years, and the sheer amount of changes that have physically occurred to the place are staggering. I've always bemoaned the lack of a yard that I can *sit* in and *entertain* in and *spend time* in, and here I am about to have it. After seven years, and me feeling like I live in a cubicle as well as work in one, for all that time. It staggered me, to think that something I've wanted for so long is happening right now.
AB and Mark came over for dinner on Saturday night. Mark had caught an obscene amount of bass earlier in the week and was in the process of frying it up in bite-sized nuggets. AB was cutting up potatoes for home-made french fries, and Calvin was seasoning steaks for the grill. I was occupied in cutting up veggies (from AB and Mark's garden!) for a salad. Music was playing in the background, and AB's daughter was playing around with the dart board (Marie had gone to the movies with friends). We were all laughing and conversing and enjoying each other's company, and I had a very clear feeling, looking around at everything and everyone, of "this is what it's all about". Good friends, good food, good conversation, good music.
The sweetest memories of all, though, tend to be the simplest. Sunday, after a morning bubble bath and an afternoon of doing various household chores, Calvin and I snuggled up on the couch together. Marie had gone to a hockey game, so it was just he and I in the house. He laid on one end of the couch with his feet in my lap, watching TV. I was curled up on the other end, reading a book and tickling his feet. I watched his eyes get heavier and heavier until he was asleep, and I turned off the TV. The house got darker as evening set in, and I turned on the small lamp next to the couch. The house was silent but for the sound of Calvin's quiet breathing and the turning pages of my book, and dark except for that one well of light.
And later, in bed, laughing in the dark over some foolish thing. Laughing until tears came to our eyes and our sides hurt. Then curling up with one another and falling alseep, heads together and legs entwined.
Ahhh... Playing House in real live is infinitely better than "let's pretend".