It's okay, I think the joke's on me (or how I received e-mail from a creep) By Catherine on 9/29/2007 11:22:00 PM
I am an oxymoron, and those who know me personally are acutely aware of it.What I mean is, I'm an introverted-extrovert. I love blogging, hate bars. I love dinner parties, hate frat parties. I'm addicted to the internet, but no, I do not want to meet up. Ever. The first night I met her, I was told by my dear friend's significant other that I am "too nice." But then I drank wine and went on a sarcastic tirade. I am guardedly-open (sans shiraz). I am an oxymoron.
The point is, I am stepping outside the Catherine-bubble and doing my first real poetry reading tomorrow evening. I selected three decent poems, and I am gonna do it. It's ten minutes of my life, and if I don't try it now I might not get the chance again. I picked two quite light-hearted pieces and a more serious one, but my market is children. And that's what y'all are gonna get. I'm rather proud, because I never used to have sage fright (there's pictures somewhere of me as Meg from Damn Yankees and as a stripper in Guys and Dolls-- no, not appearing on Flickr) but now, I'm nervous.
My first attempt at overstepping my comfort-line was to join the French-speakers MeetUp in my area, but that didn't go so well. I'll admit, I joined in a moment of weakness. I was feeling lonely, having just moved to these God-forsaken suburbs from Amherst, which is a kind of lasting intellectual fairytale in my mind. I majored in French, and specialize now in Language Arts in my classroom. I loves me the Frenchies. (And Africa, but, hello, another post for another day! Oh, how I wish Joseph Conrad were alive and writing...) DIGRESSION. See the pattern? ADD!
I joined the French MeetUp in my most pathetic moment, and then I blew them off. I just. Never. Went. The first few were house parties and brunches, and I could always find a reason to be busy. Until The Creep e-mailed me.
The Creep blindsided me on a weeknight, a few days before the monthly brunch at Panera, demanding WHY hadn't I come to any meetings and didn't I know that the organizer pays $75 per year to the site?! (interrobang! ADD.) I almost didn't dignify him with a response, but I'd be lying if I told you I was that mature. My reply was the e-mail equivalent of the bird, cause, who monitors that shit? And who cares?
Apparently MeetUp.com is the same thing as EngagedtoBeMarried.com. I was not aware. But The Creep didn't care though, and he obviously didn't get it, because he proceeded to reciprocate with how lonely he was and did I want to call him? His number is 1-800-BEGGIN-4-LUV. Three pages worth of this garbage. I wish I was kidding, but I'm not. The only thing that stopped me from posting the whole sordid affair was the fact that gmail deletes Trash mail after 30 days, and this happened in June. And I realized that my bubble is safe. From creeps.
Of course, that didn't exactly make me want to start going. In fact, it had the opposite effect, and made me think that I was not, and will never be that lonely. But again with the digression.
I decided not to venture out again, at least until this current opportunity popped up. This seems somewhat less... Full of foreboding, unlike the last one. I can read three poems, and if I totally embarrass myself then whatever, cause I just disproved my own hermit-ness. And I don't have to see them ever again. And I can adopt a pseudonym when I publish my bestselling book.
And I can rationalize anything. Thanks, Mr. Creep, you're my hero.
Check out:
MeetUp.com
Labels: creeps, I have ADD, interrobang, joseph conrad, librivox, meetup, NEWS series, poetry, STRESSSTRESSSTRESS, writing
Simplicity Month, or How Saturday Didn't Go Like I Planned, but That's OK Too. By Catherine on 9/24/2007 09:21:00 AM
So Saturday was not the day of heavy lifting and de-messing that I anticipated, but truthfully we got a frigging TON done. You should see the closet. You wouldn't even think it belonged to me. And now some lucky Sal-Val shopper will get a bunch of too-sexy-for-work shirts and a few pairs of stripper-esque high heels. Also Carol gave me 2 new white shirts that she decided weren't for her, which, hello awesome timing, cause I definitely threw out a bunch of stained and yucky white stuff. Some of my wackier items went to Cha-Cha, the only girl I know wackier than me (and with an awesome body to show off). She got the France shirt, a strappy shoulderless number with silver chain (oh yes, you know you always wanted to see me in nylon and chain-maille.) I think my club days are over... Though, they only ever existed at Diva's, because I can't dance unless it's with other girls and gay men. Sometimes I get the feeling my life is going to end up like an episode of Will and Grace. But I digress, shockingly enough.So, the clothes/closet/laundry, that got done. And the tupperware, and pots and pans, and Really Deep Cabinet. And I made a pile for dry cleaning, yay more bills. Zach came over to help, and he made off like a bandit with some of Adam's old clothes, and funny enough, a tupperware lid that HAD A MATCH. He said he was going to make a mask out of it... I hope it's worth it, cause otherwise his mask will be coming back to live at my house and cover the chili. Like, you know, tupperware lids are supposed to. I'll make room in the fridge if he's grown attached. I keep digressing, I really have no right to be a SpEd teacher with this untreated ADD.
All in all, I really wanted to make this purge an exercise in simplicity, because humans have no right to consume consume consume the way we do. In an ideal world, I'll eventually have a lucrative book contract and money to spare, so I'll be able to have a little eco-compound and spend my days as a prolific hermit. EcoStreet actually has a great blog post that gets right to the heart of what I mean by eco-compound, but until then, small things like recycling bottles and cans, composting food waste (can't do that at my house, grrrr landlord), keeping the heat/lights/AC off, going paper-free for bills and news, etc... There are infinite options to use LESS, waste LESS, and I'm trying very hard to live simply and be conscious of those things. There have been times in my life when I've given into the hopeless materialism that seems so pervasive in my generation, but I realize quickly that none of that makes me happy or has any lasting value. I don't condemn those who do live like that, because I am all about doing whatever the hell you want, as long as you don't bug me. I don't care if you sew your clothes by hand from hemp and burlap or buy everything at Louis Vuitton, drive a Prius or an H3, but collectively we need to make some concessions and realizations, because the destruction is visible on a daily basis. It's not the actions of any one individual that creates the crisis, but rather the collected actions of many, intensified by the pure, unadulterated love of STUFF that has completely permeated American society.
And it feels like it came on pretty fast-- correct me if I'm wrong, but after 9/11, there was a huge campaign to "keep the economy growing" by buying sundries and luxury items, as a kind of eff you to the terr'sts. I was 17 on 9/11, and completely unaware of the consequences it had on our economy. Maybe the mentality is left over from the 80s and 90s, when the upswing and the boom and the balanced budget made us forget our simple roots. But, as I grow older, I discover that the simpler my life is, the better I feel. Processed foods, plastic EVERYTHING, bling-- I don't need it and neither does anyone else, for that matter. So, the call, from Pavots Rouges-- donate your stuff. I am officially naming September "Simplicity Month." Take a step back, do some yoga, and reflect on what's actually important to you. You might be surprised what you find; I know I was.
For more, check out these links:
Friends of the Earth
EcoStreet
Environmental Health News
De-Cluttering: Advice Needed OR, My Titles for Everything are Far. Too. Long. By Catherine on 9/18/2007 11:10:00 AM
Something that has been on my mind a lot lately is the amount of clutter I've accumulated in the past six or so years. It seems like every Christmas gift, every birthday present, every token, in general, was the transportable throwaway type, which never, in actuality, gets thrown away. When you live in a dorm room 9 months out of the year, you're not likely to accumulate useful things like standing lamps and matching bedroom furniture, you're far more likely to receive things like teddy bears, shower caddies, and teeny tiny tables-- like 4 of them. Example: I recently got rid of a lamp I got for $10 at Linens and Things before my freshman year at UMass-- about a year after the base broke and it stood at a foolish angle. But I don't have another lamp!In the past two years, in light of The Real World, I've received many useful, lovely, and thoughtful gifts (like my gorgeous kitchen table, pots and pans, and a Pyrex set) but on top of things that have little or no use, those things become enmeshed in the rest of the clutter, making it much much harder for me to make actual use of them. I'm still in college-mode: I am more likely to buy three small things at Target than wait a few weeks and get one quality item at Pier One. Same with clothes: you're much more likely to see me drop $50 on 10 things at Wal-Mart than $50 on a nice pair of pants from J. Crew. But you'll still hear me complain when the crappy stuff falls apart and looks awful.
This weekend marks The Great Cleanup of 2007. So far, I've got a huge list of what needs to be done, and I'm daunted by the task. I'd like to ask for help, but I think-- no I know-- that I'll be a big ball of stress while doing it and freak everyone out. Luckily, my town trash collection takes pretty much everything, aside from appliances which might contain CFCs, like refrigerators, so I don't need to worry too much about getting rid of everything.
I can already feel how emotional this is going to be. I hate throwing things out, and I feel an intense connection to a lot of my stuff, almost unhealthily so. I know I'll never wear that see-through nylon shirt with the shoulder-holes, but I got it in France. I know I'll likely never again be a size 4 and should donate my suit, but I can't. I don't need to keep all those tupperware lids, as their mates were lost long ago. I mean, it took me 5 years to throw out a box full of notes from The Almost in high school... I didn't even open it, I just threw the whole thing in the trash, because I knew if I looked I'd keep it.
So, I'm gonna share my list and hope that people comment on what makes de-cluttering easier for them. I got some hot tips from Martha Stewart and Unclutterer.com-- please feel free to leave tips, advice, moral support... And if you're in the neighborhood, stop by and help! Adam and I will totally need it. :)
The List of Incredibly Daunting Future Cleanliness-Inspiring Weekend Cleanup 2007
- Get rid of the broken bureaus and non-functioning bookshelf.
- Get rid of duplicate pots and pans.
- Mate the tupperware and scrap the halvsies.
- Throw out old kitchen utensils and donate multiples of such. We don't need 4 potato peelers and 6 salt shakers.
- Put stuff we don't use often in the big cabinet over the fridge, known at home as "The Big Deep Cabinet of Catherine Can't Reach Anything."
- Donate all non-fitting, non-stylish, non-worn clothes to the Salvation Army.
- Shred all the accumulated mail (I will take a picture and post the truly scary amount there is.)
- Throw out all "art supplies" that aren't actually art supplies but rather stuff I've packratted because I think it will look cool if I someday, maybe, decoupage it. This includes wine bottles, tins, poster tubes, and all other manner of crap. Also deserving of a photo.
- Throw out stupid-looking knickknacks and burned down candles.
- Throw out all the crap from when we moved that we didn't know what to do with and stashed in the back room.
- Stash stuff we DO need but need to pack away in the back room: Christmas ornaments/tree stand, extra china. Using the back room for storage? NOVEL.
- Get rid of all manner of extra toiletries. My family thinks I smell bad or something, because every Christmas I get a basket full of bathroom crap in scents like Lover's Musk and Cloying Magnolia and Underage Stripper's Delight. I'll stick with my No. 5, thanks.
- Get Adam to throw out HIS crap. This list mostly applies to what is mine or shared.
Advice? Please?
Labels: cleanup, clutter, STRESSSTRESSSTRESS
Weekly writing update By Catherine on 9/12/2007 10:46:00 AM
So, for the first time in forever, I'm feeling pretty prolific. I've got two short-stories, several poems, and of course the novel-- all a work in progress, but the point is, I'm actually making progress, which is the most important part. I'm lucky to have two fantastic poets to help me critique and improve; I'm probably annoying them with the deluge of insecure half-poems I keep sending out. Plus there's the imminent possibility that Solvo will finally get something concrete completed, so I can start with the marketingTalking with Amanda on gchat the other day, we both agreed that there's really too much pressure to publish. Please don't take it as sour grapes, because for those writers who are in a place where publishing is a possibility, that's fantastic. I understand the desire, because I want to publish too, but I don't want to publish what's not of a caliber I think is good enough. I'd rather wait ten years and work my fingers to the callused bone, writing and rewriting and scrapping every other poem than to publish too early and gain a reputation as mediocre before I've come to understand my own style enough to make it say what I want.
So, I'll sit here in my classroom, typing in my blog instead of eating lunch, and working on poems that aren't so mediocre. I can only hope the NYT Book Review might be kinder to my modest tome than to Nabokov on his first attempt. But then, it's not very modest to put oneself in his category, so scratch that, too.
Labels: publishing, writing
An Evening About the House: Part I By Catherine on 9/09/2007 08:20:00 PM
Hello, internet, how've you been? It was a Very Exciting Day today, because I have two rescue missions on my plate. The first saddens me to no minor degree-- the cats killed my orchid. I treated it like a queen and it responded in kind, until I discovered this morning that Ray and Dixie took down the curtain nearest to the pot and knocked off the remaining blossoms.That brings me to to my first mission: Revive the orchid. I read somewhere that after the blossoms are gone from an orchid stalk, you cut it back down and it will then grow another. I'm not taking any chances though, and plan to acquire a book on the subject ASAP, some orchid potting soil (as it really should be replanted in a larger pot, damn decorative florist jobs that look larger than they are...), and whatever mineral mix for food one is supposed to use to make sure it stays healthy. If I am serious about it, that means keeping a thermometer inside so that I can turn on the heat if it gets below 60ish degrees... But let's see if I can make it start growing first. This will have to wait until later in the week.
The second mission was much easier, and I did the whole thing tonight, complete with photojournal. The story begins with a neglected potted palm plant from Ikea, many many moons ago. He's a sturdy young man, but I daresay my neglect thus far in his adolescence has severely stunted his growth. For just about six months now, my little tropical-looking friend has lived in the same teeny, flimsy pot and dry, un-nutritious soil from Sweden, or wherever it was shipped from. So today, Adam and I went to the 9th Circle of Hell and bought the materials with which to save the tree. Now it has a huge pot, with a bunch of room to grow. Only problem now is finding an unobtrusive spot for the thing.
These two missions will require a bit of learning and concentration, so I'm excited to start, especially on my beautiful orchid. The little bit of research I've done so far shows signs that my plant is growing a keiki, or baby plant. My orchid shows signs of the root system developing independently of the rest of the plant, or beginning to at least. If that's the case, after awhile I can cut it away and replant it in a pot by itself.
Orchids are definitely a worthy hobby. This is all part of a new plan to occupy my whole afternoon each day productively, in order to cut out TV and procrastination. Tomorrow I'll bring gym clothes to work and change after the bell, and go work out in the center of town. Then, hitting the library for some orchid research and a good novel. It will be good to start.
One more thing about the palm tree. I have named him Sal Paradise. And when he gets big enough, I'll sit under him.
Namaste, suckas.