equilibrium-girl.com

The Other Boy

I can imagine that life with my husband is as close to being married to Conan O'Brien as you can imagine, without the fame and having to do without him at night.

My husband, you see looks like Conan O'Brien, including the nose, only he does not have the red hair, but is blond.

The important similarity to me is that both men share an extremely intelligent sense of humor that integrates a Bell Curve dissection with toilet-related matters. For example, who else can include maxi pads and Tibet in the same joke?

Hence, the husband will be referred to as Conan O'Brien in this blog. i am probably going to draw the ire of some internet Conan (the real one, that is) stalker for being misleading, but consider it to be a tribute of sorts. i suppose

17 Year Itch

the current influx of periodic cicadas is upon us, and my feelings about it range between mild annoyance and repulsion. why are there eyes so red? we have occasional exoskeletons on our back porch, but i have yet to examine one closely.

The Governor, on the other hand, is completely repulsed. My husband brought one in to show him the other day, and he yelped, and then did as much as he could to get away from the 3-inch object of his repulsion as possible. poor dear.

i hear they make great pets. they hardly eat, and they mostly need water. i enjoy waking up in the morning and hearing the buzz in the trees as i step into my morning shower. it's intriguing for me that an animal can live for much of its 17 years underground, and then emerge for such a short period of time to mate.

there don't seem to be as many as i remember the last time. 17 years ago, there were literally swarms and swarms, cicada carcasses crunching under the soles of your Keds as you walk along, the buzz becoming deafening as it reached the crest of its aural wave. now, you can avoid them if you walk just a tad more carefully.

...And All I Got Was a Book Deal

Jessica Cutler, we hardly knew ye. well, actually, some people did know you, and quite well.

things are probably going to blow over very quickly on this one, but it illustrates the fact that life "inside the Beltway" is stranger than fiction. i'm truly not surprised if everything she wrote about was 200% true. power can be really sexy sometimes. when her book finally gets published, if i remember to, i'll probably pre-order it on Amazon.

i have thoughts about blogging and capturing your life online that are related to this, will post them after i get some sleep.

Random things I like:

Random things I like:

1. Plax
2. J&J's Bedtime Bath Lotion
3. Cute boys in geek glasses listening to iPods on the Metro
4. The writing on this blog.
5. Chunky carnelian beads
6. Junior Mints
7. Hot dentists

8. The way The Governor ends every sentence as if it's a question
9. What my husband looks like wearing glasses
10. Liquid Expresso extra fine line pens
11. Cheap faux jade Buddha statues
12. Tape flags that you can write on
13. Laughing in bed at midnight
14. Random strangers talking on the Metro to each other
15. Neatly-labeled binder folders
16. Pretty felt flowers
17. The fact that The Governor says "I love you"--or actually "I luff youuu," and then blows me a kiss.

Dream and Reality

two nights ago, i dreamt that i was pregnant again, and that i knew this time it was a girl.

only this time, my contractions were not painful at all, and i opted to walk through the labor. people were hysterical, asking me if i needed any help, and i politely waved them all off, maintaining that i was fine.

The Governor and my husband were both there, with the former playing happily to the side and asking me if i needed any help. the latter was frantic.

purportedly, dream about pregnancy often signal new beginnings, or the start of a new cycle, which for me is true. yet at the same time, my husband and i had been talking about the possibility of having another child, and we have both mutually decided that right now would not be the right time--so i wonder if that dream was part of my inner psyche putting the issue "to rest."

i feel a burst of creativity coming on, and on my walk to pick something up for lunch, i thought of two new purse concepts from materials that i already have. i need a bit more inspiration on the jewelry front, but i suppose i'll wait for inspiration to hit me.

Visual Proof of His Affable Nature

Remember in my last entry how I said that The Governor was a real charmer? Well, here's proof from our most recent outing on Mother's Day, when he was spotted meeting with constituents.

Here he is displaying wit and a sense of humor:

And here he is looking approvingly upon the lastest directive implementation.

Quite the master of true politicking, if I do say so myself.

The Governor

i've taken to calling my son "The Governor" in my head, seeing as he issues directives of all sorts that apply primarily in Equilibrium-Land." For the most part, he has outgrown the stage where he can wear the "Benevolent Dictator" t-shirt found here. his style of leadership is subject to negotiation and occasional reasoning.

of course, like some other state governors, he can be bribed effectively.

he has interpersonal politics down to a science, that one. we all know that Bill Clinton was at one time the governor of Arkansas, a position that no doubt he owed to skillful negotiation and the ability to read other people. my son is a fabulous negotiator. he will wake up, bat his eyes, and shyly ask in a reverent voice, "ice cream?" first thing in the morning. i consider my role at that time to be Lieutenant Governor and recommend an alternate course of action.

but i did waver slightly in my resolution. who can resist a hug and a sunny smile?

he did almost pull a fast one on me last night. we had come home from the park, and he convinced me that all he wanted to do was to say hi to the dog who lives in the house behind ours and then come right back in for bedtime. but the second he got outside, he pulls out his toy dump truck to play. son of a gun--it's like he promised not to raise taxes, but then raises taxes.

So, The Governor it is. I promise to keep you informed of his developing political platform and public appearances.

wool lust

i must stop going to visit Supermaggie, lest i get any ideas about filling an online shopping cart full of Babies and Chubbies.

her scarves are all so imaginative and fun, and i'm inspired just to make a funky-shaped pink scarf of my own out of fleece, even though it's almost 90 degrees today.

don't you wonder where people find inspiration, and how it comes about? my creativity comes in fits and starts. if i have absolutely no ideas, i simply can't motivate myself just to start anything. but when i get an idea stuck in my head, i just start churning things out.

for most of my jewelry, i create around one or two beads, making them the focal point of the piece. or i'll identify a need, such as a funkier alternative to pearls, which leads me to make a two-row choker of carnelian and yellow jade.

for my purses, i focus on shape and fabrics, or sometimes i'll find some ribbon or trim. some ideas in the pipeline:

a black wool structured purse that has interchangeable felt flower pins (one black, one pink, and one blue) and is small enough to tuck under your arm
a black wool bag trimmed with pink polka dot ribbon, big enough for a stack of work.
a summery marimekko-print bag with kelly green lining and pink straps.

self-fulfilling

when you lose your only pair of glasses, it's especially difficult.

It's hard to look for things when you can't really see that well.

little red bracelet

i've been working with sterling silver wire and glass beads. this is something of an "experimental" piece for me, but i'm happy with how it turned out.

i find that my best pieces of jewelry are the ones whose various components have been dancing around in my head for at least three days, organizing themselves into an order, or in this case, a randomness that makes aesthetic sense. it is impossible for me to merely sit down before a big tray of beads, a wire cutter, and my round-nose and needle-nose pliers, and make something that i truly like. this particular bracelet was the result of my having mentally inventoried all of the types of red beads i'd had in my collection.

i'm always on a search for something a little unusual and quirky, yet wearable and stylish. it doesn't have to be designer, and in fact sometimes i would prefer it not to be. it just has to be well-conceived and well-made. i guess that's why i've been making a lot of my own accessories, because i just want something a little different.

Pedigrees

since it's grey and clammy outside, i could see inside the second- and third-story windows of the office buildings when i walked back from lunch. very prominently placed certificates and degrees were the most common things that i saw. in fact, they were really the only things that i saw.

i'd never been one to frame and place on my office wall my degrees, admittances and professional certifications. i am proud of those accomplishments, but i can't say that i'd learned really anything about life from my formal education, including kindergarten. most of what i'd learned, i mean really learned. has been picked up as i go along.

take my work experiences these past two months, for instance. i have learned to give the appearance of being subdued and recalcitrant, while being strong and holding my ground. i have learned that people who are genuinely scared lash out in the most hurtful ways, and i am still in the process of learning to sidestep the lashing. i want to say that i am learning to feel sorry for those people as a defense mechanism, but i'm not entirely sure that i will ever get there.

there's also the matter of the little boy who graces my days with laughter. he is my favorite teacher, even when things are not too terribly rosy. my husband and i waited with him for three hours in the ER, due to a deep gash in his forehead, incurred courtesy of one of my least favorite pieces of furniture in our house (i never liked that old rocking chair. it was given to us by our in-laws). i heard his cries from around the corner as they stitched up the gash, i couldn't stand it so i walked away as far as a hovering, worried mom possibly could.

that boy teaches me patience, and he teaches me to be flexible in my worldview. he teaches me to really love with all of my heart and soul. he cuddles with us- when he first wakes up in the morning and isn't quite ready to get up, he will roll his little body to fit into the half-moon that we create when we lie on our sides on his bed. even with his bandaged-up forehead, he simply is the most adorable child to me.

there's also my friends. who teach me that no matter how difficult things can be in my career or elsewhere, i am still this girl whom people will call, and to whom people will regale with stories and tidbits.

so i don't have my pedigrees on my wall. i have oversize promotional posters from a foreign film. i have a black-and-white photograph of my son. actually four if you include the ones on my shelves. i have prints of lighthouse sketches. a piece of floor (don't ask). a Maneki Neko and a cheap faux jade buddha on my desk, both of which gaze benevolently at me as i tap away at this keyboard. i'd like to think that these things speak more to the person i've become than any proclamation embossed with an illegible seal.