Winding Down

I woke up this morning from what felt like a long winter's nap, pinned to the bed by a 13.5 lb. cat stationed on the quilt between my calves. Oh, yes, and I was face-down. I feel like I slept hard and woke up upside down. But now the day is bright blue and very, very cold, and the squirrels are out in the backyard en masse.

There is something very lovely about spending time at home during the week, especially when Marty is here as well. Time somehow feels more expansive than on the weekends, as if days are stretched open before us full of possibilities. The weekends always seem so rushed with all that we have to do. It's a real pleasure to have time for days-long projects, and to have the flexibility to rearrange the schedule at will.

Marty has been productive this week. He installed speaker wire in the walls of the family room so that we have the surround-sound speakers hooked up again after a year and a half. We hadn't taken care of it since we moved to this house. I can foresee a lot of action movies in our near future.

He has also been working on hooking up the stereo to our PC upstairs so that I can access my new MP3 player from the computer, and so that the MP3 player can access the internet from downstairs. In his process of installing an ethernet card to prepare the computer for networking, some of my usual activities have become more difficult. Somehow the new configuration is interfering with Front Page, making it more challenging to update Raspberry World (although I have found a short-term fix), and the internet connection seems to be freezing from time to time as one surfs or gets e-mail. But mostly Marty has been successful in his work around the house, and he has certainly been enjoying all the gadgets and wires.

My old friend Celeste is here visiting for a couple of days. I am so glad she could come, even if just for a very short visit. We have been friends for 15 years, and there is certainly something comforting in being around people who know you that well and still love you. Last night Celeste and Marty and I went to see the new Grinch movie and then to dinner at Consiglio's, which is my favorite restaurant in New Haven. About the Grinch . . . well, it wasn't bad. But it was a little too much somehow. The plot didn't draw me in the way the old one does. There was just too much groundwork to be laid, and somehow it took a toll on the clean lines of the story. But of the three of us who went together, I was the only one who seemed to feel that way. I will certainly say that Max, the dog, was adorable. And this is coming from someone most decidedly not a dog person.

Today Celeste and I may drive to New Jersey to check out Yaohan Market in Edgewater. I begged Dana for directions after reading this entry (go down to the middle for the stuff about the Asian market) in her journal. Those who know me will understand why I have to go to this place. I love the wacky Asian stationery and need more sources for it. So if Celeste still feels like going when she wakes up, we will be off in the cold, bright sunshine to look for more "SODAMI" stationery. ("Sodami -- that's what friends are for!")

I was not much looking forward to this Christmas. The stress of the last two months made me fearful that it would be a difficult, stressful time. If I had not had the miscarriage, I would have been almost 5 months pregnant for Christmas, and things would have probably been quite different from how they were. If not in what we did, certainly in how we felt.

But as it turned out, Christmas was not too stressful after all. I was very careful to try not to pressure myself too much about things I couldn't get done. And I was lucky enough to have some time off work this week, which I think has helped immensely. I ended up feeling grateful for the things I have, instead of regretting what I lost, which is a good way to feel at Christmastime.

I still hope to get some things done on Raspberry World over the weekend, like a year-in-review journal entry (maybe), the 1999 music review, and my latest book review. I hope I'm not being too optimistic. Stay tuned to find out.

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