sueeeus

Last night I dreamt of graduation.  It seemed that everyone at my university had to go to the administration office to receive a packet of graduation materials.  It was absolutely necessary in order to graduate.  I went to the office and there was a very long line of students, all waiting.  There was one small table with only a couple of people seated behind it, answering questions and handing out the materials.  Students had to show their badge to the administrator, and the administrator would then look up their name in their flip card file.  I asked someone in line who I recognized from my classes if this was the only line and he said yes, and that we needed our badge, so if we didn’t have it, we’d have to go get it and get back in line, at the end of the line.  There were hundreds of people in line, so I was glad we spoke, as I didn’t have a badge.  I went to my department and inquired about the badge.  In the dream, the professor was Hugh Laurie.  He sent me to a booth where I had a photo taken, and printed on a badge.  With my new badge in hand, I went back to the line.  I was a bit dismayed that I’d have a long wait, but happily found that the line had dwindled to almost nothing during the time it took me to obtain my badge.  I finally got to speak to the woman behind the desk, and she looked at my badge and said she was sorry, but she couldn’t give me the papers I needed, because people with that kind of badge didn’t get to graduate now.  What kind of badge, I asked.  She showed me the upper left corner of my badge where there was a miniature image of the badge, a badge within a badge.  I hadn’t thought anything of it, but it turned out that it was a special mark, given to a selection of students, mainly engineering students.  I was upset and stormed off to find my professor (Hugh Laurie) to learn why I wasn’t allowed to graduate.  But I have good grades, I told him.  I’m an honor student, I told him.  Yes, he knew that.  He wouldn’t say directly why I couldn’t graduate.  He was very mysterious about it.  I gathered that there was some special assignment that the top engineering students had to do, so we weren’t going to graduate (yet).  It was all very vague, and there was nothing I could do about it.  I had to simply accept the fact and wait.  Wait to learn what was next, what was required of me.  . . . and then I woke up, with a headache, realized it’s Monday morning, I have to go to work, I haven’t prepared breakfast and lunch for my munchkin to take to daycare, and, and, and. . .

I actually did have a professor in college who was Hugh Laurie-like.  At least, he was lean and lanky with blue blue eyes, tousled hair, and a dry wit.

Yum.  Oh, did I say that out loud

I think it was (Amanda) Soule Mama who started a corners of my home theme.  I like the idea, and the phrase.  I think it’s a flickr group, but I haven’t joined.  I get chastised enough for the amount of time I spend blogging.  Which heralds in the far too easy to assume tidings of guilt.  I was raised Catholic, after all.  Actually, I was pondering guilt in general, and thinking of writing something in the Sunday Confessions theme, while sitting in a chair that I recently placed in the corner of what used to be the dining room, gazing at the photos on the far wall, and that led me to want to talk about the corners of my home.  It’s all related.  I find rearranging furniture and rooms to be quite cathartic.  I’ve been participating in the office pool weight loss challenge and have only lost 5 pounds.  My doctor suggested that I exercise at least 45 minutes, 5 days a week, and don’t eat anything after 5:30 p.m.  I don’t even get home before 5:30, so this is not the easiest thing for me.  My coworker, who is charting the group’s progress, also pointed out that his trend analysis shows that I won’t meet my goal.  Nice of him, wasn’t it   My life and lifestyle being what it is, I don’t want to give up watching TV.  To compromise, the treadmill is now center stage in the dining room, along with my reading chair.  From the treadmill I have an excellent view of the television.  From the chair, I have a view of my photo wall.  (It’s not hard to see which ones are within reach of a certain very busy and curious one-year-old.)  Which brings me to the corners of my home.  Like I said, all related (in a very convoluted way).

In my home there is a wall of photos. Photos of family and friends.  Photos that bring back memories of life experiences.  I see Pea Soup in bloom with number one.  She is radiant.  I see my brother, the young sailor with hopes and dreams of family and fatherhood, of happily ever after.  A young man who lost hope.  I see brothers and sisters, parents and grandparents.  Children.  I see myself in times of love before love went sour.  Only three of the photos are new (Mr. Gadget’s kids, and my Boo, not visible in this image).  The others span about forty years, between 1956 and 1996.  I see a high school photo of my mother, a young beauty with hopes and dreams, so different from the woman I grew up with.  I see a brother as an infant, an innocent babe with a sparkle in his eyes.  Before life changed him.  Changed us all, with its ripples. My heart cries for the people in these pictures, wishing none of them had ever suffered any pain.  Wishing they could all have kept the sparkle, the twinkle, the effervescence of youth, of hope, of life, of love.  Wishing all their best dreams had come true.  “Life is pain, Princess.”  That’s what the Dread Pirate Roberts said to Buttercup.  He’s right, and it’s not all bad.  Pain brings with it lessons.  Lessons that open us up to the possibility of bigger and better things.  Had my own path not been what it was, with all its bumps, bends, turns, and sorrows, I wouldn’t have my precious Boo.  I can’t even imagine a life without him, and I wouldn’t change a single thing about the road that I have walked, if it meant I couldn’t have my Boo.  But my heart still cries for the sorrows of the people I love.  I wish that I could wish their sorrows away.  I wish that I could rain love down on them.

…or in my case, keeps the doctor employed. 

Of all the allergies to have, I get the one where I can’t eat fresh fruits and vegetables.  It’s an adult onset thing.  I’ve had pollen allergies for most of my life, and somewhere in my thirties I developed some food allergies.  The reaction is most intense with a few certain foods, but is present in many many foods.  It’s very annoying.  I’ve googled it before, trying to find out what the problem is, but didn’t find anything definitive.  At first I thought it might be pesticides, so I tried organics.  It wasn’t pesticides.  I found that apples, cherries, and hazelnuts cause the most severe reaction.  But I love apples!  I proceeded to torture myself by trying different varieties of apples and learned that some bothered me less than others.  Or so it seemed.  I could eat Braeburns for a while.  And then not.  I discovered Cameo recently, and had three successfully, with no reaction.  Last night I tried one, and ended up with blisters on my lips and tongue and swelling and itching in my throat/pharynx.  Very.Annoying.  I haven’t had such a severe reaction since I tried to eat cherries a few years ago.  The list of offending foods is long.  Apples, cherries, hazelnuts, celery, lettuce, carrots, peaches, pears, nectarines, apricots, plums.  Some of these things I eat anyway, because how am I supposed to live without salad   I’m not so heartbroken about the fruits because they’re sugar rich and I need to be careful about diabetes.  I have now discovered there is a name for this syndrome.  Yes, I have a syndrome.  OAS.  Oral Allergy Syndrome.  My self diagnosis is that I have birch and alder pollen allergies with cross reactivity OAS.  At least now I know.

I wish I could eat apples, though.

Young child with dreams
Dream, ev’ry dream on your own
When children play
Seems like you end up alone
…
Shilo, when I was young
I used to call your name
When no one else would come
Shilo, you always came
And we’d play

The lyrics aren’t the best match, but this song and these words entered my mind when I heard the news.  Someone I love passed away yesterday.  He was my father figure during my teenage years, when I so desperately wanted to matter to my own father.  I found a father figure in my friend’s dad.  He stood in for me when there was a father daughter banquet at school.  He always liked me, just because.  He would tease me and make me laugh.  He would ask me how I was doing.  He was proud of me, even though I wasn’t his kid.  I had the privilege of knowing him for the best of who he was, and it didn’t matter to me that he walked a rough road with his other children, before he came into my life.  My friend, his daughter, was the youngest of six, and the only girl.  She was his baby, and I was her friend.  I could do no wrong.  I looked up to him and admired him for being a man of men.  I respected him and I think that meant something to him.  Perhaps it helped smooth some of his regrets for rough roads of the past, troubles and trials with his own children.  I don’t know.  I just know that I loved him as a dad, and he loved me as a daughter.  I will always remember him and hold him dear, and I think he knows that.  Knew that.

He made me a wind catcher, many years ago.  Twenty five years ago, or more.  It’s been set aside for years and I’ve been meaning to hang it up.  This weekend I finally did.  Sunday.  The day before he died.  I was thinking of him, remembering him, loving him.  Thinking of how he made this with his own hands, for me, for all his children.

Buzz Sawyer.  My Shilo.

Three years ago I took the plunge into uncharted waters and said I do to Mr. Gadget.  I had assumed that I would marry young and be a stay-at-home-wife-and-mom-extraordinaire.  However.  My twenties drifted into my thirties.  The thirties marched relentlessly on.  Relationships crashed and burned waxed and waned.  Ours is not a magical tale of love and romance.  There is love.  There is romance.  Occasionally.  It’s not the stuff of country songs.  It’s not what I’d dreamed it would be.  Thank God!  Left to my own devices, I might have been a Stepford wife.  We are very different, the Cool Cat and I.  We have good times.  We have difficult times.  Communication is one of our biggest struggles, but when we laugh, oh how we laugh.  We are good together.  I like being a couple.  I like sharing a home, sharing a life.  I love sharing a child.

I found this Van Gogh painting with a dark haired buxom woman and a reddish blonde bearded man.  It was us.  Perfect for our wedding invitation.  We sort of eloped.  Decided to just go for it and do it.  Take the plunge.  The beauty of it is that my closest friends and family made it, even though it was short notice, and even though it was miles away.

When I returned to work, I sent this picture to my coworkers to announce what I’d done.  They all thought it was a joke.  An elaborate April Fool’s prank.  It was for real though.  (Sure wish that was my bejeweled showgirl figure.)

Happy Anniversary to my Gadget Man.