The Tiny Corners Journal

In Williamsburg, at the post office, there are sheets of hand-marbled paper available for purchase.  They are beautiful.  Each time I have visited I have wanted to buy a piece, but refrained because I couldn’t quite fit a sheet with a purpose.  Would it be a sheet of wrapping paper?  Paper on which to write a letter?  What kind of letter or gift would require a *real* piece of paper?  I don’t have an answer, so, I have not yet bought a sheet of hand-marbled paper from Williamsburg.

Last night, driving home, I was listening to Robert Shaw’s rendition of Gabriel Faure’s Requiem; Agnus Dei, movement C to be precise.  We (as in, the St. Stephen’s choir) will perform Requiem for our Lenten concert in March, so I’ve been tapping into cyberbass and prior recordings in attempts to do better.  And last night, in my attempt to learn, I listened to Agnus Dei.  And I felt like marbled paper.

So I came across the C movement, when the sopranos come in with Lux (2:08 on the video).  When I hear this, I see pools of dark pigments which are touched and put into motion, sometimes harshly, by the introduction of light pigments.  They swirl and move together with each pigment still entirely its own.  They do not mix to create new colors, but…they marble.  The stagnant dark, moved by the light.  The light…the lux, I suppose.

This means something to me, but I’m not sure in what way.  I only know I feel like marbled paper when I listen to that song, and that I will buy a piece of marbled paper next time I’m in WBG, even if I don’t have a purpose for it.

Welp, we’re half-way in to the first month of the new year, and I have a few projects brewing.

(These are in addition to my standard New Year’s resolutions - keep the house tidier, spend less money, exercise, be more present.  Hrm…).

Anyway, here are the fun things I hope to do this year:

• Cook more.  I already “cook” a fair amount, but I would like to cook more from scratch and less from a box.  My inspiration?  Alton Brown.  Over the past few months, I have been able to acquire his three Good Eats cookbooks (and yes, I know, I could find the recipes for free on the web - but I love the tactile feel to the books) mostly by using my Amazon rewards points.  The first book I bought at the Tennessee Aquarium - and it was signed! (!!!)  Anyway, I’m developing a spreadsheet of recipes I would like to try this year - mostly from Alton, but with others thrown in from additional cookbooks already on hand.  Maybe I’ll even blog these attempts…kind of like Julie & Julia, except…not.  I hope to include the kids in this venture as much as possible, as I’ve learned each of them like cooking with me, and that’s kinda awesome.
• Continue to build an arsenal of kitchen implements for my cooking endeavors.  Friends in the past have gifted me some awesome equipment, but I want more.  That probably sounds awful, but I can’t help it.  I want to learn!  I want to try new things!  Alton Brown and/or my own previous cooking attempts might or might not influence me on this, but again, I will be hoarding my Amazon points for fun things such as meat grinders, ricers, pizza peels and electric griddles.  Eeee!  Exciting!  (Really!)!
• Have a real bedroom. (Finally - no Alton references!).  Right now, my bedroom still has the glow-in-the-dark stars and hanging planets left behind by the previous residents (my bedroom is one of the “kid” bedrooms).  I actually don’t mind the stars…they’re nice to look up to at night, but I would really like to have an adult bedroom complete with color schemes and pictures on the walls and all that.  So, I’m planning to plop down some non-Amazon cash for a bucket of paint, and come spring break, will tear the room apart.  I wish I could do it right now, but it makes me happy and excited to have something for which I can look forward.
• Take, and post, more pictures. This part doesn’t feel fun to me right now, but I’m hopeful if I go through the motions I’ll eventually feel “it” again.  Perhaps the above projects will help me with that.  At the least, I would like to be more faithful to my one-a-day picture posting regimen.
• Dress like an adult. Of all my projects, I honestly care the least about this, which is good as it would be the largest financial hog.  I would, however, like to be able to attend a work meeting in something other than old corduroys or the skirt I wore three times last week.  I am very much fashionably inept (and financially limited), so I think this project will be a slow, ongoing endeavor.  But it’s still something I will work on this year.
• Hope. Hee…I hope to hope more in 2012, because even silly little unrealized hopes can change our paths.  You never know what hope - or providence - will bring.  You can look back and connect the dots in your life which have come to pass, but you just can’t know what the dots in front of you might mean (Thanks, Craig) — even if they’re silly little hopes.  So, I choose to hope.  Really, I couldn’t live without it.

So that’s my look at the upcoming year.  A nice mix, I think.

Tomorrow?  Meatloaf and brined fingerling potatoes (except I couldn’t find fingerlings, so baby golds will have to do).

A post I wrote back in November but didn’t publish (until now):

I spent some time tonight missing my friend GAC.  Part of it is November in and of itself, and part of it is the resurrection of the ‘tumor.  With missing GAC and the heyday of the old ‘tumor, I also miss the simplicity of all our lives back then.  That be dust in the wind, tho, and while those times have and deserve my heart and my respect, it isn’t something on which I often dwell.

Except in November.  I always miss my friend, but especially in November.  It’s odd the best Thanksgiving I ever had was just days after her death.  Every other Thanksgiving I have attended or hosted before or since then have been events constructed to follow the expected patterns of food, family, entertainment.  That Thanksgiving, nearly 5 years ago now, many of us were so painfully thankful for everything, because we had an acute awareness of  how insanely quick everything can pass.

We were all grieving and likely still in complete shock, but there was this palpable sense of joy (?) all the same, at least for me.  We sat, as friends and family and strangers, at long tables pushed together - sharing our food, our sorrow, our lives.

Last night I dreamed I was grilling meat, which is a fairly common waking-life event for me.  But in the dream, I was grilling for a large group of people in a strange place.  I remember grilling cuts of beef and chicken; there was a particular cut of beef which had a large black, bruised area — I tried to ask someone about it but my question was never heard.  The real strangeness came when I realized one of the cuts of meat was actually me - I was cooking myself!  I found it to be an abhorrent idea to eat my own flesh, but couldn’t tell it apart from the other cuts of meat.

And it’s funny - while being anxious about the possibility of eating myself, I neglected to notice I was quite intact - no missing limbs, muscles, etc.

So alright, my zero+ — interpretations?

I had this dream last night.  It was one of those very long, drawn out dreams - it seemed to last forever and jumped back and forth on the brief stepping stones of wakefulness throughout the night.

I have several varieties of recurring dreams.  I used to (and rarely still do) dream of the ocean.  At some point I began to dream of cities - usually New York but sometimes Chicago or others.  In the past couple years, I have dreamed of Williamsburg.  I am usually lost in my city dreams, searching and climbing open-air white staircases, or wandering unknown streets.  I am lost and seeking my friends.  The Williamsburg dreams generally include my Dad in some way, and I am always trying to get to the colonial parts before they close down for the night.  Old Navy has had more than a few cameos in my WBG dreams.  Heh.

Last night’s dream is still a bit jumbled.  I distinctly remember the main part, but the edges are fuzzy.  I was away from home, on a trip with friends.  It was a mesh of all three dream themes, but entirely different.  We were cooking for each other, and that was very important for me in the dream.  But there were tunnels to navigate — not necessarily dark or eerie, but child-tunnels — the kind you see kids happily climb through in city playgrounds.

In a particularly open and colorful part of a tunnel, I was pulled aside and kissed by a man who in waking life I once had an interest; an interest that was not reciprocated.  In the dream, he said, “Ask me any question, and I will answer.”  But I stumbled with words, though I knew I only wanted to ask “Why now?  Why here?  Why not then?”  So I was quiet, but we continued through the tunnel as a couple, and when we emerged we held hands and worked on plans to cook for our friends.  Lasagna, maybe?  I almost recall something like that.

…

I do love dreaming, and I do love to attempt to interpret dreams.  It was a beautiful and vibrant dream - joyous, even; but when I awoke and realized it wasn’t reality, I began to feel bitter and alone.  These feelings have clouded my head all day in not so pleasant ways.

I have been feeling especially lonely lately.  I dislike saying that; it pisses me off.  I am stubborn and want to be independent.  I don’t want to want the feel of another’s lips on mine to be the thing that puts me at ease.  But sometimes I *do* want that - need it even - despite all I’ve heard about how one should be happy in being alone in order to be happy with another.

…

Sigh.  And smile.  Writing about it to the zero+ people who actually read this has helped me.  Yes, I’m lonely as hell, frustrated and…scared.  But it’s good to talk.  And especially to talk about this dream, which has stayed with me today, for the good or the bad.

I really, truly love taking pictures of people.  It digs into a part of me no other medium can dig.  I’m not trying to be pretentious — really — there’s  something to taking portraits I just love.  I love…people.

And sometimes that lends me to being in over my head, as I have 1 hour and 7 minutes to finish processing a wedding.  A wedding which occurred two months ago, and for which I was paid.  Ugh!

I love it.  I love people.  I do not love being responsible for pictures.

I stepped back in time –

lilac, irises, boxwood.

This was once my home.

The Quiet brings a

clarity of thought unknown

to my everyday

…

I can let it out

and the Quiet doesn’t mind

We are quite a pair!

Stuck in the middle

Half of each but not a whole

Consarned genetics