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 This has taken longer than it should have, but I am wearing my jeans comfortably. Not the barometer white jeans from ten years ago (ha!) nor even the other pair of white jeans I bought when I acknowledged I was never going to maintain at 130 pounds, but my regular Levi's, three and a half years old. I bought them the weekend before I started working at my hateful first job in Denver, and they fit, and the only good thing about the hateful job (a very good thing indeed), a free gym with a stairmaster in the basement, led to those jeans swimming around my slender hips in a matter of months. I left the hateful job, and sob! the stairmaster too.
In the three years since I left, I haven't stairmastered for a half an hour followed by weights at least four times a week and so have not maintained that weight, but this late winter Nordic Tracking and step-aerobicking seems to have done some good. I am wearing jeans at work because it is snowing again, and I am sitting at my desk with my left knee up and left foot on the chair and right leg folded under me, foot under butt, a pose I could not have achieved a month ago in the same denim constraints.
Speaking
of my hateful first job, I noticed several weeks ago that the sign for
Cherry Creek office was no longer in front of the building. Being ever
so mature I haven't bothered to check the website until just now, when
I discovered a new name and had an instant of malicious pleasure that
they'd been bought out before I realized it was probably just a name change.
Pity. Its list of offices hasn't changed much except that it features
"Downtown, CO," which is apparently a new town. [On the bus on the way
home, I saw that Hateful was gone but the new name was there. Ah well.)
Anyway.
So last night
I went to aerobics for the first time in two weeks (I have been such a
schmuck). Last weekend I bought new sneakers
that are allegedly designed for women, by women. Like OB, I guess (I am
disappointed that ob.com
is "Off Broadway--Productivity Tools for Architects & Engineers" instead
of tampons). I wondered how much difference there could be between one
sneaker and another, until last night. I don't expect to run in Keds or
really play basketball in Converse All-Star High Tops, but between one
real sneaker and another, what's the diff?
Well there's a big difference. The Nikes I had been wearing were almost
three years old, the cheapest pair I could find when I bought them (between
the Hateful and the Next job), and after three years are now almost as
worn out as the pair they replaced, then five years old. These Rykas purport
to be designed for women's feet, for the kind of actions you perform in
step, and their soles are designed for the gym (and would wear out faster
than regular sneakers on the street) for better gription. Also they're
new, which might help. But my feet had been hurting the past several times
I did step, and last night, despite two weeks for my aerobic capacity
to plummet, they did not.
I am pleased.
I'll continue
to use my old Nikes for biking, although I'm considering getting bike
shoes. Before he got bike shoes, RDC
preferred hiking boots to sneakers because the boots gave more support,
but boots seem too heavy to me. I wonder at myself considering getting
two pairs of specialized sneakers instead of one general pair that I wear
to tatters, but since I don't run and don't wear sneakers unless actually
exercising, I can justify myself (I always can). Health and comfort of
my feet and bones and increased efficiency on the bike. There.
As children,
CLH and I had two pairs of
shoes apiece, a pair of little red dress shoes from Stride-Right and a
pair of sneakers. The little red shoes were oxblood, not red; we called
them red. I remember the chairs in Stride-Right, little yellow leatherette
thrones at the back of the store. One had a rooster and the other a rabbit,
I think, embossed in blue. All of our pictures have either bare feet,
those same little red shoes, or sneakers (different sneakers, since BJW
didn't have any brand loyalty to them). CLH says she ached for shiny black
patent Mary Janes throughout her childhood. Did I, or were they too girly
for me? I remember those annual clothes shopping quests in late August.
Regular clothes from Sears, dress-up from Sage-Allen (a small, now-defunct,
Connecticut department store chain), and most of our regular clothes sewn
by our mother until she took an outside job (which might have coincided
with our rebeling against her handiwork).
This is
one of my favorite pictures of me, featuring my mother's handiwork.
The little bag dress with smocky apron is a hand-me-down from CLH, and
my hair is longish and curly. When CLH and I were about four and seven,
BJW brought us to Grant's (another defunct Connecticut store) for portraits
and in those photographs CLH is in the orange one and I am in a blue one.
 I
called CLH Wednesday when she was going through old photographs and letters
and tossing a bunch. How could she bear to? "I'm keeping every word from
you, though. I figure one day they'll go into the book" (the same book
DEDBG was asking about).
She told me RML just returned
pictures CLH left at their high school reunion and gave her some others
from their trip to London the summer after their 11th grade. (I was going
to say "after eighth grade" because of course that's when it really happened--to
me) "There I am in Tralalgar Square with those fucking pigeons. Okay,
picture my hair in 11th grade. [frightening, unflattering; we call it
"the mushroom"] Do you remember that black and white skirt I had? [no].
And a peasant blouse. 1982 and I thought I was the shit."
It was those Trafalgar Square pigeons, by the by, that put the finishing
touches on her fear of birds and consequent denial of Blake as her nephew.
In 1995, we brought Blake with
us to Aspen to have Thanksgiving with aunt CLH. She regarded him out of
the corner of her eye, suspiciously. In the morning, I uncovered his cage
and brought him out, three months old and still quite a baby, to meet
her. She lay on the couch, still in bed, and watched, nearly petrified,
as I cuddled him until he was safe (i.e., had pooped) and then let him
explore. He climbed up the blanket from the floor to her knees (which
she acknowledged was kind of cute) and stared as he made his way up her
body and returning her stare, curiously. At this point I took him away
before she swatted him like a fly, but not before she had Seen: "What
is that hideous gaping hole over his beak?" Apparently she had seen only
one side of his face. "That's a nostril. He's got another gaping hole
on the other side, and remind me not to show you his ears."
More snow
this morning, still wet. Yesterday morning, with the first wet snow I've
seen in Denver, I expected the bus to be even later than it is on a regular
dry snowy morning. It was on time, so I had very little time to build
a snowman, but I did, a real snowman, made of snowballs rolled over more
snow to fatten them up. Really sticky snow that snowfolk come to life
in! Despite the wet sticky snow the bus wasn't very late, but I worked
fast. This morning we have more snow, yet despite the bus's being on time,
I reconstructed my snowman (whom someone had dismantled if not trodden
to bits). The same stopmate now smiled instead of smirked, and when we
boarded the bus another regular (Linda, the only one whose name I know)
asked who built the snowman. My stopmate pointed to me, and told her about
Scarlett O'Hara from three weeks ago. "With
snowball bushes," I added.
I know Linda's
name because I bother to talk to her: she reads. Last year she was reading
all sorts of Chinese stuff before a trip to China. This year she's reading
regular fiction, plus a Pearl S. Buck (Pavillion of Women) for
old time's sake. Whereas my stopmate never reads, and another regular
seatmate reads Prevention or Shape or (recently) an actual
book: Monica's Story, and another stopmate either gossips with
the first stopmate or just sits or occasionally reads V.C. Andrews, moving
her lips. Linda and I don't talk often, unless we see each other in the
library on our lunch hours: we're busy reading.
Last night
at step the moves took us all over the step. During an interval of repeated
moves, the instructor ran up to me and asked something that I entirely
failed to comprehend, not hearing her over the pulse in my ears. She wanted
me to switch steps with her so she could be in the middle of the room,
and I was the only other person who had two layers of risers. So I scurried
to the front of the room, remembering a Tuesday several weeks ago when
the other instructor canceled at the last minute, and another student
suggested I lead the class.
I'm not sure if she meant that I was good enough to lead or that I only
thought I was good enough to lead. I am one of the stronger students in
the class, but not so strong that I could speak instructions or count
out sets, let alone remember a program. For me to assume she meant it
unkindly is a function of my paranoia and lack of self-confidence, which
in turn are two sides of the same coin. SIgh.
A coworker, A.,
and I just scampered out for coffee. She wants to go a lot more often
than I do, but then she rides her bike to work everyday whereas my mocha
frappuccinos don't get burned off as regularly. But anyway, it's cold
and I wanted something warm so I went and dangled my insulated cup over
her cube. She whooped and joined me, and off we went. Instead of a mocha
frap I got a steamed cider (it being warmer), which is delicious just
by itself. A few weeks ago I had a sip of one another Starbucker made
for A. with caramel and vanilla, and it was so delicious that I got one
next time, but 12 ounces of something so sweet and nigh syruppy was too
much more than a sip to be good. Today I got plain, hot cider, and it
is delicious.
As I pulled on my ski jacket, I remembered that this morning I dumped my earrings in the pocket, needing the three whole seconds it would take to poke the wires through my mutilated ears to lace my boots. So I put them on in the elevator but inspected them first. Is it a figment of my imagination or is the silver goddess figure wearing thin? It must be my imagination: how can earrings wear out? But my rings are wearing out and this makes me sad.
On my right
ring finger I wear what I call my Tolkien ring, a moonstone set in a complicated
silver setting. Last year I bought another
ring for that finger since the moonstone had got pretty scratched
up in its seven years, but the new ring dropped one of its iolites after
three months. Though RDC found the stone, I've never had it repaired,
and I've happily worn the moonstone since. Except that lately I've noticed
that the band is worn thin. So again I want a new ring, or more than one.
My wedding band and engagement ring are set in supposed white gold, but they look pretty damn yellow to me. Next to regular yellow gold, they look distinctly second-rate. I've seen really silvery white gold, and one day I'll have them reset in something that looks like silver but is stronger, either silvery white gold or platinum, I care not. In the meantime, my left hand is otherwise empty. I love my engagement ring, but it's not my usual style of ring and I don't want to wear more gold, so instead of being unable to match I opt not to match it. Therefore I'd like to pile up my right hand, but I haven't found rings I've liked in a long time. I guess I haven't looked, because there must be funky jewelry available somewhere, but I haven't justified the expense and I won't buy a ring unless I Know I want it to become one with my flesh.
I thought
the Menage ˆ Troiseaux picture
showed the iolite ring, but it doesn't much. It shows my two silver bracelets,
though, as do the later Halloween picture, the King Tut, and the ZBD one
(slightly). My left hand looks naked in the Glacier picture: I probably
wore my band but left my sapphire at the camp.
When I got married only my mother knew me so little that she presumed
to ask me if I was really going to wear all that trash (I quote) for the
occasion. Like I would wear new supposedly Special meaningless crap on
my wedding day. I did buy new earrings, but earrings are transitory, earrings
were part of the costume of dress and stockings and shoes. But my rings
and bracelets are part of me, not of the costume. She doesn't understand
about me and jewelry anyway. I had this elaborate scheme worked out to
tell my mother and grandmother I was engaged, and she didn't get it because
she doesn't know what I like but only what Should be.
For my 21st
birthday, my grandmother gave me a ring she found in Arizona with jasper
and turqoise. Neither stone is a color I like but I like my grandmother
and every present I received that year was special, so I wore it. Wearing
it on my left ring finger, I said I was engaged to my grandmother, which
was fine with me. During grad school two years later I lost the turquoise
somewhere, but my favorite jeweler near UConn fitted the ring with another,
and I continued to wear the ring until RDC and I got engaged. In the month
between finding my sapphire and getting the ring (during which time we
told only my sister and best friend and his mother), I had my grandmother's
ring refitted for my left middle finger.
The ring came on a Thursday and on the Saturday I went to Old Lyme. In
my mother's house (where my grandmother now lived), I gathered them side
by side on the couch and told them I had news, and I did this whole song
and dance where once upon a time I wore this ring and was engaged to DEW
but now instead (switching rings behind my back) I was going to wear this
other ring. My grandmother understood immediately and squealed and congratulated
me. My mother saw no diamond in the new ring and asked, "Well, is that
an enagement ring?" as if I'd conduct this dance after saying I had news
for any other reason.
My sapphire
is beautiful. It's extremely dark, almost violet; and depending on the
facet you look through, it shows lavender, red, violet, or a variety of
dark purply blues, flanked by two little diamonds. I love it. It's not
a diamond ring, though, and therefore in my mother's mind could not be
an engagement ring. I'd rather have had only a semi-precious stone like
an amethyst but they're too soft for daily-forever wear, as is tanzanite,
my first choice for precious stone. On the hardness scale, the diamond
is 10 and sapphire 9: close enough for me.
So anyway I told her yes, of course it was an engagement ring, you ninny, except I left out the ninny part, and then the next words out of her mouth had no congratulatory aspect but asked "Will the Dittohead be invited to the wedding?" Even the phrasing of this pissed me of, the passive construction making him the subject, the primary concern.
I already knew
why she'd brought it up immediately, although I still thought her priorities
were skewed. Before moving to Aspen the month before, CLH had spent a
few days at home. One of their topics was marriage, and somehow the Dittohead
came up then too, by BJW of course. I find it interesting that although
she maintained that neither was interested in marriage, she intended for
him to be around until and for her daughters' weddings. CLH told her at
that point that her wedding would not be the meeting ground for her parents'
S.O.s, and of course BJW hit the roof. So it was still at the forefront
of what forebrain she has when I announced my engagement.
Which you think she would have welcomed, since RDC and I been living in sin for almost two years by then, but that's another issue.
I said no, because we were having a small wedding with only our closest
friends and family, and neither of us was close to the Dittohead, so....
She fumed, but in the end I was glad, because if I had invited my parents'
S.O.s, the Dittohead still would have broken up with BJW two weeks before
the nuptials, and considering her behavior toward my father without his
gf there, her behavior with the gf there would have been worse.
Should I write about the wedding? The best description of it was the photograph album CLH made afterward, "The Truth Behind the Scenes." I'd like to put that up.
I did start to write about the wedding but if I do that it'll be a while.
It's a jumble.
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