dynamic elf

This morning I woke up from a dream where I was sitting on the couch in my current livingroom with my mom. We had our arms around each other and were chatting and she seemed sad. My dad came home and they exchanged some empty words, and he went upstairs; then, I held her and she started crying because they'd grown apart and would probably get a divorce if it wasn't for me. I held her a while, happy that I could be an adult daughter and a comfort, but so, so sad for her. Then I woke up and they were both still dead. It's probably about the job thing, but still -- I woke up shaking.

As always: love 'em while you got 'em, love 'em the best you know how. Be gentle: we are all so beautiful and so fragile, even when we are fucking up.

So there I was, driving in to work on Earth Day, musing on how people who are assholes in highway traffic probably don't think of any of the other cars on the road as actual people. This led me to wonder how often I personally think of strangers in moving vehicles as people, not just as little bits of a system I am trying to navigate. While I'm thinking about this, a guy who's a dead ringer for chillguru driving a light-blue Datsun signals that he'd like to merge in front of me, and I let him in. (I like to let in anyone who signals -- it's my tiny little positive-reinforcement campaign to the world.) He waved his thanks to me, and, since I love it when people do that, I smiled and waved back. He smiled and made the little surfer "hang ten" gesture. I assume that's what he meant, since in context, yellow wouldn't make much sense.

Check it out!, I thought. We're both people! In cars! Going very, very slowly.

A few minutes later, we passed out of the shade and into a beam of sun, and he must have caught my (hot-pink) hair, because he looked surprised, then made hair-petting gestures and an enthusiastic thumbs up. I laughed and signed "thank you", and tried to indicate that I liked his crazy curly hair, though I think that might not have come across so well. Later, when I started eating an apple, he excitedly picked up his bag of dried apple and made another thumbs up, like, Hey! you eat fruit? I totally eat fruit too! Rock on! I brandished my apple back at him fiercely, for some reason, and he laughed, and then we had to merge into other traffic so I waved goodbye. Later, I passed him in order to take a different exit, and we both beeped our horns. Beep beep! Beep beep.

It was even better than the time I was caught in traffic in the tunnel going eastbound on Storrow, and everyone started beeping their horns musically at one another. I could see people in the cars around me, laughing and trying to honk in time, like a big giddy horn-flavored drum circle. As we left the tunnel, we all sped up and it faded out, a few people beeping their way up 93 or down into the city, alone, but happier.

Sitting in a cafe where, all the way across the room, some people are having a conversation about someone named "Molly" who is NOT ME. No amount of talking rationally with my brain lets me tune them out.

Much as I love life-affirming bad judgement -- and oh, you know I do love it -- it would seem that even good judgement can be life-affirming. Good to know.

In other news, I don't know who got me this headache, but whoever it was, it's totally the wrong size and you should take it back. It's all squeezy.

Good weekend, if a bit odd. Saturday we brunched, and then had a mini-DDR-fest for most of the day. I was feeling a bit low, what with it being February and all, but hopping around was certainly a good thing. ...

Saturday night we ran out of oil. eep! Apparently, cee had called the oil company on Tuesday, and they had never come out to fill the tank (which makes me quite pissy). We didn't actually run out until after close of business on Friday so we had to huddle for warmth under the electric blanket. Rory the kitty was much more cuddly than usual - I'm surprised he didn't just get under the covers and be done with it. We'd originally planned to have Wedoff come over in the morning and put together the power rack, but since neither of us wanted to get out of bed, we called and delayed. Eventually the emergency oil man showed up with 20 whole gallons of fuel (oooo.) and we got up and started bustling. W. and I put the rack together while David washed dishes to keep his hands warm. (sad!)

Anyway, the cold made us speedy. We got the whole rack AND the lat attachment together by 2. Then we met Kristen and went to go see Howard Zinn speak. I want to be this guy when I grow up. The talk was put on by the Alliance for Democracy, and they had ten or so short, two-minute speakers go up before Zinn himself. I really agreed with some of them, disagreed with others' goals or methods, and was indifferent to the rest. However, I had a great moment where my ideals and my emotions met and shook hands. I've been thinking that the most important part of making the world a better place is working toward your vision, whatever that may be. I'd rather see a thousand peaceniks working in vague concert trying to realize their visions of a better world than ten people I agree with 100% and hundreds of apathetic automatons. I want PeaceGeeks to help visionaries of any sort, help them realize their mission even if it's not entirely my own. But all that was idealism and fluff until Sunday, when I found that I really did *feel* that very deeply. I want to help these people try to change the world - because some of them will go ahead and do just that. It was very strangely exhilarating.

I've also been very emotional recently - it feels as if my emotional sinuses have cleared up. This has been a little disorienting, feeling things so much more deeply than I have in a long time. cee pointed out that, duh, I'm coming out of a long depression and it only makes sense that things would feel stronger. I like how objective she can be about my life.