happy st. valentine's
I guess on Valentine's, if you are lucky enough to have someone, no matter how far away, the least you can do is build them a little shrine on your blog and hope they don't think you're too whacked out. This weekend, to prove my belief that hockey is love and it's always a good day for that, I showed up one snowy Pittsburgh Saturday to watch Superstar play in his last college hockey game of the forever ended season. It was exciting and sad and Superstar beamed in that way that only the goofy can who know they'd have been too illogical to have made this work by themselves. That's why it's always important to date someone crazier than you. It's probably how we ended up being the purveyors of alcoholic beverages for the team captain's "rockin' after hockey party" that would have been a whole lot less rockin' without us geezers showing up with the goods. While I do expect a thank you, I know we'll never get one. It's just another fine memory of CMU, hockey, and the home game at which some undergrad thought my boyfriend was 40. It's ok Superstar, you're still a star to me, and there's nothing wrong with being more than old enough to buy booze.
Friday we skated, Sunday we skated, Saturday I watched people skate, and ever since I got home I've dreamed of skating. I have this strange nostalgia about Pittsburgh that differs from childhood memories of places and things gone by. It's grittier and grown-up and more romantic -- love in a depressed, rusty city with snow and hockey and curling up under blankets in old brick houses with splintered hardwood floors. It's staying up until 4 a.m. to do homework and then seeing the light come in through the long windows and knowing you still had to face the day. It's living in a town where every corner is a mystery and nothing ever looks the same. It's a sly second of life you know you can never recreate, but can still go back and visit if you don't use up all your vacation days at work. It's where Superstar still calls home and the place from which I hope to whisk him away in two short months from now. I just have to make sure there's hockey at the intended destination if I ever hope to keep him there.And on this Valentine's Day, a friend of mine who doesn't like this contrived holiday so much still understands what everyone is stressing about, in this little observation she sent me by James A. Baldwin.
Love takes off masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.
why i wish i had a hunt horse
I'm on a mailing list for a foxhunting club I used to ride with every now and then when I had a horse (and no, we don't kill anything, we just ride horses and drink port, yes, at the same time). Periodically, in addition to hunting, we'd ride in "hunter paces" -- events organized by the club that invite you to come and train your horse or compete with others in the field. There are various "classes" and you enter the ones that best suit you and your horse's abilities. This one came through on the list recently:
Class 7. GROG RACE. No jumps. A team of three riders will complete a short course with a tankard of grog in hand, in sequential order. First rider will leave the start gate to ride the course as fast as possible without spilling grog and will pass the tankard to the second rider within a "trotting zone" (faster than a trot in this zone will incur a time penalty). The second rider will immediately ride the course as fast as possible without spilling grog and will pass the tankard to the third rider, in the same manner. Third rider will cross the finish line after completing the course. A team which has spilt more than half of their grog will be eliminated. If a team suspects they are low on grog, any rider has the opportunity to refill their tankard from "the tavern" (near the start gate), before finishing the race. Fastest time wins.Ok, I really wish I had a hunt horse again.
loser
Can you say I am? What is everyone else going home to? I want to know. I'm leaving now for a cold bed and the upstairs neighbor's blasting television. Oh what I wouldn't do for a house in the country with my horses in the backyard and the sun on my face.
late
I'm here at work still, it's late, I should go home. Being at work late makes you start to question things about your life that you might not otherwise think about. Things like, do I actually have a life? Could they put any more sugar on these dried cantaloupe slices? Why does my office plant seem to grow better at my old company when it has real sun here? Why does one of my pod-mates keep an unopened Wyder's Pear Cider on the windowsill? Am I allowed to drink it if I'm here late? How long do you officially have to stay here to be the last one to leave?
One of the other designers is still here. I can never seem to leave after her. She sometimes stays at her boyfriend's house to avoid having to travel all the way to the city at night. That's where I'm going after work. To my boyfriend's house. Oh wait, my boyfriend lives in Pennsylvania. Well, maybe I can just go there next week or something.
There are these giant rainbow dots on the floor here, glued to the carpet. I keep tripping on them. It's very annoying. I'm going home now.
One of the other designers is still here. I can never seem to leave after her. She sometimes stays at her boyfriend's house to avoid having to travel all the way to the city at night. That's where I'm going after work. To my boyfriend's house. Oh wait, my boyfriend lives in Pennsylvania. Well, maybe I can just go there next week or something.
There are these giant rainbow dots on the floor here, glued to the carpet. I keep tripping on them. It's very annoying. I'm going home now.
