Click the picture above to view the whole set. Memphis folks, be sure to check out the Elvis entry.
Lots of writing to do tonight, but I couldn’t resist putting up some photos from today’s races. Keep watching the blog for video of the event in the next couple of weeks.
Another long weekend, and my boss is off to the Bahamas. She was just in Hawaii over Christmas. Man oh man. It makes me so wish I had money. And yes, I just don’t. I have in mind that I must get to Paris soon. I found really great prices on tickets for April, when my boss is taking a week off, but I don’t think it’s going to fly. It’s just too hard when you’re new to a city. I’m earning a post-doc salary, and Aaron is in a new environment with few local contacts.
It makes me jealous of people who have spent their lives in one place. There is a familiarity and a stability about that which I’ve not really had. While I don’t feel like I’ve moved a lot in my life, I’ve moved a whole lot more than most people I’ve met.
I want to feel that I am part of a community again. I had that in Bloomington, but it took a while. I hope this is where I end up staying for a while. Perhaps it’s why finding the right place in Boston feels so important to me these days.
That’s my Ph.D. That little piece of paper took 7 years and a 6-digit student loan debt. And now it’s mine. Think I might frame the sucker.
ACT ONE
Two days ago at work, I was chatting with a fellow post-doc about Christmas break. She’s staying in town, and we talked about how nice that can be. I told her about how, when I lived in Bloomington, Hamilton (my ex) and I loved staying in town over break. Since it was a college town, noone was around. We stayed in our jammies, watched movies, ate tons of foods, played with the cats, and actually taped ourselves in to block the draft around the front door and mentally shut out the world.
"You lived in Bloomington? I thought you went to school in Memphis."
"Nope. That was just my pre-doc year. Before that, I was in Bloomington for 7 years."
"I know IU is a big school, but do you happen to know…?"
And then she asked me if I happened to know one of my closest and most favorite friends from my Bloomington years.
ACT TWO
I left after work that same day and headed to Whole Foods to get my Christmas groceries. After arriving home, I logged on to Tribe, and a woman I’ve known online for a few years has sent me a message:
"Were you shopping at Whole Foods in Newton Centre today?"
"Why yes I was. I didn’t even remember that you lived in Boston!"
ACT THREE
Last night, I joined the JP Christmas Caroling Mob at Stonybrook Station. I ran into a woman I met at the JP Open Studios. I had taken a picture of a toddler with her that day, and I asked her if she’d like me to e-mail the picture to her. She became emotional and said that she very much would. She was a foster mother, and this was her last day with the child."
I ran into her again, and she was once again very grateful I’d taken the picture. The child was back with the family and doing well.
She was there last night, and when we started to sing, she stood next to me. "You have a very good voice," I said… and I meant it. I’m a snob and don’t say that much.
"In my former life, I was an opera singer."
"Me, too," I replied. And I meant it!
She asked me where I went to school, and I said Oberlin and New England Conservatory. She’d been at NEC at the same time I was, although she was getting a Bachelor’s while I was getting a Master’s… you know, before I fled. She even knew my nutty teacher, the expert in training coloraturas, and she knew her quirks.
Now this woman works in child welfare in the neighborhood in which I now live. Very similar paths.
We’re going for a drink some time.
ACT FOUR
After the Caroling Mob, we ended up at Spontaneous Celebrations for cocoa. There was a guy I’d been noticing all night. I approached him.
"You look so familiar to me."
"Where do you live?" he asked.
"Here in JP."
"Me, too. That’s probably it."
"Maybe. What college did you go to?"
Turns out he went to Oberlin, too, only not when I did. He is about 7-8 years younger. And he was in Bloomington, too. He performed with a man I knew there. I might have seen that.
But here’s the kicker, this man lives at the same tiny intersection as me… DIRECTLY across the street.
Yeah, that’s probably it!
Yesterday when getting ready to leave for work, I couldn’t find the little card that lets me into the underground parking garage. Luckily, when I arrived, another employee was arriving at the same time, so we used her card to let me in. On the way out, I borrowed the receptionist’s card, then had to stop on the way out to give it back to her. Running from the car to the front door, the snow was harsh and the wind whipped. There was a loud crash and a flash of lightening. Now I know that made this storm a "thundersnow." Never heard of it. After dropping off the card, I raced back to the car, unable to look up because of the sharp pellets of snow (bordering on hail) that were pelting me. When I threw the door of my car open, I whacked myself in the boob. OUCH!
The ride home was beyond treacherous. Lots of little accidents, and my "bumper"had a couple of chances to live up to its name. An ambulance went by, then I heard it honking – A LOT! And then I realized that in fact, there was another ambulance behind me honking, but since I couldn’t see out the back or sides of my car, I didn’t know that. I actually took a little phone video of that scenario since we were going to slow and noone was in front of me.
I felt REALLY bad for several people who were coming off the Arborway on to Centre Street west in JP. It was a long slow hill, and there were several cars spinning their wheels at the top of it, so hundreds of cars were stopped behind it. People all along the journey were getting out of their cars at stoplight – and just in the road – to remove snow from their cars. I think a few had malfunctioning windshield wipers, while others had the problem I was starting to have. The wipers removed snow from the from windshield, but there were large mountains of snow forming on the hoods of the cars, and they were getting so high that it was beginning to obscure the view of the road ahead. And all along, there was thunder and lightening and only about 20 feet of visibility.
I know how to drive in snow from my life in Oberlin and Bloomington, but I’m a little out of practice. The truth is, I don’t even have a scraper anymore. I had one that broke right before I moved away from Bloomington, but in Memphis, I never had cause to replace it. I think it’s time for a walk up to Centre Street for a new one.
I’m actually just really excited to get out with my camera. Now that the streets are plowed and the sun is out (although not melty out!) it’s just beautiful, and it’s a Saturday. Pretty good timing for a thundersnow.
