Sunday, December 30, 2012

happyhallidays.



the snow gave way to pavement, eventually, just like we all do, melting or sublimating into the shiniest thing we can show, sometimes blinding, to passersby and other folks yearning to be elsewhere. we drove for hours and hours and hours, and all this, to get home after only six days away. inevitably, we arrived in a flurry of disappointment and chaos, the renderings of an ending. this ain't no happy new year. not yet.

this holiday season was one of those that brings me immediately to a list for the next one: How to Fix All the Things That Sucked About the Holidays Last Time. there weren't a ton of things that sucked, really, but it seems that the holidays happened without enough buildup, with very little spirit, and it all just passed by without enough notice or pause or momentum or panache. so here i sit, still sitting as i have for so many of the past six days, yearning instead of doing, planning to improve, improving my plans, sixteen steps to a better me. one step would be to get up and go and not worry about who can keep up or who wants to stay. another might be to hug my mom more; we had great chats but not enough of them. i might continue with the imbibing and staying up late, if for no other reason than the opportunity to sit next to those i love and just be there. i will run more, a lot more, even if it is cold enough to freeze the snot inside my nose, while it's still inside my nose. and i'll take a lot more pictures; things look better 1/125th at a time, and i can focus better through a pentaprism. and there must always be a fire, and a slackline, and enough time doing enough things in the cold to get sweat frost on my hat.

back in the big, dirty city where no one gives a fuck and there's enough concrete to keep everyone's mood to themselves, we have a dishwasher that might work and a four-year-old who has already puked her holiday all over the dining room table. we have clean laundry, a seven-year-old who is perfect, and a freezer full of bread products whose consumption will inevitably fall to me. there are tires to be changed, bikes to be put to action, and enough bailey's to get through any project hot or cold. merry christmas. and happy new year.

Tuesday, December 18, 2012

newtown.



i don't know what it is about december, but sometimes, people are horrible.

i got home from work on friday and had had a fine ride, had picked up the girls, was getting changed to head to my sister's, and made the unfortunate move of checking up on some stuff online. splashed across the news page was another tragedy, but this one hurt more than many: twenty children had just been killed, on purpose, without a reason.

there are so many things wrong with killing children that there is really no unblurred location for the raging reasoning to start. i don't care if you are mentally ill or suffering from anything physical or mental or social or spiritual; you have no right to take the life of a child. having children of my own, and having grown up in two different cultures of varying gun/violence-centricity, i hate the headlines about this news. i hate that this is news that we have. i hate that anyone, on a whim, shattered so many people at once.

some of the things i have been hearing/reading other people say include making sure to not remember the name of the murderer. some people say we should only remember the children. some people say remembering will never be enough, and perhaps too much.

whatever the case, i cried when the president cried. i don't know how to bring up the topic to my girls. i can't even imagine having to not come home with my girls. i have to hope harder for the future.

guns suck.