Not So Busy

While I love the onset of autumn, I dread the approach of fall. The one is a season of crisp weather, crunchy leaves, apple picking and pumpkin lattes. The other is the return of Life in full force...with all its tight schedules, deadlines, and demands.

I updated my weekly calendar this morning, and ever since I've been battling the temptation to crawl under my desk and hide my head under my cardigan. Leaving aside my full time job, there are the five high school seniors who will be wanting my attention to their English, Religion, and Government papers, as well as monthly half-hour phone calls; the CCD class JM and I will be leading; the youth group I've promised to help out with at least once a week on Wednesday nights; the piano students on Saturday mornings; the women's Bible study I finally (and I think rightly...but time will tell) signed up for; the women's singing group I'm trying to organize on a monthly basis; and the writing exercises I have set for myself as a kind of challenge. The complaint never changes, and it seems to grow a little louder and more panicked each year: "I'm so busy."

We're all so busy. But here I make myself accountable, oh readers: there are some good, leisurely things I intend to do this school year, despite the fullness of my calendar. Like apple picking one Saturday morning in October...at least a little bit of hiking (or a long bike ride) one weekend afternoon in November...an afternoon of making and sending Christmas cards in early December...and now and again spending quality time with good friends, either enjoying dinner at my apartment or meeting up somewhere in town for coffee and good conversation. I'm not so busy that I can't spend quality time doing simple, fun things with the people I like best. And if I get to that point of being busy, then I'll have to make some serious cuts in my calendar of commitments.

So friends, I promise: no complaints of being "so busy." I'm busy enough to keep on my toes, and just "un-busy" enough to snatch a few precious moments of leisure to spend just as I like. I refuse to spend the next seven months running with such frenzied haste that I forget to stop and enjoy the moment.

Here's to the coming autumn. Here's to (*gulp*) the coming fall.

This Is A Fun Thing To Do.

Attention Everyone:

Ask Mary Beth how she feels about the metro system in Washington, D.C.

This will stimulate conversation for the next eight minutes and forty-four seconds.

This is especially useful if she is at a boring party with you and you want to promote discussion among the guests.

The effects of this conversation on the recipient may vary. Side effects include, but are not limited to: acquiring knowledge of the union and union members, increased/decreased appreciation for the union and union members, annoyance, anger, boredom, and genuine interest. *

*1% of recipients have experienced true happiness, though whether this symptom is a result of this conversation remains unconfirmed.

If anger persists 24 hours after the discussion, contact your physician.

This is safe for pregnant women and women who are breastfeeding.

"To thine own self be true."

It's time for a new post. It's time to write about something pithy and relavant. It's time to write about anger.



Yes, anger. That gut-boiling, rousing, unavoidable (if you're living in this city, anyway) emotion. I remember as a kid I used to get angry all the time. My siblings made me angry. Banging my toe or my elbow against hard objects made me angry. Bullies made me angry, especially when they made my sisters cry. I responded to these situations with indignation, with raised voice and that funny adrenaline rush that starts in the pit of your stomach. I felt, in all these situations, that I had the right to be angry, and so I threw myself into the emotion whole-heartedly, arms swinging, ready to stand by my conviction of rectitude or die in the fight.



And then I got to adolescence and the early, painful lessons of sociability and not always being justified in your anger. I learned that there are, indeed, two sides to every argument, and it's not always the case that one side is 100% right while the other is 100% wrong. In fact, that's almost never the case. So I started to question, and eventually to swallow, my anger, because I realized it wasn't always as just as I liked to suppose. By the time I graduated from college, I was a full-blown pacifist. Now, as a young professional, I'll give up almost any argument for the sake of maintaining peace and avoiding raised voices. I'm never confident that my position is 100% right. And as soon as the other person presents an argument with even the slightest bit of relavance, my confidence level drops and drops, until I'm almost completely sure that his side is the right one, and I just need to get over my own opinion. So I shut up and back off--but this doesn't mean that I'm not still angry.



It just means I'm constantly angry, like a pot with the lid on, and the water simmering but never going anwhere.

Day after day, I let people argue me into submission. I let people dictate my opinions and reactions to things, because I hate confrontation, because I'd rather avoid raised voices and sitting at home at the end of a long day, fully aware that so-and-so is angry with me. Because I want, more than anything else, to be liked. Even more absurd, I want to be liked even by people I don't like.

So coworkers tell me how to do my job, even after two years, and instead of smiling and letting them know--as kindly as possible, of course--that I've got it under control, I apologize and conform. Strangers on the metro or in line at the grocery store shove and glower, despite all my best efforts to stay out of their way, despite my (I hope) friendly smiles. Hardest of all are the people I do know. I have recently discovered that I cannot be everyone's friend. Nor do I wish to be. In fact, there are certain people I would love to "show the door" in my life in a very concrete way, but I'm afraid to do so. Why? Because those people would dislike me, and I don't know if I could stand that.

I've ran smack up against the real world, and I'm learning that here you have to fight for your place, or you'll get bowled over. And I don't mean this in a "survival of the fittest" sort of way, either. I just mean that you truly have to be vigiliant and firm, or you run the risk of losing your foothold in your own life. You have to work, day after day, to carve out a space for yourself in your own life. Otherwise you run the risk of letting everyone around you dictate your activities, your schedule, and your opinions--even (and most insidiously) your opinions about yourself.

Maybe I'm still an okay person, even if so-and-so is mad at me.

Maybe it's more honest to quietly excuse people from my life than to allow this anger to simmer against them day after day, until I can't say a kind word or think a kind thought about them, and my every word to them is a veiled insult or a snide comment.

And maybe, when it comes right down to it, the most important thing really is to be true to yourself. Without forgetting others and their needs, without threatening the space to which others cling so tenuously in their own lives, without breaking the prescriptions of Christian charity, maybe the old cliche has it right. Because, in the end, if you can't be true to yourself--who can you be true to?

A Happy Ending

My mother sent me a brand new pair of leather gloves to replace the lost ones! Hooray! Thanks, Mom.

An apology

Realizing that my last three (!!) posts have been on issues romantic, I promise that my next post will be all about our amazing little apartment. I just want to have some photographs to share first. And possibly a sofa...

Self-Discovery in Its Many Awkward Forms

This past weekend was one of those weekends of self-revelation. I spent a good portion of it by myself--almost always a recipe for disaster in terms of self-discovery--and I had to giggle at the lesson in my own personality which I took away from those forty-eight hours: I do not respond well to pick-up lines.

It's not that random friendly attempts at conversation from men I don't know set me on edge. Believe it or not, I don't unleash streams of vitriol at the men who come at me with their somewhat awkward, always unsolicited overtures of interest. To be honest, I don't even (in general) find them all that annoying. Perhaps because they're so new to me, I'm still rather touched by the notice when it occurs. (And it doesn't often.) The trouble is, I just don't know what to do with it.

Now maybe this comes about as the logical result of living my teenage years (you know, "sweet 16" and all that, when most girls are learning the gentle arts of...well...being girls) secure in the conviction that I would be a nun, and that I could therefore leave all that ridiculous "girl stuff" to my friends and sisters. As a college student I'd come through that conviction well enough, but I'm afraid I'd missed something on the old boy front. Men? What the heck are those? That's been my typical response to all things of the "boy-girl-girl-boy" variety for pretty much my entire young adult life. It's only in very recent years that I've even stumbled across some semblence of a sense of fashion, for goodness' sake.

Whatever the reason(s), the sad truth remains that when I'm faced now with masculine interest of just about any variety (except, "Hey lady, you're in my way" or "Hey baby," to both of which I respond without hesitation or difficulty, and always appropriately), I simply do not know how to react. And so, in typical Mary Beth fashion, as a rule I just don't act. I put on my kindest, most distant smile, respond with as few words as are civilly permissible, and withdraw.

And think of all the clever, open, engaging things I should have said later.

Saturday morning gave me my first glimmer of this truth about myself. I had several hours free to grade some MODG student work before my one piano lesson for the day, so I betook myself to Panera where I indulged in a breakfast sandwich and a cup of tea as I read 12th grade Government papers. I had a seat next to a window overlooking their outdoor seating area, and occasionally I'd glance up and watch people go by. At one point, a youngish man took a seat at one of the outdoor tables with a mug of coffee and a copy of In Conversation with God. I thought, "Hmm, that's a neat idea. Bring your spiritual reading to Panera." And I went back to grading. After a few minutes I guess he decided it was too cold outside for reflection, because he got up and brought his beverage and his reading materials into the restaurant, making a beeline for the booth that was right behind my table. I glanced up, caught his eye (not on purpose, lest you get the wrong idea, oh readers), and smiled a polite and (I hoped) distant smile. He walked past, and then I heard a distracted, very apologetic, "I'm sorry" at my elbow.

I turned. He had set his books down and was now looking at me with an almost sad expression on his face. "Sorry?" I thought. "Good gracious, for what?" But all I said was, "Excuse me?"

"I love your miraculous medal," he replied.

(The first thought that flashed through my mind was: email forward--"Did you feel what I felt when we dipped our hands in the holy water together?" And it was all I could do to keep from bursting out laughing.)

And I said: "Oh, thanks," and went back to grading.

"The young man went away sad"... or relieved...or both.

And then Sunday. I drove out to Reston to see Katie and Sam and Katie's family at her parents' house. I went out early and stopped at Reston Town Center (for reasons which I am not at liberty to divulge, but they involved a particular party's birthday). Having an hour to kill after my errands were finished, I stopped in at Starbucks, purchased a brownie (to celebrate Sunday) and a coffee, and sat down to read a bit of the novel I'm currenty working through, F. Scott Fitzgerald's Tender Is the Night. I settled myself in the quietest corner of the very busy coffee shop, near an older man who was filing taxes and a youngish (I say "ish" because, while I'm relatively certain he couldn't have been a day over 35, his hair was almost entirely gray. But he wasn't bad looking at all...not that I noticed, of course) man doing work of some variety on a lap top.

I read without interruption for a good twenty minutes. It was beautiful. Reading Fitzgerald is like having a love affair with the English language. And then It Happened. The youngish fellow stopped his work and stretched and looked at his watch, and almost simultaneously with a very large and (I'm sure) gratifying yawn asked, "How's Fitzgerald treating you?" I had the initial impression that his question was directed at the wall above my head, so I almost didn't reply. Then I realized the guy was grinning at me.

So I put on my best closed-face, "I'm sure you're very nice, but I don't know you from Adam and I definitely don't know what to say to you" smile and replied, "Good. I love it."

"Well, I have a dictionary in here," he picked up a blackberry from the table and waved it in the air, "if you need it. Fitzgerald was one of the most pedantic authors of all time." Given my love of Fitzgerald's crafting of the English language, I can't quite agree with that description. I did, however, have to admire a guy who uses the word "pedantic" in normal conversation. Not sure what to say, I nodded and said, "Thanks! Hey, that's why I read him."

And returned to reading. Conversation: dead in the water. Five minutes later I gathered my things and left.

This does not bode well for my future life, does it?

Memoirs of a Miser

Here is a sad story.

Mary Beth discouraged me from sharing this story. It is so sad that it makes her feel, as she put it, "sick." I suspect what she experiences is that heart-dropping-into-your-stomach feeling you get when you are reminded of something massively unpleasant. I know because I get the same feeling sometimes. It is a very sad story.

One day in early December I went out to buy a pair of leather gloves. My objective was leather gloves and leather gloves only. I had never owned a pair of sturdy leather gloves and, being that my hands are almost always cold, especially in December when the rest of me is almost always cold along with them, having to shove my hands in my pockets every time I ventured outdoors was putting said gloves constantly in the front of my thoughts.

When I buy something that I can wear, I take great care in making sure it is the best I can afford. Even before the Great Glove Day, I had been out numerous times eliminating any cheap alternatives that might have blurred my budgeted mind. I also saved money for a bit so this excursion could be considered a "splurge." (I never splurge.)

The gloves on my mind that day were from Banana Republic. It was the greatest purchase I had made in a long time. Expensive enough that they were worth it. Black leather. Unadorned. Timeless. Beautiful. I felt classy just putting them on.

I never knew such a luxury as warm hands. After that I never went outside without them. I made sure I knew their whereabouts before I even considered whether or not I had a coat to put on. I took care of them. I kept them in my pocketbook when I didn't need them, so they would never be lost.

Then happened the Fatal Night.

I worked until closing. My sister came to pick me up. At this time we still lived in the yellow house a few miles away from my store. When I got in the car I took my gloves off absentmindedly and put them into my pocketbook. Or so I thought...

The next day I had to leave for the bus stop in a hurry. I checked my purse for my gloves, but they were gone. I thought perhaps I had removed them the night before (often I find myself, for no reason whatsoever, moving an object from one place to another. People say this is a symptom of obsessive compulsive disorder), but they were in none of the places I usually put things, and I did not have time to conduct a proper search. I left without them.

All day at work I thought and thought about where I could have put my leather gloves. In my mind I retraced my steps from the night before. Left store wearing gloves. Got into car wearing gloves. Took gloves off in car. Climbed out of car. Entered house. No more gloves!

Realization struck. My stomach dropped as I remembered that the gloves had sat in my lap during that car ride, not in my purse as I supposed. They must have fallen to the ground when I unfolded myself from the seat and stood. It was the only explanation. They must still be on the ground then, I thought, unless someone has taken them! This piece of the puzzle was resolved and for the rest of the day I itched to get home and rescue them.

That evening my sister again gave me a ride home. She gave me hope when I related my woes to her; apparently she had seen the gloves on the ground that morning, but left them there thinking they belonged to some other cold-handed soul. Then they may still be there, I thought. It had snowed the night before, and some of that day, and when I got home the ground was coated. Nevertheless I searched, digging and kicking up snow in my efforts to reclaim my prized leather gloves. But the search resulted in nothing.

We went inside and I shared my loss with our two other roommates, both of whom saw the gloves lying in the yard that day, but neither of whom picked them up, for the same reason Mary Beth didn't. Those were good leather gloves, and by now they were long gone. Someone stole my gloves off my own lawn. I had to shut myself in my room for a little while. I felt like someone who's just had his pocket picked of something dear and valuable.

Mary Beth doesn't like me to tell this story because she feels partly to blame. "I should have just picked them up," she kept saying. But I do hope she doesn't still beat herself up, because I am not upset with her or anyone (aside from myself, a little, for being so careless). I just hope whoever nabbed those gloves off the grass needed them more than I do, because as long as that's the case, I don't really mind making room in my pockets for my hands.

Is It Spring Yet?

See title.

In With the New

I've been twenty days in the new apartment. I'm charmed.

We have two mattresses, one dresser, two floor lamps, two bookshelves, a chest, a rocking chair, two rugs, one table, and some kitchen appliances and miscellaneous articles. We intend for it to be a fully furnished apartment eventually, but I sort of like it this way.

Oh, we also have a writing desk and its accompanying chair. In case we want to write letters. Or draw a picture.

I've become so fond of my mattress on the floor that I don't know if I will ever go back to real beds again.

Most reading is done on the floor, in my case, due to lack of a sofa and the fact that if I attempt to read on my mattress, I will fall asleep. Which would defeat the purpose of owning the books, who in turn occupy the bookshelves.

The hardwood floors are exciting because when I wear socks I can slide across them.

The coat closet is very large. I bet we could squeeze up to eight people in it if we wanted to. But that would be silly because we can't have eight people over at a time, because I broke one of the drinking glasses so now there are only three, which means we can only ever have one guest.

(We broke this rule last night and had three girls over for dinner, but we drank wine from wine glasses, and Mary Beth has plenty of those, so the issue was avoided altogether.)

We have our own washer and dryer, and they are hidden tactfully away in a closet. It is convenient because I can use them when my garments are soiled and forget about them the rest of the time. But don't worry, that isn't how I treat my Actual friends.

There is a spacious linen closet right in the bathroom! No more drip-drying when I forget to bring a towel in with me when I shower!

The refrigerator is cold, and the freezer is colder. The oven is warm when I make it warm, and the gas stove lights up as it should. Altogether we have a very functional kitchen.

There is a comfortable view from the living room window of the lovely homes across the street. Today it is snowing so it is a very white view. Some disgruntled neighbors are digging their cars out, but usually they are very pleasant people.

Work is a ten-minute walk for me now. Nine on good days. Twelve on slow days. Perfect except for the fact that it's January and I have no gloves.*

Oh yes, and we can heat and cool each room individually. Except the coat closet is always cold, no matter what.

One of my favorite things about our new home, though, is that there are none of those beastly camel crickets hopping around and creeping up walls and attacking me in the night. I could live here forever for that luxury.

*See "Memoirs of a Miser," posted 02/12/10

My Love Affair

I fell in love on the metro this week.

At least I fell into daydreaming. I had to take a later train after a morning meeting on Wednesday, so the 9:00 a.m. rush was past. There were more empty seats than occupied ones on the yellow line train at King Street. I took a seat by the window and opened Graham Greene. Reading Graham Greene always puts me in the mood for falling in love, though I can't really explain why that's the case. I had five pages left of The End of the Affair, and I dove into them with divided heart--half delighted in reading Greene, the other half sad that there were only five pages left. For the seven and a half minutes (and three metro stops) it took me to get through those five pages, I paid no attention to the world.

Then I reached the end (sorrow!) and closed the book and put it away, and took a long look around me. And there he was. A dark-haired soldier in uniform with his right arm in a sling.

I probably wouldn't have noticed him much at all except that just at the moment I happened to glance in his direction he happened to be glancing in mine. Our eyes met (excuse the cliche), and he smiled a small, amused smile and then looked deliberately away.

I liked him right off. This never happens, especially not on the metro. When I happen to make eye contact with men on the metro, my first reaction is almost always annoyance, if not complete revulsion. The sorts of men who will make eye contact with ladies on the metro tend to look at us as a possiblity, a conquest they could laugh about with their friends later. Then there are my favorites--the obviously Christian guys who read Bibles or books with titles like Finding Christ in the Modern World. I also like the stuffy literary types who grow beards and wear glasses and read scientific journals and Arabic texts. Those guys make it a point never to look at anything that might be remotely female, so they're safe. (Safe from what exactly, I've never been able to figure out. But don't worry--it won't get them.)

But this soldier was different. His expression didn't say, "Hey baby," and it didn't say, "Excuse me, miss, but I have more important things to do, as you can see...." It just said, "Hi."

I liked that he didn't keep staring (though we made eye contact once or twice more). I liked that he was a soldier, and I liked that his arm was broken. Most of all, I liked that he had the sort of face that belongs to a person with a good sense of humor. His whole demeanor said, "I'd tell you a joke if I knew you, and we'd both laugh, because we'd agree that it was funny." And I liked that, though we transferred to the same red line train (and the same car) at Gallery Place, he didn't try to strike up a conversation.

Two stops later, I got off the train, he stayed on it, and it rumbled off as I made my way up the escalator to Massachusetts Avenue.

And that was that.

I think what I like best is that I'll never see him again. But I was in love for twenty minutes, and that was kind of nice.

How To Catch A Misfit

I spent today at the Boulevard in Largo. I helped the ladies of Largo select shoes.

I sell shoes. It's what I do. When ladies need shoes, I'm the one they come to.

I left work around 6:15 this evening. It had been a long day. A long day in Largo. My throat was dry and my feet hurt. Outside was darkening and the wind was cold. But I didn't mind. All the ladies of Largo left happy who entered my shoe store today.

I made my way to the metro. I passed a man.

I had passed several men, and many ladies too, but this man was not like those men. He wore the most serious of expressions. There was something in the way he walked that made him different, and I think the only difference was that there was absolutely nothing in the way he walked. He was a tall, lean black man, dressed all in black. He was slow and cool, and he knew it. He was young but he walked with a cane. It was dark but he wore sunglasses. There was nothing intimidating in his demeanor, but he walked like someone around whom interesting things could happen at any moment.

Printed on his t-shirt was the word "Misfit."

I had taken three steps past him when he called back to me. I knew he would. He was the sort of person you just know will strike up a conversation on passing you at the Boulevard in Largo.

"Excuse me, can I ask you something?"

I turned around. Considered with apprehension what manner of question this particular man could have for me, and decided I was much too interested to say no.

"Go."

"What do you think a 'misfit' is?" he asked, taking a step closer and indicating his shirt.

I promptly answered, "You." At this his serious expression melted and a grin lit his face.

"That's a pretty good guess!" Then the seriousness resumed.

"I'm Misfit, by the way. I'm a rapper. I rap. My rap name is Misfit."

Misfit proceeded to invite me to his show that night. Single tickets for only two dollars. But I had just finished a long day of selling shoes to ladies in Largo, and my throat was dry, and my feet hurt. I declined. So he gave me his card.

"Well then check out my website. Does your phone have a camera?"

"Uh, yeah."

"Could you take a picture of me?"

So I did.


"Okay, well it was nice meeting you. I'm Misfit, and your name is...?"

"Jean."

"Nice meeting you, Jean. Could you email that picture to me? My email is on the card."

"I'll try not to forget."

"Okay. Later." And he turned slowly and walked away.

This is unlike me, but I will refrain from cheapening his seriousness during this encounter. I will do this by not saying another word.