in the car

you can't go on thinking nothing's wrong
who's gonna drive you home tonight?
 - "drive," the cars

some days, the weight of the world gets to be too much. lord knows there was a ton of that this weekend. my beloved saints? yeah, we're not going to talk about that. it's cold. i think my body hates me, based on how many varied aches, pains and ailments it's throwing at me. and that's not even getting into the unimaginable sorrow and rage of the attempted assassination of a congresswoman.

so what did i do? i got in the car and went for a drive. ostensibly, it was to run errands; the man needed a key made, but had a call today, so i volunteered to do it. (i am not doing ANYTHING until a week for tomorrow. i. am. BORED.) but once that was done, i wasn't ready to go back and sit in a chair while everyone else lived their lives. so i wound my way around the metro DC area, fighting traffic, blasting music and getting my thoughts in order. it was so restorative that even the light swearing i had to do while negotiating probably my least favorite intersection in the area didn't stress me out.

maybe other people aren't like this, but i am. there is nothing that settles my soul more than being alone in the car with my thoughts for a little while. it may not cure my ills, but controlling a slick rolling ton of american-made steel sure does salve me for awhile. it's the little things, eh?

obligations

gaah. nablopomo failure yesterday. i think i'm going to take hannah's idea of a bye day, because i had a lot going on. i feel kinda bad that i fell short so close to the goal line. it was day 28! but hey, that's the way it goes, i guess, when you're out there living experiences in order to be able to write them. and it's been a pretty amazing weekend.

i'm dating outside my religion - by which i mean college football team - for the first time, and it did not work out well for my beloved bayou bengals. it did, however, work out well for my beloved razorbacks-supporting boyfriend. (sigh.) so a large portion of the remainder of the weekend was spent with a) me pouting, b) him gloating and c) me fulfilling a bet i just won't get into details about. suffice it to say that while betting on sports is wrong, this worked out well for both of us.

but it's all about fulfilling obligations. and i am glad to do that, not only for selfish reasons, but because i love making the man happy. his dedication to me makes me want to return the favor to him. it's absolutely perfect; i couldn't be more thrilled with the way our relationship has evolved over time. we're cut from the same cloth, and we want nothing more than the best for each other. always have, always will. my obligation to him is simple - love him as well as he loves me, no matter what. easy as pie.

comfort food

oh, what a weekend for a louisiana-centric sports fan like myself. ooh, the stress that my alma mater and my beloved saints gave me. the only happy, and i use the term loosely, sports fan in my life today is the man, whose giants won the division. ugh. drama and more drama.

i salved my jangled nerves as i sometimes do. no, not with wine, though that's a good guess. i chose to make things better by pulling together one of my all-time favorite emotional tonics - red beans and rice. oh, man, there's nothing finer to ease my mind. back down south, you can get the beans in cans; all you have to do is make rice and nuke the beans. hell, if you're a hopeless slack-ass, you can even use instant rice (though i find that stuff a sin). here in the heathen mid-atlantic, though, it's an all-day affair. four hours of cooking and prep time, once it's all said and done.

sundays are for cooking large meals at the man's house, sharing my bounty with his friends and generally flexing my domestic goddess muscles. i get a huge charge out of it; they gush, i get proud. but this time, there was a level of emotional balm to the act of chopping, boiling and serving. when i'm stressed, as i usually am, i find release in things like cooking, cross-stitch, and really out-of-character traditional "womanly arts." there's a level of traditionalism to this relationship that i never saw coming. doors are held. drinks are purchased. i cook meals; he takes out trash. it's surprising, and what's even more surprising is how comforting i find this dynamic.

living in this new reality is comfort food for my tortured soul. whatever the source of the torture, this new relationship soothes me. there's love, companionship... there's everything i never knew i needed. i get to be exactly what and who i am, no questions. if i want to be suzie homemaker, i can. if i want to yell at les miles for ANOTHER STUPID CLOCK MANAGEMENT DEBACLE, i can. there's room. and there's no greater comfort than that.

voice of god

i am a little dedicated to sports. it goes deep with me. i've been a yankees fan my whole entire life, starting in 1981 when things were bad. i remember the lean years before derek jeter showed up. so when i read today that bob sheppard, who announced games at yankee stadium since before my dad was born, passed on, it really knocked me for a loop.

not a shock, really; to live to age 99 is an accomplishment within and of itself. but mr. sheppard passing is one more iconic piece of my childhood slipping away. it's a small thing, one that i only got to enjoy in person a few times, hearing your team's announcer speak the names of your favorite players. but tied into every joyous moment i spent in the stadium is the rolling, gorgeous voice of mr. sheppard. reggie jackson called him the voice of god. if i were a believer, i'd be inclined to agree.

time only goes one way. but losing even little pieces of the fabric of your life hurts. rest in peace, mr. sheppard.

fevered ego

i interrupt this fun night of memorizing elements of hearsay exceptions and watching the nationals lose to touch on a subject near and dear to my heart - egotism. it's not a word with which i'm unfamiliar. i've been tarred with that brush a time or two. i mean, hell; this is my favorite shel silverstein poem:

i love myself
i think i'm grand
i go to the movies
just to hold my hand
i wrap my arms around my waist
and when i get fresh i slap my face

but as much as i adore myself, i cannot fathom the depth of thoroughly unnecessary onanism that is going on over at ESPN tonight with lebron james. this is the height of spectacle, and why? because it's freaking BRON-BRON! we are all WITNESSES or something! gaah. no thanks. and not just because i'm not a fan of his to begin with. it's so much more.

i like baseball, football and hockey. those are team sports at their cores. yes, technically, basketball is too, but under the reign of david stern, the sport has become all about THE SUPERSTAR. the NBA essentially exists as a group home for fevered egos and drama queens. it's appalling. drew brees is my quarterback, but without tracy porter, it's suddenly not so clear that the saints win super bowl 44. the yankees won the series, true, but who was the MVP? hideki matsui. my beloved ovie is a god on the ice, but the capitals' best weapons have names like brooks laich and semyon varlamov.

but in basketball, it's all about the god. and bron-bron is god. so that's why the sports world is being told to stop on a dime to watch him tell us all where he's going to play next year. well, no thanks. you're not bigger than the game. i won't buy in. i'll watch my local last-place baseball team try to get it together and win tonight, and i'll watch them do it as a unit. as raging an ego as i can be, even i know when to say when.

when.