pantoum's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- DRAWING LESSONS Confirmed that I tore a ligament that runs from the tip of my tibia down behind my ankle to the sole of my foot. I'm pretty sure I did this on the leg press when I was curious to see how much weight I could press and stupidly did two sets of 180-pound ankle lifts. The tear is on the foot/leg that I broke three times. which makes perfectly good sense and confirms that I am a certifiable dumbass. I'm icing it down for a couple of days and limiting I'm icing it down now and limiting myself to the elliptical cross-trainer and leg machines that don't focus on this ligament. Hope it's better soon. So it's 1:45 a.m. and I have just returned from a swell dinner party. Twelve of us celebrated Musicgrrl's forty-eighth birthday, ate fine Mexican food, drank margaritas, played the CSI board game, and talked nonstop. The game was a surprise to Musicgrrl, although guest were instructed to show up at the party dressed like television detectives. Some people went all out—Nancy Drew was there along with two coroners wearing gloves and hemostats, Angela Lansbury from Murder, She Wrote, and one couple who came as Men in Black. Also, the effervescent BeBop and her partner showed up late and BeBop chirped, in her happy little kid voice, "We're forensic entymologists!" No Kojak, but I guess wearing a skullcap all those hours wouldn't be fun. I borrowed a pair of espadrilles and some bright South Beach clothes and showed up as a Miami Vice detective.
During the salad course, I described going on a killer-whale watch near Vancouver and being so close to the pod that I could have reached out and touched several whales. Then someone said a Catholic friend had scary killer whale nightmares for years until she realized one day that the whales were nuns. Then three different women told Catholic school stories and recommended the film The Magdalene Sisters,, a true story about Irish girls who were held as indentured servants in a Catholic school that did laundry for a nearby hospital. Then we riffed on an evil nun named Sister Mary Orca and laughed until we cried. We figured out that, between the twelve of us at the table, we have a total of 108 years of college, which perhaps explains why the board-game instructions that made no sense frustrated us to the point of finally deciding to make up our own rules so we could just play already. Musicgrrl extended our Catholic-school theme over the main course by asking each of us to make a confession. I looked around and realized that Coolio and I were the only outlaws in the room (and already knew that Coolio would need to be the center of attention). Then, true to form, she interrupted each confession that threatened to garner more attention with another story about herself. I was probably feeling especially introverted tonight, but gotta say that the two other extroverts and Coolio seemed to compete for airtime the entire party as we introverts looked on, exhausted. Operagrrl leaned over and commented about how interesting it was to watch three extroverts exhaust nine people. BeBop (who apparently encouraged Buzzcut to asked me out) pulled me over to the sofa while we were having appetizers and said, "So I understand you have ridden in Buzzcut's new car. O goodie! I want you to know that we do not like this situation AT ALL. She just needs time, you know." Bouncy BeBop is so cute and childlike and certain that black-and-white worlds really do exist. I told her that we barely even dated, that BeBop isn't interested and I'm not either, and that I am not ready for a relationship—so thank you for saying that but, hey, we have both moved on. At some point, all of us were talking about alpha females and Coolio leaned over to me and said, "She's bouncy and perky, but I've always known that BeBop is the one true alpha in any room." Dunno if she out-alphas Work me, but is certainly more intentional about needing attention whereas I just want to chill with my little thoughts until everything makes sense again. And, truth be told, I don't so much care about controlling people as I do about insisting that no one control me. And, truth be told, I don't so much care about controlling people as I do about insisting that no one control me. I also don't have much invested in being alpha, but recognize that some alpha behavior traits define me. (Knowing with certainty how to do some aspects of publishing the right way topping this list.) To put a positive spin on it, I have a leader personality, but am usually fine with someone else filling the role so long as they're doing a decent job of it. I will definitely take over if they suck though. Tonight, I mostly sat back and observed group dynamics, which were fascinating. Am still feeling numb and antisocial and more or less like a deer caught in someone's high beams when someone speaks to me, and so am just keeping a low profile and remembering that I won't always feel this way. Musicgrrl is a dear, dear friend though and I would never miss her birthday party simply because I'm being emo right now. And my silence did afford me plenty of time to observe some particularly smart lesbian repartee. I shopped for hours to find the right gift for Musicgrrl—and anyone who knows me knows what kind of hell shopping is for me. Finally found it at an art gallery where I should have just gone in the first place because that's usually where I find the right gift. Now let me back up and say that I have been giving Musicgrrl drawing lessons for over a year, and that they usually take place outdoors. I got her a beautifully illustrated children's book about Audubon entitled The Boy Who Drew Birds, plus two hand-carved bird bells. And wrote a sweet message in the card that made her tear up. Since I am on a mission to improve Bird's faith, I also bought two basil plants, a rosemary bush, some oregano, and a beautiful new blooming orchid that is sitting on my piano right now and making the whole room look and smell more beautiful. • (Monday) Shakespeare and her partner arrive tonight, so I just made everything clean and shiny. I plan to take tomorrow off and go to the hospital with them for Shakespeare's post-breast-cancer follow-up scans. It'll be good to see her. BEST-OF SPAM: Dear Stud! Receive your access password now. 9:16 a.m. - 2005-04-11 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
||||||
|
||||||