Happy Birthday Dorian

I forgot to mention, that sometime this week four years ago, my first cat Dorian was born.

She is here right now, licking my hand as I type this.

So happy birthday, dear Dorian. No cat, no pet could ever be as dear to me as you are.

Onion Soup

I made onion soup
because that's all we had in the house;
onions
and a bit of milk,
some butter, salt, pepper
a bag of carrots.
I remembered a recipe from one of those
colonial diary books for little girls
I still had the book
I scrounged in the box of forgotten tales
and fished it out
I chopped the onions
three yellow, one magenta
four carrots, orange, diced
a chunk of butter, and plenty of salt
enough pepper to give it flavor
some oil and bacon fat
I put it all in the bubbling milk
until they all became soft
that's for supper
scroungings, leftovers
for us, the poor young couple
I hope it tastes all right!


I also made some corn fritters, they taste divine.

Sundays

Sunday afternoon around 5pm
I'm sitting on white rose sheets
with the windows wide open
chicken soup bubbling on the stove
i put a pound of chicken, sliced fine
with onions, potatoes, carrots too
and more stuff to make it divine
soon the fragrance will waft through the rooms
and perhaps drift out the house
someone will smell our evening soup
and perhaps walk faster towards their home
or maybe just stand, cause it stoked a memory.

Today we woke up at 6:30am
before the moon had completely left
I had a good spell, I guess
usually I'm awake nights, and fade at dawn
like those faraway stars
They are so beautiful so distant
But I want to be a singing bird
to greet the morning in.
I've had enough of sleepless nights
feeling alone unloved and wanting more.
I want to worship the sun
and get things done
oh that rhyme was terrible
but it's true, I swear
I want to change
I want every day to be like this
cooking together, in a house
freshly cleaned
the cats warming in the light
and just laughing
enjoying life
and saying good night
just like today
this sunday.

Kevin

Since I talked of my dream about Kevin, I guess I'll talk about the real Kevin.
Kevin and I have been dating for over four years now- kind of impressive, if you consider we started dating when we were fifteen.  Sometimes I think we clung together merely for sheer stubbornness, and laziness.  I'm not a very optimistic person, as you might note. 

We started dating right after summer school, the summer before sophomore year.  We really started talking the last few days of health class.  He had a horrible buzz cut and wore clothes that didn't look too clean, even though they were washed, and he had mild acne, and ugly skin colored braces, but despite all that he had bright brown eyes that were innocent and kind.  Plus he was tall and confident and loud, which was something I was not, so perhaps that might have been the first attraction for me.

Our first date was at the movies, we watched Accepted.  Our first kiss was awkward, the second was wonderful.

And so the years passed, with many a story, both of us changing of course, but somehow we only grew stronger for having the other around.

He was, and is, the most patient boy I have ever met.  He stayed with me through my years of depression, remained with me through my odd relationship with a gay best friend who I had been desperately in love with before we met, and was rooted firmly like a stone against the storms of my emotions.

So basically, I love him very much.  And he loves me, what's more amazing.  :)

Dream

On my mind:

I dreamt a disturbing dream yesterday.  My grandmother's old brownstone apartment is in real life a four-story faded reddish brown brick color with showy green cornices and black painted iron fire escapes.  I dreamt in one part that it was being restored and renovated to gloriousness, though perhaps restored isn't the best word for it.  There was never really a time where that building would have been gorgeous, as it was originally a chicken farm.  I used to imagine, when I was living there on and off again throughout the years, that the ghosts of fowl would cluck pathetically at me, but of course it was just my imagination.

In my dreams, everything was being bricked, every wall, with expensive goldish brown bricks, full of light and splendour. Not sure what that means, but it was quite beautiful to behold!  Everything seemed much more glamorous somehow.

I also dreamt that I married someone who was not Kevin.  He reminded me of my fifth grade crush, Jonathan, a pale freckled boy, tall and with dark red hair and a thin friendly face.  I don't know why I married him, but we were setting off for a life together and planning to live in that restored building?  We had loads of expensive stuff, and we seemed quite happy... except I thought of Kevin with a sad heart.

But then it either flashed forward after our honeymoon or whatever, and I was pregnant.  I gave birth in my grandmother's house to four tiny eggs, which my mother opened to reveal four miniscule doll-like babies.  She carefully tore the placentas off, and I tried to make them breathe.  But they would not come to life.  I asked my grandmother to tell me at least, what gender they were, but she said they never had any.

It seemed to darken then, and the happiness from the beginning, all the bright colours seemed faded, and all I could think of was Kevin.  I was walking in a gloomy light to a big building where there were huge black cars and a swimming pool, a grungy place, yet obviously belonging to a rich man.  Of course it belonged to Kevin, and there he was with long bedraggled hair and a hardened face that had no love or recognition for me.  It hurt, and when I woke up it made my heart hurt.

I remember in the dream we made love in the pool, and on the ground, and I felt nothing but overwhelming sadness and the water was clear dark aqua green, kind of like the background color of this blog, and reflected my emotions.  I walked down from the building through the long steps, except it was somehow a fire escape.  I almost fainted down the fire escape, but Kevin ran to catch me, and I remember wondering if he could love me again?

Nighttime Endeavor

It is 5:42 am here in New York.  I'm sitting here typing, waiting for the rice to cook, because I am hungry and desire a makeshift Korean meal.

Yesterday in the evening, Kevin and I set out to get Quigley to the Friendly Ferals house for his second round of FVRCP.  It was a coldish autumn evening, and me in just leggings and a charcoal gray hoodie, with a cat carrier bag slung over my shoulder.  We got lost along the way- we thought we got off at the wrong bus stop and walked around for ages, across the highway and down those winding walkways, with just a chain link fence between you and the night sky.  Most of the lights were off, and it was a gloomy feel indeed to see below a train track and dark trees on one side, and on the other side blaring cars with bright yellow headlights rushing to their destinations. 

Of course I walked moaning about my hunger and tiredness after a point, as I am unhappily the sort of girl who can't take discomfort with grace.  We walked by Panera and Five Guys' Burgers, and passed a Trader Joe's- which has some of the tastiest chocolate with walnuts I've ever tasted, but we couldn't buy a single thing, as we thought we had no money.  There was a mixup with Kevin's check and that meant trudging along with an empty belly.  I don't know how the hobbits did it.

We finally found the house- it was mere minutes away from where we got off the bus, of course.  Quigley took his shot manfully, and we checked our account at the nearby Chase at the inlet mall.  Gleefully it allowed us to have $20- we ate delicious fries and garlic knots, bought fresh and hot at the delightful brick oven pizzeria a few doors down.  We couldn't eat inside, what with us having a kitten, so we took the box of food and dined wonderfully in the warmth of Chase bank. 

It was embarassing when people walked in, to withdraw money or whatnot, but it was worth it to step away from the chilly air and just enjoy :)

Beginnings

I can't believe I'm starting a blog/journal/diary again.  Not to be boring and predictable, but I was the kind of young girl who would rush out to buy a Hello Kitty notebook from the nearest stationery store when in the midst of a sudden inspirational burst. 

I'd sit down at my chipped white painted desk and scrawl out pages (this isn't as dedicated as one might think, the pages were usually tiny and my handwriting quite on the large side), and I'd write and write.  This would only last a few days at most, and the journals were then tucked away in dusty corners- I was a messy girl 90% of the time, I seldom had any urge to clear up the mounds of tossed clothes and teetering piles of old books- very rarely would I get bursts of dangerous cleaning storms.  Same for religion- that came in despondent moments while living in Astoria.  Same goes for yoga and diets.  You can sense much about my character from this.

But I digress.  I haven't really written in years.  Surprising for a girl once declared 4th most likely (out of five) to be the next Shakespeare in her middle school graduating class.  Note that our graduating class consisted of maybe 60 or so people, and that ought to tell about my writing ability.  :)

Blogs are so ... narcissistic in a way.  I don't know who's going to take the time to read what is likely to be a huge mound of self pity or a dazzling flash of ego inflation.  I guess I'm just lonely again, and this is the closest to social interaction I'm willing to go for.  Plus, I just want to write.

Writing is really the only thing I was pretty decent at (I'm better at reading), and I'm in one of those contrary moods where I want to defy that horrible dinosaur of an English teacher that made me silence my pen for these years.  I exaggerate, of course, nothing but my own hand stilled the pen.  But it was part of the reason I suppose...

My boyfriend says I dwell too much on the past, and it is so very true.  I do want to get over that, I do want a bright new future, but I think here perhaps I'll try yet again to quietly pick over my life so far.  I've made many beginnings, oh so many, that if all my hasty beginnings of diaries, friendships, and journeys were to be gathered in a pile, it would be about the size of a four story building... but I want to try again.

Surely making a start is better than not trying at all.  I hope the patience of paper will beckon me, and keep me this time.