A Bizarrely Happy Wreck

It's here! And it's been awesome! I'm 30 today!

It seems that too often people feel amazing outpourings of love during life's tragic events, but what luck!... everybody has been so kind and loving and giving... and nobody even had to die! Never have I felt so supported and nurtured by those in my life. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Out of pure inspiration and hope and raw girly emotion, I've cried no less than five times today:

1. While watching The Cosby Show episode in which Rudy (still little and cute) and her chubby friend Peter break Cliff's juicer. I lost it when Claire told Rudy how much she loves seeing Rudy's face across the dinner table each day. Yeah... I know... what the hell?
2. And while watching the following Cosby Show episode about Cliff's parents' 49th wedding anniversary - You know the one. They commission a painting for the grandparents of when they were young. The family puts on the adorable lip-sync performance. The episode closes with the sob-worthy quote by Cliff, "You know, the 22 years I've been married to you have been the happiest one-day-at-a-time of my life." (Smooch, Bryan.)
   
3. When getting in the car to go to the gym and Tom Petty's "Free Fallin'" was playing. In high school, whenever I felt sad or stuck, I'd drive around and blare this song. ("I'm an American girl! I ride horses!")
   
4. When getting out of the sauna at the gym, only to be greeted by, like, the most soul-wrenching birthday song ever: "What's Up?" by Four Non-Blondes. ("I'm totally still trying to 'get up that great big hill of hope'!")
5. When unwrapping my present from Cathy tonight to find ANARCHIST HOMEMAKER coffee mugs! (Super shout-out to Cathy, Tim J, and his amazingly talented girlfriend for ensuring that I'll always be inspired to raise hell... even during a relaxing cup of Joe.) They're the coolest things ever! And they hold a lot of appreciative tears!

Another list for the ol' 3-0 (ol' heave ho, ol' Steve O...) Today, it occurred to me that there are a few things I've changed my mind about over the years, things I once spoke adamantly about, and now I know I'm just plain wrong.

1. In high school civics, my little H-dub-lovin' self would rally against affirmative action. "Special treatment!" I'd croon over my politically-listless classmates. "Don't take special treatment! I would never want a job just because I'm a woman!" Now that I've been working for a good 12 years now, I see that, alas, I was wrong. I want a job because I'm cute.
2. Saunas are not bacterial mating grounds soothing only to those who can't work up a sweat on their own. I really don't know what to say here. I was young, I was stupid, and I could evidently sweat at the drop of a hat. There are few things that give me more pleasure than those slick stone benches and the dusty smell of Dallas water steam.
   
3. "Smooth" by Rob Thomas and Santana is actually a pretty enjoyable song. Yeah, I don't know. It just is.

Maybe when I'm 60, I'll have changed my mind about Uggs being stupid and Designing Women being awesome. But then who will I be if I don't have that?

Impatience and Positivity

"When you embrace Lady Liberty, life becomes easier, cheaper, and much more fun," so says Tom H. in Freedom Manifesto. The path to liberation in 2010 has not been so easy so far. It's not because our abstinence from the world of consumption has been difficult. Other than momentarily coveting my friend Allison's new slouchy brown boots, I've not really cared about purchasing new things. But for whatever reason unplugging hasn't happened fast enough for my taste.

For example, I come home from a lovely dinner this evening to find a sopping wet phone book on my door step. While I appreciate any good litigation lawyer's attempt to woo me with his floppy oversized telephone book cover while I'm trying to find a decent dentist, I resent having to peel the gooey plastic off the book, wait for it to dry, then put it in the recycling bin. This is a dumb rant, I recognize, and Lord knows I don't want this to become a ranting blog ("And what's the deal with phone books?!) but it's an example of the minutiae from which I'm trying to unplug. Is it even possible to do so? Well, one step at a time. I just went to http://www.yellowpagesgoesgreen.org and requested that I never receive telephone books again. Hooray, I saved a tree! Now you go save one too! Stick it to those jerkwads who name their beautiful businesses things like AAA Cheesemaking and Aardvark Framers just to secure a front page seat!

But as I was saying, not consuming has been pretty easy. (I've started getting whiffs of early spring trends, and there's not a piece I've seen so far that can't be snuffed out with a vintage-inspired cotton fabric and a Vogue pattern. Suck it, Ann Taylor!) Just gotta snip each tiny tether one by one.

On the eve of my last week as a 29 year old

It's likely that my loyal followers have placed bets on my first drunk blog. Well, it's your lucky day, those of you who put money on January 19 between 11 and 11:30 pm. Booya!

This long weekend was one of those weekends littered with annoying problems/life issues that only get more annoying when you realize that you're wasting time being annoyed with stupid shit when people in Haiti don't know where their next meal is coming from. That kind of annoying. What the fuck do I have to be worried about?

Well, I'm gonna say nothing. At 11:19PM January 19, I've got a whole lot of nothing to be concerned about. I'm perfectly inebriated after a delightful night with one of my BFFs. I've got my kitty cat. Seinfeld is on. I just talked to my husband, and let's face it, he's the coolest fucking guy on the planet. Man, he's cool. Today's my mom's birthday, and she's witty and smart and beautiful. Bottom line: I've got a ton to be thankful for.

When Bryan and I get down and grumpy, as we were for part of the time this weekend for various bullshit reasons, I make us list out things we're thankful for. Our pets always make the list. Our home. Each other. Lately, knitting has been a big one for me. Acupuncture for Bryan. And how cool is that?

As I approach thirty, which I've done with a lot of anxiety admittedly, I think about what a teenage me would have said about the 30-year-0ld me. I think in some ways she would have disappointed. Disappointed that I wasn't a big actress or an accomplished novelist, but let's face it: though teenage Heather rocked in her own teenage ways, she was fucking stupid in a lot of ways. She was great at taking long walks and making time for friends, but she worried a lot, and she didn't get the beauty of the moment, and dare I say, a stitch in time. Ha! (More later on the Tao of Knitting...) And that's what I'm focusing on now. I'm better at understanding the beauty of the moment, though maybe I can't always savor it. Shit. Is it possible that I'm as happy as I aspired to be back then?

Totally, dude.

Knitting

With my renewed commitment to sustainability came an interest in knitting. I've always been crafty but had no good reason or motivation to put any of my skills to use. However, a year or so a go, a woman in my Sunday School class casually mentioned a politically liberal knitting blog that she follows. Now it's not that I assumed that knitters didn't have political opinions, but the idea of a progressive knitting subculture wasn't something I'd considered before. But oh how it delicious it sounded. Chirping about health care reform while whipping out a little JCrew (sans sweatshop)- inspired number? Well, I was reminded of the classic Seinfeld episode where George aspires to eat and have sex at the same time.

So I just got back from my second lesson with the aforementioned woman. Her name is Lucy. She rocks. She's one of the smartest, most articulate people you'll ever meet. And turns out she's one hell of a knitter. And one hell of a teacher.

We had our first lesson right before Christmas, which provided me with enough instruction to experiment with a scarf. She also suggested a few books, but I settled on Stitch n' Bitch, a hipster knitting instruction manual by the founder of Bust magazine. (For those who don't know, Bust is a third-wave feminist magazine. It's an important periodical, but I've never been able to get into its vibe. Philosophically, I identify more with second-wave feminists, but that's a different posting.) It's a great book, though I'd recommend using the book along with a great teacher.

So! If I was in knitting school, my report card would show that I have demonstrated competency in the following areas:

• casting on
• knit stitch
• perl stitch
• frogging
• tinking
• garter stitch
• stockinette stitch

Tonight I learned:

• rib stitch
• increasing (yarn over, bar increase, and make one)
• decreasing (k2tog, ssk, and skp)
• I-cord

Let's hope my next report card is as positive. I'm giddy.

Too Much

Today's one of those days where I'm completely overwhelmed by the minutiae of life. The details are getting to me, better known as the "small stuff" we've been commanded not to "sweat." Currently, I'm sweating the broken pipe outside my house. It froze and burst last week when I was out of town, and according to the City of Dallas, 15 gallons of water per minute spewed out of our poor neglected PVC. All I could think of was a harrowing documentary called Flow that Bryan and I watched last year. Flow focuses on the world water crisis and shows scene after scene of impoverished villagers scrambling for a few drops of water out of a rusty communal pump. Meanwhile, I feel incredibly inconvenienced having to wait on the plumber who is two hours late. And guilty for sweating over two extra hours. And guilty for wasting enough water to quench hundreds of mouths.

But perhaps Bryan's right when he justifies our accidental waste: our homemade geyser fed the hydrosphere.