i jump therefore i am

so here's a weird turn of events. this snow is making me feel sad. at least i think sad is what it's making me feel. i've been working from home all day and just glanced out the window and the sight of all this snow made me kind of misty eyed.

it could be any number of things. the change of seasons. the feeling that time is passing. the feeling that christmas is coming. missing family around the holidays. or it could just be the fact that i'm tired and a little bit cold and can't find my winter pjs.

i read the most amazing wendell berry quote today. one sentence. "be happy because it is humanly possible." be happy because it is humanly possible! all of this change and turmoil. storms. elections. spilling blueberries on my new coat. snow. we all seem to be thrashing around a little bit. and all because it's humanly possible.

but it turns out there are lots of things humanly possible. it's possible to run long distances. chop wood. read books. bake bread. jump over a puddle. or jump right into one. it is humanly possible to be joyful.

so bring it on hurricanes, snowpocalypse, and a claustrophobic job! i'll jump right over those puddles. it is humanly possible to jump. and everyone knows jumping is really just dancing with no music.

oh we did enough

so a funny thing happened while in the bathroom the other day. i mean, what's the deal with toilet paper?

not really.

what happened was this. i'm in the ladies room. the stall, more specifically. and my supervisor and a colleague enter the room and start talking shop. and yada yada, the conversation reaches a point where supervisor says, "you can talk to annie about that." and the colleague says, "which one is annie?" and now i find myself at an impasse. what probably should have happened is that i would have called out, "hey girls! i'll be out in a second." and we all would have had a good giggle. but instead i was gripped by some strange sort of masochistic curiosity to see how i was about to be described. she has long hair? she has reading glasses? she has a laugh like sunshine and eyes that sparkle like the sea? i stayed quiet. and this is what she said.

"she has fair skin and she's always really pleasant."

she has fair skin and she's always really pleasant. first of all, fair skin?? damn you new york city. i stayed awkwardly in the stall until it was all clear and then escaped. and proceeded to ruminate over the event for the next several hours.

when people die, we say all kinds of things about them. i always wanted to be more like my brother. she was a loving mother. none of us will ever forget their laugh. and i think that we often ask ourselves, what will be said about me? right? or is that just me... my thought is nothing new. you could all probably script this rumination as well as i have. what will people say about me when i die? why don't we say these things about each other when we're alive? what would they say if they were being REALLY honest?

she had fair skin and was always very pleasant.

sure, it may not be, "she saved my life from an alligator attack," or, "she helped deliver my baby while stuck in the top car of a ferris wheel." but maybe heroes are overrated. or maybe i'd just like to think so. i can't pretend i don't wish i could live as the perpetual "most likely to change the world" recipient. and yes, that is a real award i received while employed at a summer camp. and by real i mean made of cardstock and permanent markers. but the fact of the matter is, there's not room enough for everyone to be a hero. it's when we try to be that we end up in the streets, covered in war paint, burning up cars and bumping into each other with our baseball bats, declaring, "i have something worth fighting for!" and we become party to the coup.

i may be wrong but it feels suspiciously like growing up to realize that, when it's all said and done, i may be content with a marble marker that reads only as below:

annie frary carter
she did not own a cape.
she was always very pleasant.

a fine kettle of fish

i would like to be beautiful when i'm old. i don't even care if anyone is around to see it. i would like to wear gold jewelry on my wrists and have excellent posture.

i think i'm going to need glasses soon. it doesn't bother me like it would have when i was younger. in fact, i sat next to a woman in a cafe today who had the most extraordinary reading glasses. big round cut glass inside tiny metal rims. she had very small hands. she reminded me of my grandmother. i stared at her until it was obvious and uncomfortable and then i left out the back door.

when i get these glasses, i will wear them around my neck on a chain. it will make me feel like Sara Plain and Tall. a friend told me the other day that my resistance to succumb to modern society will put a barrier between myself and meaningful relationships. at least i think that's what he said. he definitely implied that it will be difficult for me make friends if i keep ignoring everyone who reads books form electronic devices.

maybe that's true.

maybe not. have you ever noticed that most epic stories have a character who is the old person with wisdom and no spouse? wuthering heights. anne of green gables. bat man. there's alway this old single person who's the most likable of the bunch. they know the most about themselves and all the people around them. and i bet they didn't own a kindle.

my point is this:

i would never want to be part of a club where they would have someone like me for a member.

ok, that's not really my point but i've been watching a lot of woody allen movies lately. it's sort of my point. in reverse. i would like to be part of a club that takes the time to make coffee in a percolator and walk home from work and read aloud to each other for fun. so it only seems reasonable that i would get my practice in now, kind of like an early application. how else am i going to end up the beautiful old woman at the cafe eating apricot pancakes? i might never have blue eyes or great posture, but i might be able to be the old person with a lot of good things to say.

shy city

like seeing an ex boyfriend for the first time since the breakup, i was in chicago last weekend. out of sight out of mind i guess, i couldn't remember the train system to save my life. i was afraid of being embarrassed. such is the way when you show up out of nowhere. but chicago was gracious. i made it downtown. made it into an old toyota. made it to wrigleyville and spent the rest of the weekend drinking whiskey and wearing lace and passing around a box of tissues. such is the nature of old love. breakups are so complicated.

when i landed in new york city i lost my metro card. the bank was closed. my phone battery was dead. and best buy didn't have any paul simon. i was at a loss. and really mad. i made it to my apartment, don't worry about that. but in the absence of empathetic slow jams and after shelling out 50 bucks for a new metro card, i stood in the hallway in my underwear and said to olive the cat, "why does today suddenly suck?" she looked right back at me and said, "i'm hungry." i figured this was as wise an answer as i was going to get. i ordered in and put my slippers on. olive and i watched roman holiday while sucking on a jamaican beer and that night i dreamt of being on an airplane in an airport where the lights didn't work.

when i woke up the sun had come out.

it's almost 11 and i haven't answered a single work email. bad dreams and good weather. they distract the mind.

the clean sweep

i am currectly existing on udon noodle soup. multiple times a week, after work, after a late afternoon of errand running, delivered to my door while spring cleaning. i have walked up and down this fair new city and sampled its udon noodle soups along the way.

there are some things that just become part of a place. records and band of horses are owned by nashville. laura marling and fried dumplings are all san francisco. and from now on, udon noodle soup will be new york. and probably the smell of cedar oil. but that's another story.

other non-dietary lifestyle changes have occurred in the past few weeks as well. change one: no more subway. transport. not long sandwiches. those haven't been a part of my life since their weekly appearance during my 8 year old ballet days. and on the occasional roadtrip when my mother is there and her vote counts as two.

i've stopped taking the subway and started taking the bus. or walking. it's almost weird what a difference it's made. i've always hated subways for their cramped darkness anyway. you exchange that for an above ground experience, seeing faces, feeling sunshine, being able to escape if calamity strikes... yes, that's an important factor for me. one's sense of participation with the world is magnified ten fold when you're on a bus. and you don't have to smell as many armpits.

on to lifestyle change number 2. no headphones. that's right. no headphones. to know me well is to know me saying, "WHAT? I DIDN'T HEAR YOU, I HAVE HEADPHONES ON." i treasure my aircraft qualified sound-minimizing headphones like any well trained pilot. kings of leon from 22nd to 59th. van morrison crosstown on the M72. paul simon while perusing anthroplogie. ah, to live life with a soundtrack. and a complete unawareness of the goings on around you...

embarrassingly, this has been an epic sacrifice. miraculously, it has yielded epic return. in 3 weeks i have had more conversations and learned more names than in the combined 3 months preceding them. it's as if i'm being introduced to the city for the first time. and what a lovely city she is! and getting warmer by the day. in fact, i almost bought an ice cream cone the other day! but as my hands were full with take-out bags of udon noodle soup, i had to pass. a girl's gotta know her priorities...

a wednesday farewell quote:

"What's the point of being a writer or an artist anyway? Herman Melville wrote f*****g Moby Dick, and he was so poor and forgotten by the time he died that in his obituary, they called him Henry Melville. You know? I mean, why bother? They're just gonna forget our f*****g names anyway."

"Your Herman Melville story, that's bull****."

"It's true! They called him Henry."

"No, I mean he wrote a 700-page allegorical novel about the whaling industry. I think he was a pretty passionate guy, Joel. I hope they call me Henry when I die, too."

"Yeah, one can only hope."
-Adventureland

the happy kind

everything is making me cry today. the raging hormones of the
christmas spirit. on the bus this morning, i greeted my driver with a
smile and a good morning. this is something i learned from san
francisco. those folks know how to honor their bus drivers. i sat by
the window and waited and waited to drive away and realized we weren't
driving. when i looked up, i saw we were waiting for an elderly man
at the door to scrounge together $2.25 to ride. before i had even
taken stock of the situation, at least three ladies and gentlemen on
the bus opened up their wallets and started pulling out quarters and
bills. "do you have it all? here, do you need another one?" by the
time the flurry of fingerless gloves had ceased, the man was handing
back coins as he had received too many. our bus driver said thank you
over the intercom. i was overwhelmed. i looked out the window and nearly
cried a little.

at which point, we stopped at the next red light and
there across the street was a mother standing with her very small
child at a construction site. the men in their hard hats and
florescent vests had stopped their work and were knelt around the boy,
showing him the rebar and explaining their task with smiles on their
faces. just a simple moment of strangers sharing the wonder of work
with a small boy. when i got up to leave the bus and walk the
remaining blocks down central park, i paused at the door and offered a
"merry christmas!" to the bus driver. he couldn't believe it. he took
my hand and said, "oh my! thank you dear. Merry Christmas!"

i wanted to be disappointed. does no one say merry christmas anymore?
are we so used to the holiday that we blush when someone actually says
the word christmas?

but no. i had to remember that i had already seen two
other merry christmases that morning. in the form of kindness and
quarters. and then, at my desk, i got an electronic holiday card from
a former colleague in korea. a giant image of a manger snow globe
with red lettering that shouted, MAY THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD SHINE ON YOU
THIS SEASON. and below it, "for there is born to you this day in the
city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord."

that's three good cries before 11 am. three good cries. because good
is all around us. all thanks to christmas morning.

merry happy