As the days keep turning into nights...

I miss being alone in my own space.  I don't have my own space anywhere.  I think that is why I always elect to sleep in at Richard's when he goes to work.  Because then I am alone.  I never get to be alone otherwise.  I want an afternoon or an evening alone.

I hear it's nice in the summer, some snow would be nice...

Sitting in class right now.  Creative writing. Twelve kids and only one other English major. So it goes.

I'm loving studying literature these days.  My Vonnegut course is amazing, as usual Stu Peterfreund is the highlight of my semester.  "Understanding the Bible" is going well, in the sense that I'm wild about the material.  Not the book itself necessarily, but the fascinating history and geography and people behind it.  The professor, however, is quiet and meek, and is impossible to hear from anywhere in the room.  So we're not looking at an easy A, but it's fascinating stuff.

I have a face I cannot show, I make the rules up as I go...

So much has changed since last spring.

Obvious things first, I had a breast reduction.  That's right, I have little boobs now.  I look very different, but I'm much more comfortable with myself and my back feels the best it has since I was a kid. So woo surgery!

The recovery has been kind of hard on me (and probably harder on Rich, who has had to deal with me fairly full-time).  For the past three weeks, not only have I not been myself, I have forgotten who she is.  I've been moody, and antisocial, and strange.

It was so easy, and the words so sweet. You can't remember, you try to feel the beat ...

Today, I got a letter from myself. I wrote it in a computer class that I took in the tenth grade.  It was dated December 19, 2005.  I was sixteen, I still lived with both of my parents and what was then all of my brothers, I had just fallen in love for the first time, and I was as open-hearted and warm as anyone is ever likely to be.  My friends were my whole world, my mom was my hero (some things never change), and I was so willing and so able to put my whole soul out in the open.  Some of this letter is awkward, some is embarassing, some doesn't make sense to anyone but me, and some of it is about people and things that live in my past like a beautiful scene in an old movie.  Reading this letter was like having lunch with myself at sixteen.  Though it is a little strange, I thought it was important, and I'm going to reprint it here, with as few corrections as modesty will allow :). I'd like to introduce you to Rachel Cathleen Esteban, aged 16.

Tonight: I posted this, and went right to sleep.

Today: I ate more than one meal. I woke up in the morning and did not go back to sleep. I did not take a nap. I did not text my boyfriend all day. I realized that he probably doesn’t mind when I text him all day. I asked for a break when I needed one at work. I picked up my paycheck three days late because it slipped my mind. I was off the computer just after midnight.

Pogonotrip.

So this is going to be an odd post.  I decided, at some point tonight, to write a poem about Rich's epic beard. Instead, I wrote a story inspired by the beard. Then I quickly hammered out a poem that needs a lot of work. But I was amused either way, and here they are.

Tuesday March 9th, 3:01 a.m.

I miss warm-colored walls and flowered curtains, black-and-white mountains, and the spiderwebbed branches of winter trees.  I miss the smell of wood burning in the fireplace, and mom making her Pennsylvania-German version of stroganoff.  I miss walking uphill, and downhill.  I miss hearing the repetitive slapping of the lake on the dock for the first time after the thaw.  I miss the initial sinking shock and then the rising relief of the first cannonball of the season.  I love spring in Boston, but spring is going to happen at home withoutme this year.  I can feel the melting, the growing, the waking up, from here.

For Querida, who lived longer and better than anyone expected, and surprised us even more when she died.

For five years I wondered
what song I would sing at your funeral.
For five years I waited
in grimy hospital chairs and sterile rooms,
making your terminal setlist in my head.
I could sing you ‘The Wind Beneath My Wings’,
but you would hate that. I could sing you
‘Forever Young’ but more accurate would be
‘Only young once in a while’.
I worry that you were only young when I wasn’t.
I could sing you ‘The Old Rugged Cross’ and pretend
you were some kind of devout Methodist, but you
were the one I came to when I didn’t know
what to do about boys, and when Cecily got pregnant,
and when my parents were just a few years too old to handle.
You read Anne Rice novels and Harlequins and loved
Poison and Ozzy Ozbourne and, if truth be told, you
were so up in the air most days, that you
were probably pinching God’s toes black and blue.
You loved Him, and He loved you, but it’s too late to pretend piety.
I could sing ‘I Will Remember You’ but
that would only make the ladies from the church board
feel guilty that I, at nineteen, was the only one who
had any recent memories of you at all, not that even I
called you enough towards the end of things.  Because I didn't.
But I was the one who would walk your kids home from school
when you were too sick, and bring you salted watermelon,
a food preference I wouldn’t understand until you’d died,
and it would become all I could stomach, just like you.
I could sing you ‘Sweet Love’, but you and Eric
loved like burning oil and boiling water.
If I were being honest, which I guess I shouldn’t be
at your funeral, I would sing ‘I Knew This Story
Would Break My Heart’, because I did.
After five years of you, querida, I knew you didn’t intend
to stay for the whole party. And I knew I’d never
sing at your funeral. And I knew I wouldn't be
there for you at the end like I should have been.  And I knew that
drinking wine with you would turn into drinking alone, staring at the wall,
a glass dangled loosely in my hand, listening to Aimee Mann
or James Taylor breaking through drunken recordings of your
voice in my head. Just yesterday morning, they let me know
you were gone, [Rachel, the men in this town will]
put an end to you. I walked out this morning,
and drew a picture of you, you and your anchor tattoo [of baby feet that I got at
Ozzfest last year, one for Gabey and one for Mary, and one for Anthony]
That’s how I knew this story would [break your heart in two if you let them].
That’s how I knew this story would break my heart.

Love you, pup.

My dog, Ripken, was put to sleep this weekend.  He was a weird dog, to be sure.  As a puppy he was a pain in the ass and all of my friends were either scared of him or annoyed by him.  He barked too much and too loud, he was a tad aggressive, and often, even right after a bath, he smelled funny.  Mark once used a $30 bottle of mom's shampoo to wash him with, to make him smell better.  Essentially, Mark payed thirty bucks for the dog to smell halfway decent for about four minutes.  He ate my socks, chewed on the furniture, and often peed on the carpet. But he was a good dog, he was my dog, and I loved him.  He was very loyal to the family, and once even defended our home during a break-in, scaring the intruder nearly to death (and who wouldn't be scared of such a huge dog!).  He always seemed to know, in the way that a family dog does, when anyone was sad or lonely.  If he thought you were feeling low, he'd sit on your feet (if you were on the couch) or on your lap, or just curl up with you, and lie there with a look on his face that said "Oh, I know.  Trust me, I know."  And I really think he did.  That dog was there for me during some of my darkest days when people just didn't cut it.  I got in a lot of extra cuddle-time with him when I was home last, but I still wish I'd gotten to say a proper goodbye to my pup.  He's better off now, and he's no longer in pain, but still.  I'll miss him.

5 a.m. on one of the Mondays that are weeks from spring.

I think it feels almost like spring because I'm going to be alright. Because its certainly not the weather, not the sun or the trees. But still. It feels like it's almost spring.

I feel like this was a big weekend...

...but being all sick I missed a lot.

First things first.  It looks like, within the next week,  or two, I'll have two jobs instead of none.  Hopefully.  One as a babysitter and one at a restaurant, hopefully.  Neither is totally official yet.  But I think that there's a good chance that both will pan out. Which is great actually, since I don't know how to manage free time.  Best to fill my hours with things to do so that I'm forced to find time for things like homework and laundry.  Right now though, I'm glad to have the freedom to sit home with this horrible headcold and mope about my sniffles.

My mom is, as we speak, moving into her new apartment.  It's strange that my family is moving and I have just been sitting home with my tissues and will be largely unaffected until I visit them next. I may not be going down for spring break this year, what with hopefully starting to work again next week, so I'm not really sure when that will be.  I do miss them though.  I'm pretty sad that I'm not flying down yet.  And if I really don't go down, I'm sad that I won't have the chance to speed down the highway with Bridget in the shitmobile.  In fact, I may never have that chance again, as it seems the shitmobile is no more! Mom has a new (to her) car to go with her new apartment! Her sisters drove down in her mom's previous vehicle this weekend to give it to her, and stayed to help with the move.  They're the best! And so is G-ba for finding such a generous way to recycle her car.  G-ba, by the way, apparently replaced that car with a sexier model, a fire-engine-red number with all the bells and whistles.  Snaps for G-ba!

My own life has been its usual self.  A smattering of homework, some scattered naps, and a few good nights of hanging out with the gang.  Friday night was great. We got to see Marissa for the first time in a while, and that was nice.  Rich left for VT to go see his best friend Kate around ten thirty, and at eleven Ben threatened to tickle me.  This led to about ten minutes of hysterics, and I only came out of the corner when Ben pinky swore he'd never tickle me ever as long as we live.  I'm petrified of being tickled.  Completely petrified.  After that, Tim defeated a bottle of rum (which has now been given a place of honor above the stove, like a drinking trophy), and somewhere in the middle he and Max had a juggling contest. All in all, a success.  Then I woke up Saturday with a vicious and vengeful headcold.  I suspect I got it on a job interview I had on Thursday--the kids had been sick all week, and my interview to be their sitter consisted of hanging out with them and their mom for an hour.  New kids, new germs.  Ah well.  So Saturday I intended not to go out, but Bridge, Ben and Mims wouldn't hear of that, and I allowed myself to be talked into going to Lisa's, where I essentially took a nap while my friends played a board game.  Then we met DanWhite, and as the hilarity began to ensue, I went home and watched "My Fair Wedding" with Kayleigh until sleep.  Today was Superbowl Sunday, and I spent it largely hanging out listening to music in my room.  I went to the store and bought some comfort food, and I had Bridge and Anna over of course, but mostly just stayed in bed.  Then Kati and I hung out for a while.  Then, or rather now, I'm doing this. 

And now for something completely different.

Easter Eggs and Hidden Tracks.  These things make me insanely happy.  I mean really.  Little extras at the end of movies, weird quirks in computer programs, and CD tracks you are only likely to find if you first buy a real CD, then play the CD on in an actual stereo, and fall asleep for quite a while. I get really psyched about them, and when I go see a movie I'm likely to sit through the credits just for the chance to catch one.  If every director put them into his movies, they'd be less special, but I do wish a few more of them would consider how happy they make me. Harry Potter and POTC tend to be good about them :)  For a funny example, type about:mozilla into your browser.  I mean, if you have Firefox.  It does different things on other browsers.  I think Internet Explorer flat out disabled it.  But it's amusing either way.  The wikipedia page on the subject was amusing as hell.  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_book_of_mozilla)  And it makes you hate Internet Explorer and AOL just a little more than you already did. 

Now I'm going to sleep.  Maybe.  Although really three isn't late lately.  I'll likely stay up this late tomorrow too, as Stormin(g) the Castle (Rich's radio show) is on from 1:30 am to 3:30 am.  If you'd like to listen (and you should, he's good)  you can just click here

Ugh.  Okay.  Sniffles aside it is definitely time to go to bed.  It's just hard to be tired when you've done nothing but sneeze all day.  Sleep sweet, all.

<3 Rach

PS--Cousin Luudle, I love you and miss you and am thinking of you from across the universe!  You are such a magnificent person <3

I guess that's why they call it the blues...

I am a college student, and as such, I admit to spending the occasional weekend night drinking with friends.  Not generally in excess, and not in any situation that would be considered less than ideal.  Any family reading this, do not be alarmed!  Now that I've made that disclaimer..

Last night I got fairly well smashed.  I decided that I would stop worrying about everything on my mind and just try and be young, have a good time.  I suppose keeping track of how much alcohol I actually drank was one of the things I stopped worrying about.  This little experiment in adolescence led to a good half an hour of loudly exclaimed drunken wisdom, conducting conversations from a horizontal position significantly lower to the ground than my conversations generally tend to be.  My friends were wonderful sports about it (possibly because I have had conversations with many of them from similar angles when they overindulged) and they let me say my peace about every topic from the recent election in Massachusetts to the myriad reasons that Pocahontas is the most inspiring of the Disney princesses.  As I sobered, this progressed to some measure of confusion as to why I was on the floor, and complete disbelief when I was informed that, yes, I had been on the floor for twenty minutes.  And while I was on the floor, completely blocking the path to the restroom, other guests of our small party had been forced to go next door to my apartment to use mine.  All in all, an embarassing night.  My friends must be such wonderful people to deal with me.  One friend was especially splendid, and obliged when I begged "Don't leave until the room stops spinning! I can't face the spinning alone.  It's just too much."  To that friend, whose name I shall keep to myself due to the fact that I've clearly said we were drinking, thank you very much for holding my hand until the spinning stopped.  You are, as usual, my hero.

On a more pleasant and altogether less embarassing front, PianoMike seems to be on board with the idea of starting a band.  We went to the Curry Student Center today and played around with the grand piano for a while.  He played "I, Giorni", a composition by Ludovico Einaudi, so beautifully!  That song makes me cry when I play the CD, but hearing it live was much better.  He did a lovely job.  We did a little bit of Simon and Garfunkel, and decided that this week we're going to set about learning some songs.  And, eventually, find other musicians to play with.  Or perhaps that should come first?  Well, either way, we're moving forward with this idea.  I had the strangest sense of something exciting beginning today when he was playing.  Maybe devoting some time to making music will be good for both of us. I know I've missed singing fiercely.  I've also been very suddenly interested in art again.  I've been drawing on every available surface, and itching to get my paints out.  I'm not really an artist, but I do enjoy it.  It is as though every painting I haven't done, every song I haven't sung, every poem I haven't written over the past year is just clawing its way out of me.  I'm pretty excited about it.  I was once pretty creative. I think I will be again.  One night last week, I opened my window and it smelled like spring.  I think that's a good sign.

"Someday out of the blue, maybe years from now, or tomorrow night, I'll turn and I'll see you.  As if we always knew, someday we would live again, someday soon."

-Elton John, "Someday Out of the Blue"

Monday you can fall apart. Tuesday, Wednesday break my heart. Thursday doesn't even start...

Had a party at the apartment last night.  Lots of fantastic pictures for Facebook, not a single one of which is "taggable" (we're clearly drunk in all of them, we can't tag them). 

We started out with Kayleigh making cheesesteaks for everyone (well, almost).  Then we started the festivities.  Kayleigh invited Lucas, aka Train Guy, to the party, and we all liked him I think.  It felt like he fit in well, which is nice.  Love having new additions :)  Later, we had a MUCH more random addition, which is I believe the funniest part of the evening.

So I was downstairs having gotten into some sort of footrace with either Anna or Rich or Sam.  I know, I know.  Keep the party contained.  But sometimes, a girl's gotta run.  So I'm in the lobby, not really minding my business, when a freshman wanders in claiming to be looking for "Rachel" in ###.  Now, ### shares the same door as my building but it's got a different set of stairs.  We were intrigued by the coincidence. So then, instead of letting this kid go on his merry way, several of us engage him in conversation, and he decides we seem like more fun than the party he was on his way to (or perhaps he never was on the way to another party, and heard my name to try and weasel his way into ours...and it worked).  So to keep everyone from continuing to shout at this poor kid in the hallway, I bring him to our humble abode.  I gave him the tour, refused to give him alcohol, and allowed him to hang out with us for a while. Then, this kid gets cocky, for reasons we don't really understand. We had essentially been harassing him from the moment we met him in the hallway, and yet, the cocky.  So at some point, after he declared that he was more than capable of hooking up with Bridget (a statement which nearly got him knocked out by Bridget I'm sure, and she could do it), and informing us that he'd been kicked out of the last party he was at because he got in a fight, I decided things had gone on long enough, and I forcibly removed him from my apartment, in my oh-so-subtle drunken Rachel way.  After briefly making sure he hadn't taken anything (though we obviously hadn't let him out of our sight the whole time).  Then, he bolted with the tequila (which I hadn't been letting him drink anyway).  So two of the guys have to chase him down.  When they caught up to him, he tossed them the tequila and bolted :)  So much for his bravado and self-proclaimed muscular prowess.  It was like living an episode of the Jersey Shore. "DonJohnson" (not his real name, rather the name we gave him), wherever you are, you're not invited to future parties.  But it was nice to know you.

 And now for something completely different...

Mikey and I are going to start a cover band (which hopefully will progress into a regular one?) Yes, it was just a drunken idea, but I think that we've got talent that's just sitting here.  And I think we have fairly similar taste, and have the same ideas about the kinds of things that should be covered.  And...AND...he just got into Joni.  In other words, this is gonna kick ass.

So yeah.  That was Friday night.  Then I had a wonderful Saturday morning, had french toast with Katidid and Mimsy for lunch, and sat around writing on my blog for a little while.  Later tonight, kidsitting.  Later later, probably some more questionable life choices.  I do love college.

<3 Rach

"I wonder what it's like to be the Rain Maker.  I wonder what it's like to know that I made the rain.  I'd store it in boxes with little yellow tags on every one.  You can come and see them when I'm done.  When I'm done..."

-"Real World", Matchbox Twenty

Happy Tuesday

Sitting at home, listening to Rich's radio show (Stormin(g) the Castle, on WRBB our campus radio station).  PSAs right now.  It's kind of weird, but I love public service announcements.  They're the weirdest of all commercials and usually they're not telling you to buy something. I mean, that PSA for the Make-a-Wish foundation, where a little boy with a terminal illness gets to be a batboy for his favorite pro baseball team, makes me all weepy. Rich is being ridiculous :)  And I've decided that, while some of the metal just makes my ears shut off and I tune it out, most of it is pretty awesome.  I just wanna get up and flail around the room.  Only I don't do that because I might hurt myself or others.

Tomorrow I have what is only my third day of classes. I love having five days off per week, but I secretly wish I had full-time school again.  I absolutely love school.  I think that the primary reason I hated being on co-op was not getting to be in class in the fall.  September is my favorite month because of the weather (crisp but still comfortable, and still colorful) and because of the gorgeous back-to-school atmosphere. Buying notebooks and textbooks, rearranging your sleep schedule to fit your courseload, meeting new and old friends in classes, meeting new professors, exploring new subjects, reading new books, learning new things, classroom discussions, writing papers, doing homework, all of the things my college friends probably think I hate.  They are the things I love most.  I had so much fun doing my homework today, you have no idea.  I was required to write a one-paragraph response to A Midsummer Night's Dream and I ended up analyzing the whole play (it IS my favorite).

Today's summary.  Woke up, had an absolutely lovely morning and didn't get up early, did laundry with Emma (disaster, I smacked the dryer because it didn't take her money--sometimes that helps it just sort of notice you're feeding it--and it shut itself off--as if to say "I don't need to take this kind of abuse from you") in the afternoon.  At two thirty, Anna, Emma, Bridget and I went to lunch with Kate, Dan's girlfriend.  Dan is in Cuba :( for the semester, which sucks, but Kate is awesome so we decided that we'd try to hang out with her whether he's in town or not.  Then back to my apartment, where I fell asleep for a few hours instead of going to anna's.  Made tea for Kayleigh and I (love love love my "tension tamer" tea).  Did my homework (my awesome, awesome homework).   Looked at my other blog, Great and Fearsome, cowritten by Peri (greatnfearsome.blogspot.com) and tried to think of some things to write on there.  I'm "Great" and she's "Fearsome".  Didn't feel inspired today, didn't want to push.  We're using it to write a book about the team.  For more info, click on over there.

So yes. Back to school again tomorrow.  Hopefully punctually, because Professor Goshgarian is not impressed thusfar with my lateness (he's my 8am and my 9:50am class).  Alright.  Twenty minutes until the end of Stormin(g) the Castle, and I'm going to try to become sleepy in that time. 

Goodnight, sleep sweet!

"I swear to God I'm going to pistolwhip the next guy that says 'shenanigans."

-from SuperTroopers (2001)

11:11 p.m.

I was remembering the way, when you first went away and I would call you at school (big impressive freshman that you were), you always reminded me that it was 11:11pm when it came around. You would sit quietly and wait while, for the full sixty seconds, I made my daily wish (always for you). I was struck tonight by the care in that simple act. You were so good at loving me. I am getting over you, it's happening, but I think that for the rest of my life I'll love you when I remember that. Every now and then, at eleven eleven, I'll love you for one full minute, as much as I ever did. I know that's not what you want, but it is going to have to be enough. Tonight, at 11:11, I wished that you would find a girl that makes you happier than I could. If you are half as good at loving her as you were at loving me, she'll be the happiest girl in the world.

A Poem for Sarah's Ophelia Project

Ophelia was crazy.
I think that sits at the back of all of our minds.
While we read Dickinson, Sappho, Woolf, and George Sands,
While we wax philosophical about
Hamlet getting her down (drowned),
We all, learned women that we are,
must know underneath it all
that she was nuts.

I wonder, then
why our fascination with her?
Why we, who say “Well,
of course I would never let a man treat me
like that,”
find her so captivating?

My baby brother would say that we are all in love with her.

In love with Ophelia, there’s a thought.
Are we all fixated on Ophelia,
her beautiful name,
her often depicted
(and where do we get this idea?)
long, flowing, wavy hair,
such a delicate flower that
one man could crush her with his words?
Do we want her?
Or are we all so
strong
that we are drawn in by her
weakness?
By her daintiness?
By her foolish willingness
to pin all of her hopes on
one bad boy,
not caring that he may never
leave his mother and commit?

Do we all wish to be that weak?
Is weakness, as we tell ourselves
the thing that brought down Ophelia?
Did she drown in it?
Did someone else break her because she was so
weak.
small.
powerless.
female.
?

I think not.
I think, if you read Hamlet one more time,
you’ll find that she drowns herself.
I think, if you read Hamlet just one more time,
you’ll find that she
stood her ground.
Even though it sunk her in the weeds.
Even though she
behaved very much like
the crackhead outside the gas station.
I think, if you read Hamlet one more time,
you’ll find that she
impresses us with her strength.
And we all fear her.
We are terrified.
We do not fear weakness, we who have none.
We fear our own strength.
We fear being the last one standing
for a cause that means to kill us.
We fear what Ophelia should have feared.

But then, she was nuts.