Grace.

A beautiful father in a black, wool coat stood facing me on the metro this morning. We were cramped like sardines, and he had a baby wrapped in a pink onesie strapped in a backpack on his front. The kid couldn’t see because her tiny pink hat was covering her eyes. I stared at the kid, wanting to scrunch the hat up on her forehead, but I didn’t want to be the weird stranger who touches other people’s kids. So, I stood there, staring at the kid who couldn’t see me.

What did I see? I saw a family where the father helps out with the domestic life, and the mother enjoys her job. I saw a happy marriage and a lovely home, probably with a modern design and unique area rugs. I imagined they used to have wine and cheese soirées, but after the baby, they’ve been perfectly happy to stay in and just watch a movie at home, together. I wanted to start crying. This concept of domestic life is so familiar, yet so foreign to me. It’s almost within my reach, and yet it terrifies me. And when I reject it, I’m left feeling utterly empty and lost.

Another stranger, a woman in her twenties with curly, chocolate brown hair reached out her mittened glove and with a smile, freed the baby out of its darkness and flipped the brim of its fuzzy hat up. “Thank you,” the father said. That could’ve been me, the stranger who gave that baby sight again, the miracle worker.

As I climbed off the train, I thought about my best friend and the kind of deep caring that she is capable of. She has the sort of love in her that screams “nurturing mother to be.” Examples? I left my pajamas in a pile on my unmade bed. She folded them and left them sitting neatly on my side of the bed. Before that, we were on the metro, bundled up with hats and mittens, and a woman sat next to us in high healed shoes—nothing like the boots I was wearing. Natty looked at her feet and winced, “She must be freezing.” I nodded, and quickly forgot about her, but ten minutes later, as we rode up the escalator at Chinatown, Natty murmured, “That lady must be really cold right now.”

“I’ll start at the left side of the kitchen and work towards the right. You can start on the right side of the living room and work towards me. We’ll meet in the middle.” That’s the phrase that started our Friday night clean-a-thon at 11 PM. We didn’t finish until 3 AM, not until Natty had scrubbed the hardwood floors on her hands and knees. I watched her with a completely befuddled look on my face, stunned at this woman’s ability to care for something that wasn’t her own, to do something so humble. She also whiped off that nastiness that lived on top of the fridge, and put the stinky dishwashing sponges in the dishwasher—they’re now like new. The cat fur-covered living room couch? Vacuumed. The grime around the bathroom sink? Gone. Toilet bowl? Sparkling clean. Bathroom floors? Washed. What happened when the Lincoln log of a poo clogged the toilet on Sunday? Natty to the rescue. I honestly didn’t even know that we had a toilet brush, and it turns out that we have two plungers.

The extent of my domestic grace can be summarized by saying that as I changed the cat litter underneath the washing machine (washing machine sits up on a heavy-duty wooden shelf in the closet), the spin cycle jiggled the 32-load jug of Tide, which then slid off and fell on my head. I winced in pain, wondering if I would now have a reason for being domestically stupid. Head trauma is always a plausible excuse.

We went on a self-guided walking tour of the Kennedy homes in Georgetown on Sunday. My parents joined us. Natty and I packed a picnic of cheese, crackers, veggies and dip. Plenty of napkins were tossed into the bag, even a spoon for the leftover BTS cake that she baked for me. I felt awkward doing something as tender as packing a picnic. She seemed perfectly at ease and comfortable. “Should we bring some more bottled waters?” She asked. I agreed that we should and then felt immediately embarrassed that I had underestimated the number of people who’d probably want one.

As I walked from the metro to work this morning, I thought about the father with the baby, and I thought about all the mistakes I’ve made in the past that have led me to the point I’m at right now—living a rather meaningless life with a severely dulled sense of caring.

I’ve watched my roommate’s cats eat dozens of times. Natty noticed that the gray cat wiggles its ears when he chews. I had no idea.

It was very windy and cold this morning, so I had an excuse for the tears welling up in my eyes as I opened the door to my office building. My hat and hood covered my face well enough to hide me from the security guard. I breathed a sigh of relief as I stepped into the empty elevator and cried in mourning for what I’m missing in my life.

My friend Natty and I went to the National Zoo yesterday. I saw one of the coolest things ever: an elephant peeing.

The zoo was almost empty so we got to spend a lot of time staring at elephants behind bars. As we stood admiring one of the lovely creatures, it let its bladder lose. Dear god, it was like someone turned on a massive garden hose. So cool.

And then, a pygmy pulled the carpet out from under him and it tipped over. And we laughed. My, how we laughed.

And now, for some elephant jokes. My favorite kind.

• Hickory Dickory Dock,
  An elephant ran up the clock,
  The clock is being repaired.
• A fool-proof method for sculpting an elephant: first, get a huge block of marble; then you chip away everything that doesn't look like an elephant.
• An ant and an elephant share a night of romance. Next morning the ant wakes up and the elephant is dead. "Damn", says the ant, "one night of passion and I spend the rest of my life digging a grave!"

And now, for something extra special:

ELETELEPHONY
once there was an elephant
who tried to be a telephant;
no no, I mean an elephone
who tried to be a telephone.
(Dear me I am not certain quite
that even now i've got it right)
how e'r it was he got his trunk
entangled in the telephunk
the more he tried to get it free,
the louder buzzed the telephee.
(i fear i'd better quit this song
of elehop and telephong.)

We also got to see a few hippos and pandas. And we stayed up till 3:30 AM cleaning the house for my birthday bash. That's a good friend--someone who will come halfway across the country to clean your house and smile the whole time.

Today, we're off to paint some pottery.

My best friend is in town for my birthday weekend. We're going to a diner this morning and then off to the zoo. I feel like we're skipping school. We've spent a good part of the morning taking pictures of cats.

My friend just said, "Sometimes, when we don't know what to eat for dinner, we sometimes say, 'The cat.'"

CNN.com had this picture up this morning. The caption underneath it said, "President Bush makes a point during his State of the Union speech." Get it? He's pointing. Nudge, nudge. Funny, isn't it?

I am stunned that Northwest Airlines has managed to hit a new low in Stupidity.

In July 2006, NWA distributed a list titled “101 Ways to Save Money” to its employees (yes, to the remaining workers who survived another round of layoffs). This move was so dumb, it landed NWA in the #2 slot of CNN.com’s “101 Dumbest Moments of Business” list.

For your enjoyment, I’ve broken down NWA’s list into a handful of categories, which will give shape to the otherwise random and excruciating suggestions (so excruciating that I started laughing hysterically when I read them, while clawing my face in agonizing embarrassment).

I've added my own comments in parenthesis.

Category 1: Return to Pre-Perestroika Soviet Living (This list is a long one, so hang on tight. We’re taking off…)

5. Ask for generic prescriptions instead of brand name.

9. Make long distance calls at night and on weekends, instead of mid-day, mid-week.

15. Get hand-me-down clothes and toys for your kids from family and friends.

19. Write letters instead of calling. (I see a great Russian novel coming out of this one.)

22. Use public transportation.

27. Form a baby-sitting cooperative with friends and neighbors.

30. Share housing with a friend or family member.

38. Make cards and gifts for friends.

45. Shop around for eyeglasses. (I know someone who knows someone who can get you an American frame.)

66. Iron your own shirts. (Vat do you mean? Zats how ve alvays do it.)

72. Buy pre-owned toys and children's books at garage sales.

75. Inspect clothing carefully before purchasing it. (It might have lice in it.)

77. At the grocery store, comparison shop by looking at the unit price. (Ha! Back in my country unit price was imprinted into the item. Fixed price = Good.)

83. Shop around for long distance rates. (Use rotary phone.)

84. Hand wash instead of dry cleaning.

96. Compost to make your own fertilizer.

98. Cut the kids hair yourself. (Follow proper communist guidelines for hair cutting.)

Category 2: How to Survive a Nuclear Winter if You Have Your Own Mini-generator (if you don’t, you’re probably not around to care)

1. Set your thermostat to 64 and turn it down to 60 at night.

4. Carpool.

8. Replace 100 watt bulbs with 60 watt.

12. Buy spare parts for your car at a junkyard. (WTF??? Are you kidding me?)

18. Take a shorter shower. (Or, just bathe out back in the pond.)

34. Change the oil in your car yourself regularly.

40. Have your water company do an audit so you are not charged sewage fees for water used in your garden. (Then, bonk the nice audit man over the head, drag his limp frame into your bunker, and proceed to tickle his ears with a goose feather until he wakes up. Free entertainment while the earth regenerates its wildlife and natural resources. Special note: Pull one goose feather out, and throw the dead goose away. Do not eat.)

49. Use low flush toilets or water saving devices in the tank. (Or just take a dump out back in the pond. See #18 above.)

58. Turn the hot water heater down and wrap it with insulation. (Then, wrap yourself with insulation and proceed to turn the heat down from 60 at night to “off”.)

65. Caulk windows and doors. (So the light doesn’t get in. It burns.)

88. If you are leaving a room for more than five minutes, turn off the light. (Better yet, don’t turn the lights on at all.)

90. Keep your car properly tuned.

Category 3: Life as a Hobo Aint What it Used to Be

2. Use the phone book instead of directory assistance.

3. Use coupons at the grocery store.

7. Rent out a room or garage.

10. Throw pocket change in a jar and take it to the bank when it's full.

16. Meet friends for coffee instead of dinner.

20. Brown bag your lunch.

32. Do not use your calling card.

39. Shop in thrift stores.

42. Grocery shop on double coupon days.

46. Don’t be shy about pulling something you like out of the trash. (Or someone)

56. Borrow a dress for a big night out or go to a consignment shop.

63. Buy, sell, and trade clothes at consignment shops.

79. Use old newspapers for cat litter. (Remove cat and sleep on newspapers.)

80. Shop at discount clothing stores.

95. Search the internet for freebies. (Like free cat litter.)

100. Buy in bulk food warehouses. (Buy, steal, what’s the difference?)

Category 4: Akin to the Ghetto in the Jewish Quarter

6. Do your own nails.

11. Always grocery shop with a list.

13. Go to museums on free days. (i.e., after-hours, entrance through side window, etc.)

21. Make your own babyfood.

25. Apply for scholarships and financial aid. (Classic. Apply all you want, buddy.)

29. Go to a matinee instead of an evening show. (If possible, use the same technique to enter as when trying to visit a museum.)

31. Hang clothes out to dry.

37. Take a date for a walk along the beach or in the woods.

48. Move to a less expensive place to live. (Bingo. Fits category 4 perfectly.)

59. Never grocery shop hungry. (Please sir, may I have some more?)

67. Plan your weekly food menu before shopping.

73. Have potluck dinners with friends and family instead of going out.

85. Grow your own vegetables and herbs.

87. Donate time instead of money to religious organizations and charities.

89. Shop at auctions or pawn shops for jewelry and antiques.

Category 5: Free Medical/Financial Planning Advice From a Major Butt-Crack-of-Corporation is Cheap, But the Aftermath is Expensive

14. Quit smoking.

23. Drop duplicate medical insurance.

35. Get pre-approval from your medical insurance company before undergoing any procedures or tests. (And what if you don’t get approval? Don’t get that chest x-ray for your cough?)

36. Buy 'no frills' vitamins.

41. Refinance your mortgage.

44. Convert your cash value life insurance to term.

51. Buy fruits and vegetables in season. (When not in season, supplement vital nutrients with the “no frills” vitamins mentioned above.)

52. Avoid using your ATM card at machines that charge a fee.

55. Ask your doctor for samples of prescriptions. (Holy sh*t. Girl, you did not just say that. Snap.)

57. When you buy a home negotiate the sales price and closing costs.

60. If you qualify, file for Earned Income Credit.

61. Shop around for prescriptions including mail order companies (Medi-Mail 800-331-1458, Action Mail Order Drugs 800-452-1976, and AARP 800-456-2277).

62. If you pay for childcare, make use of the dependent care tax credit or your employer's dependent care flexible spending account.

64. Shop around for the lowest banking fees.

71. Go to an optometrist for routine vision tests or to change an eyeglass prescription. (As opposed to an ophthalmologist?)

81. Skip annual full mouth x-rays unless there is a problem; the ADA recommends x-rays every 3 years.

86. Shop around for auto financing.

91. Request lower interest rates from your creditors. (Yes, and be sure to use the word “please.” They’ll be sure to comply with a sweetly asked request.)

93. Pay bills the day they arrive; many credit card companies charge interest based on your average daily balance.

97. If your car has very little value, you probably only need liability insurance. (Heck, in some states, you shouldn’t even have insurance—like South Dakota . The population is so small, you’re not likely to run into anyone else.)

99. Increase your insurance deductible.

Category 6: Dear Lord, This is Just Embarrassing, aka the Familiar Whine: “God Mom, Stop It! I Know People Here!”

17. Request to get interest on a security deposit for your apartment.

24. Buy old furniture at yard sales and refinish it yourself.

26. Exercise for free-walk, jog, bike, or get exercise videos from the library.

28. Buy your clothes off season.

33. Volunteer two hours a month for reduced cost food through the Share Program.

43. Trade down your car for a less expensive, lower maintenance one. (Two-seater bike?)

47. Recycle. (Just lock your recycle bin up at night, or else the hobo might just take those cans. See #46.)

50. Drop unneeded telephone services like call forwarding or caller ID.

53. Bicycle to work.

54. Shop around for auto insurance discounts for multiple drivers, seniors, good driving records, etc.

68. Buy a good used car instead of a new model car.

69. Purchase all of your insurance from the same company to get a discount.

70. Cut your cable television down to basic.

74. Use the library for books, video tapes, and music.

76. Don't use your dishwasher dry cycle; open the door and let them air dry all night.

78. Make your own coffee. (Hire your own Columbian.)

82. Water your garden at night or early in the morning. (So that your neighbors don’t see that you’re stealing their water supply.)

92. Trade in old books, records, and CDs at book and record exchanges.

94. Buy software at computer fares.

I’ve been letting my roommate’s cats join me in the bathroom lately. Is that weird? I do stop short of letting them hang out while I shower, though. Cuz that’s definitely weird.

I watched Edward Scissorhands last night and the furballs were curled up next to me the whole time—possibly because I had the space heater on about two feet in front of me, full blast, of course (still no heat in my house). The gray cat let me play with his paw, and he even curled his paw pads around my finger, as if he was holding hands with me. Cats like people touching their paws almost as much as Mary’s brother (from There’s Something About Mary) likes people touching his ear muffs.

Why am I writing about cats?

Because aside from my cousin in Cali, I didn’t talk to anyone after I got home from work last night.

I reheated leftover Chinese takeout (in a frying pan no less, since my roommate doesn’t believe in microwaves). It takes a lot of skill to not burn the rice when reheating. You have to put the gooey beef and broccoli in first, let that simmer for a bit, and then add the chunks of cold rice, smooshing it with a fork or the back of a spoon.

The next bit of the ritual is climate-specific. I stood over the hot frying pan and warmed my hands, while intermittently stirring the mixture. If I lived in Florida, I could’ve skipped that step.

At this point, you must be thinking, “This girl is so pathetic.” And you might be right, especially about the hand-warming hobo behavior. But the thing was that I didn’t mind the quiet.

I love the part in Edward Scissorhands when Edward is sitting on the curb, all dejected, and then a big puff of a sheep herding dog comes up beside him. Naturally, Edward snips off some of the fur growing down over the dog’s face, so it can see again. We each do what we can. Like when Edward didn’t rat out Kim’s boyfriend for coercing him into breaking into that fortress of a house—all because he was in love with Kim. “He’ll do anything you tell him to,” the boyfriend said to Kim.

I cleaned out the cats’ litter this morning. They’ve lately been taking dumps on the living room floor, or just outside of their litter. Just enough to make me ask incredulously, “But why???”

Until you’ve cleaned up someone else’s poop, you haven’t experienced humility.

I also cleaned out the fridge this morning. Several week-old tuna, moldy cheese, spoiled milk, slimy mushrooms, expired eggs, and rotten asparagus.

I’d say I pitty the garbage man who has to unload that crap into the trash mobile, but hey, you haven’t experienced humility until you’ve picked up someone else’s poop, or cat poop mixed with spoiled food in the form of an overstuffed garbage bag.

I actually clicked on the “cooking for one” link on the Food Network’s website. It was a reluctant click, but a curious one none-the-less. I found a list of 10 hints on how to grocery shop for one. Some ideas were practical—like asking the butcher to individually wrap steaks so you can unfreeze them one at a time. Other hints were just counter-intuitive: Buy little baggies of spices, because even though they’re more expensive, “you’ll waste less.”

What else can I say about last night that wouldn’t further embarrass me? I’ve so far admitted to picking up a cat’s shit off the floor, reheating Chinese takeout in a frying pan, heating my hands by the stove, watching a movie alone on a Thursday night, holding hands with a cat, going to the bathroom with a cat watching me, cleaning out a bunch of spoiled food from a stinky fridge, and looking up hints on how to avoid having food spoil, since every meal is a “meal for one.” Yep, I’d say that just about covers everything. Congratulations to me; I’m officially pathetic. (In case you’re wondering, there was a lot of hand washing in between all of these activities.)

For your enjoyment: The Ten Tips.

Yesterday's article in the NY Times, titled 51% of Women are Living Without a Spouse got me thinking... Are these women on to something? How am I convinced that marriage is something that I want to experience?

I then got an email with a link to The End of Marriage, an interesting article pinning capitalism as being almost antithetical to the institution of marriage (thanks Jewish Atheist for sending that!). After reading the article and scanning through people's comments, I started thinking (yet again) about what exactly marriage means to me.

At its most basic, marriage is an ideal. Ideally, marriage is a public acknowledgement to stay with the person until death, no matter who you or they become. It can be, in a strange way, the most freeing experience next to the unconditional love of a parent. I don't believe that marriage is necessarily a "stable" and "secure" environment. It's as stable and secure as the couple wants it to be. I know a married couple that chose to let each other not be monogamous--in fact, the man preferred other men once in a while. But the couple loved each other until the woman died of cancer in her 70s, and she'd had other lovers too. They both knew of each other’s “others.”

To me, marriage isn't entirely about monogamy, or even acting selflessly, or having to curb your appetites in order to grow inwards towards your spouse, while these things may play a significant role. It's about pledging to keep another person in your life forever, under whatever conditions the people are comfortable with. Its chosing your own family. It's almost like having your own personal historian running after you with a notebook. Just someone that witnesses your life and lives it with you.

About a week ago, I heard about North Korea contacting a German man who breeds rabbits. No, it’s not because they want to start a petting zoo. It’s because they want to alleviate the hunger situation by breeding Giant Rabbits that can feed up to eight people from just one magical animal (bonus points to you if you know where I’m stealing the phrase “magical animal” from). Please see picture below.

I know.

It’s strangely adorable yet grotesque. Somewhat curious and a little bit scary. Soft and fluffy, and probably a little too smelly for comfort. Not quite dog, not quite rabbit. Perhaps a little bit horse.

My love for rabbits started a long time ago, and I was able to own half of a rabbit through joint custody with my boyfriend at the time. We owned a Dutch, peach and white fuzz muffin, with non-loppy ears and a great backside of floofy tail and rump. Then, said ex and I broke up and I never saw it again. Custody battles are awful.

Over New Year’s, one of my friends gave me a book about bunnies. It covers everything from how to pick out a healthy bunny from a litter, to feeding, to cage design, and almost anything else you’d want to know about this titillating subject.

I was entranced for about an hour, scanning through the pictures and ogling the “cute wittle bunnies.”

I have eaten rabbit before. I can’t say I’m proud of it, and I don’t think I would eat it again, knowingly. After spending so much time with my rabbity creature, and loving it, it would be like eating a very distant relative of mine.

I can’t blame the North Korean government for pursuing such an approach to alleviating hunger, but I do wonder if this idea will be successful. To feed a rabbit of this size, it takes quite a bit of fresh food—lots of vegetables and grass. My bunny used to love cilantro and bananas, for example. I could place a handful of both into her food dish, and it would be gone in half an hour.

I can’t help but wonder if it would be better to give those vegetables directly to the people. I don’t know very much about this subject, but I feel like something just doesn’t add up. Bunnies of this size don’t occur in nature because it’s simply not efficient for them to grow this large. Rabbits are known for their speed and agility, and I can’t imagine a creature of this size surviving for very long. Predators aside, I can’t imagine how a bunny this big would find enough food in the winter to maintain its size. It just can’t be done, captain (more bonus points if you got that geeky reference).

Please share your thoughts on this subject. And if you need to start a support group for the gagging reflex that you haven’t been able to suppress as a result of this discussion, please feel free to use the comments section for that.

At the airport, I picked up Kurt Vonnegut's A Man Without A Country. It's been described as the closest thing to Vonnegut's autobiography. Here's an excerpt:

"But I had a good uncle, my late Uncle Alex. He was my father's kid brother, a childless graduate of Harvard who was an honest life-insurance salesman in Indianapolis. He was well-read and wise. And his principal complaint about other human beings was that they so seldom noticed it when they were happy. So when we were drinking lemonade under an apple tree in the summer, say, and talking lazily about this and that, almost buzzing like honeybees, Uncle Alex would suddenly interrupt the agreeable blather to exclaim, 'If this isn't nice, I don't know what is.'

So I do the same now, and so do my kids and grandkids. And I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, 'If this isn't nice, I don't know what is.'"

I probably love you already. That’s why it hurts like this. To say to you, “I don’t know.” To admit that I’m scared. On some level, I must love you. Very deeply.

Perhaps infatuation, or some other magnetic force like chance, and now I find myself running. I wish I could run to you. I want to.

If you were someone who didn’t feel so softly, if you didn’t open yourself up to me…I could have passed you by and sat elsewhere, or slept next to you for two hours, passed you a Mountain Dew can, barely touching your fingers, but not spoken to you. I didn’t see this coming. I had no way of knowing how you’d make me feel.

Sometime after my lame remark about the crossword you were working on, you poked my arm. You showed me the glowing, dimming blue sky with an unbelievable shining moon… and you took my breath away. You let me in so that we could build a fort around us made of sofa cushions and blankets, one big enough so that you and I could crouch in it together. Innocently, we laid ourselves out for both to see. The man next to me on my right couldn’t have known. The stewardess had no clue. I don’t think anybody knew.

I am happy with you, and utterly terrified of what that means. I’ve spent the last few years building up an image of the man I’m supposed to spend my life with. And you’ve surprised me to the point of utter disbelief that I could have been so wrong in knowing where true happiness lies. I had no clue.

After what I said to you tonight, I understand why things will change between us. I shattered the image that comes from being given the benefit of the doubt, undeservedly. I am flawed, and deeply ashamed. And I’m panicking, because I know that infinite variety comes from being with one person. What if you are him?

I see magic in you. You have greatness in you too—it’s written on your back. I’ve kissed the image of a dove flying into flames, and I wish I had the courage to close my eyes and jump.

Please forgive me and be patient with me. I don’t know how else to say it. I wish I could pull a blanket over us and shield us from who I am. I’m a coward.

I don’t know if you’ll still feel the same way about me when I get back. You might not want to see me, or if you do, you might be angry with me. I couldn’t have known how easy you are to fall for. I thought I’d have some time to prepare myself, to talk myself through letting go of delusions and expectations. I thought I was more open than I am. I thought I could handle anything.

I didn’t think it would happen like this. That I’d find myself here in such a way.

Someone found my blog last night by searching in google for the following:

"What if you wanted to soundproof a clock that is ticking inside of a shoe box, what would you use?"

Ladies and gentlemen, I'm officially freaked out by this person. I hope it's a birthday gift.

I wrote the following before I got on a plane headed back to DC from Minnesota a few days ago:

I used to write resolutions in my diary. They were always excruciating to read afterwards, sort of like hearing a tape of yourself speaking during a drunken night of complaining to the girls. There were resolutions that made me want to slap my face from embarrassment, like, "I want to kiss so-and-so." There were resolutions that were permanent goals that I never really cared about achieving, like losing ten pounds, because then I’d be perfectly happy with my body. The other resolutions swirled around some form of emotional health and self betterment, usually dealing with finding true love and blissful happiness. I’m not knocking either of those last ones, because I’d still like them to come true, but I think I’ve started to look at resolutions on a smaller scale.

This year, I’d like to be able to commit to something. Like deciding what city to live in long enough to hang up artwork on my bedroom wall, which I still haven’t done at my current apartment. I still have boxes of random things at my parents’ house, and yet more boxes and odd pieces of furniture at a friends’ house in Wisconsin. So it seems that my physical possessions are scattered across two states and a district, and I’m sort of scattered with them.

I’d like to commit to DC long enough to not travel anywhere for two whole months. I seem to use weekend trips as mini escapes from the reality of where I’m living.

I imagine it must be peaceful to be certain of something. Certain that barring some major catastrophe or random bit of bad luck, there is at least something that will be permanent in your life.

Perhaps certain that the person you’re with will still be there if you mess up and do something mean. Or certain that you’re making the right decision by staying at your current job, and that passing up another opportunity won’t swing your life into some sort of abysmal downward spiral of other bad decisions.

I see people who are living lives of loud contentment, as opposed to quiet desperation. The loud contentment that answers compliments like, "Wow! Your body looks great after the pregnancy," with statements like, "Well, that’s what happens when you have kids young."

I see these people, and I wonder if they ever look back and ask themselves, "Why did I make that decision?" I wonder if they ever wish they’d done things differently.

The strange thing about this question is I can’t imagine an alternative to the way things actually went–if not this life, then what would I rather be living? I think it’s easier to feel discontentment in abstract terms.

...And then I got on the plane.

***

I love Robert Frost and I just read a poem called Home Burial. Here’s a clip of it:

‘My words are nearly always an offense.

I don’t know how to speak of anything

So as to please you. But I might be taught

I should suppose. I can’t say I see how.

A man must partly give up being a man

With women-folk. We could have some arrangement

By which I’d bind myself to keep hands off

Anything special you’re a-mind to name.

Though I don’t like such things ‘twixt those that love

Two that don’t love can’t live together without them.

But two that do can’t live together with them.’

I stumbled across Etsy, a kickass arts and crafts site. It allows indie people to sell their creations and it allows the buyer to shop by color. I could play with that feature all day.

I dig the site because it's a totally new concept to me, and I really like that it lets artists reach a broad audience. It reminds me of the Crafty Bastards fair in Adams Morgan (a neighborhood in DC), which I sadly was unable to attend this past summer.

One of my favorites: Ashley Goldberg. She makes prints of adorable and pathetic creatures. They sort of make me want to vomit in my mouth a little and want to hug them at the same time.

It’s raining in DC and I’m a little scared by that. It’s now January 5, 2007.

Yesterday, I read an article on CNN.com about an ancient ice shelf breaking free from the Canadian arctic. Apparently, 16 months ago, 11,000 football fields snapped free from Canada’s Arctic.

New York hasn’t had any snow in November or December. This hasn’t happened since 1877. Check out this New York Times article.

My birthday is in January, and I remember having birthday parties in Minnesota that always revolved around the winter somehow. I’d go sledding, snow tubing, ice skating, build a snowman, have a snowball fight…but the last few years have had very little snow to work with. If I still lived in Minnesota, and if I still had these kinds of birthday parties, I’d be feeling pretty blue about things. Now, I’m just scared.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not one of those people who thinks, “Oh my God! We’re all going to die! Right now! That’s why I have to use up all the exclamation marks that I can before I go!!!” But I do believe that global warming will change some major things about modern life as we know it. I don’t mean modern humanity—I mean modern lifestyle. (And in the long term, humanity too.)

I watched Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth.” One of the crucial points in the movie was that global warming doesn’t affect the globe uniformly. Global warming doesn’t just mean that the earth’s temperatures are climbing due to an increased amount of carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere. It means that there is an impact on the way in which human beings live. Some regions will experience severe droughts, some regions will experience flooding, and the effects of global warming by region can have very different results--from mass starvation, to mass migration, to the spread of disease.

I heard people in Minnesota say, “Forty degrees in December? I’m not complaining… I like this global warming business.” I’d say people in Minnesota have less to worry about for now because the effects of global warming haven’t become an inconvenience, yet.

But places like the Colombian Andes (which are 7,000 feet above sea level) now have outbreaks of Malaria. (Source: Al Gore’s www.climatecrisis.net) And Napoleon Dynamite’s Liger isn’t a joke: polar bears and grisly bears have started mating, for example.

I’m curious to see what the world looks like in 50 years, when I’m 73. In fact, I’m more curious to see what I’ll look like then. Yeah, forget the world. I want to know about me. Me me me.

Maybe that’s why dealing with global warming is such an uphill battle. I find it hard to look past my own lifespan. And “for the benefit of future generations” is so generic when you don’t have your own kids.

For a list of things you can do about global warming, go here. Become carbon neutral, and stop driving. I’m done preaching now.

My impact is 5.2 tons of CO2 per year. The national average is 7.5 tons per year.

I found it interesting that flying is a huge source of CO2 emissions. While I don’t have a car, I do fly a lot. Maybe I should just bike or canoe to Minnesota and all the other places I like to travel to.