I recently got an “aniversary” reminder from Outskirts Press that it had been a year since I signed up.  And I’m no closer to finishing and publishing any of the books I’ve planned since that time.

{sigh}

After the gas pump clicked itself off at exactly $17, I went into Super Kiss to hear a customer unable to grasp the concept of not getting the free dinner with purchasing 3 car washes when he only wanted one.

I immediately recognized his annoying voice as “Paul”, someone I worked with during the 2000 census.  He was mind-ragingly moronic and offensive, almost as if his one life’s skill was finding and pushing people’s buttons ad infinitum for no reason.

If another attendant hadn’t opened another line, I assuredly would have told him to get the hell out of the store if he wasn’t buying what they were selling on their terms.  That poor cashier …

We finally gave up on the wood stove.  Too many delays, and them not knocking on the door loud enough for three adults and a dog in line of sight of it to know anyone was there (and hence missing any opportunity for them to finish beyond deconstruction) … we just asked for our money back, and got it.

The house is well insulated and the furnace is really efficient; managing wood and the stove itself would be more of a pain on afterthought.  It would have been worth the trouble for a fireplace, but the chimney wasn’t built for it.

We’re going with a fish tank.

Side note: When they deconstructed the faux fireplace facade, we found a lot of interesting things.  Photos, a pay stub for Seneca Red Hots, a $100 US Savings bond (1985) owned by someone with an address on the next street, an add for a free dress with purchase of laundry soap, random playing cards and a die … we’ve offered to return the stuff to the previous owner and haven’t heard back.

I was buying an email gift card for my wife today (don’t worry, she never reads this blog) over the phone, as the company wanted to charge me a shipping fee if I purchased through the site.

When I asked the rep if they accepted PayPal, she said “I don’t know what that is.”

“You never heard of PayPal?”

“No.”

“Are you in the United States?” (She didn’t have any accent I could make out, just a cute little American teen voice, but I could think of no other explanation.)

“Yes.”

“Have you heard of eBay?”

“Yes”

I tried to explain that it was a merchant system that millions of companies used all the time, but she thought I meant it was a type of credit card, which would have opened up a whole other can of worms, so I dropped it.

It was almost 10 years ago that it was hard to find anyone who knew what it was.  That’s forever ago in the Internet age. 

What are they teaching these kids these days?

Whiteouts today, a few feet of snow over the last couple days.

And our family holiday parties have begun with a Yule gathering at some in-laws tonight.  Mwerry kept joking about how she’s love to have some online friends from down south in the back seat watching us drive through all this, half the time with the hazards on.

But in spite of it all, we can’t go anywhere near the malls — consumers are spending like crazy!  Must be that “recession” we keep hearing about, and in the midst of the “global warming crisis” at that.  Sometimes life with your eyes open is just too damn ironic.

We had a horrific discovery yesterday — the box with all our Christmas ornaments is missing.  We last saw it packed up for the move, and know it is neither here nor there.  We don’t see them being stolen, and I wonder if they got caught up with donated items in all the confusion in early August.

But this isn’t about “decorations” — it’s about ornaments from the Old Country, the Great Depression, two world wars, relatives that passed, trips and travels, childhood memories, small photos, gifts on our first newlywed Christmas, and the signed cards from our wedding that Merry turned into ornaments.  Even the traditional pickle that was hidden on the tree since long before Merry met me as a multi-generation family tradition.

We have some money to buy new ones, but few of them could come close to ever being replaced.  It’s times like these that the impermanence of things falls around you, and you want to cling to memories that you know may someday fade as well.  And now looking at a Christmas tree will never be the same.

Our first Christmas here in the new house … the excitement of Merry buying me a Santa Fe train like I had growing up and setting it up under the tree is bittersweet.  Nothing is ever the same as we remember it.   And we walked a mile or so each way in the snow with a wagon last weekend to buy a real tree down the street, picking one that had room for the huge collection of ornaments that are now … it’s hard for me to say it yet … gone.  We can only hope to fill them in with equally memory-invoking items over the years and pass down what’s left.

It makes me question all the silly things that I’ve saved over the years — paperwork and records that are factual but not really about life, in comparison to things that are worth remembering and retelling to the people you Love.  Hopefully this will be a sort of fresh start for the better in some small way.

I met with a professional coach / consultant and they told me lots of stuff I already knew I should be doing, but couldn’t listen to myself.  One change I am implementing right now is to have a set (yet flexible) schedule for work (Kentropolis) versus all the other stuff I do.  It’s more of a challenge than I thought, but already I feel rewarded with being able to leave work behind me, yet get work done when I need to.  Who ever would have thought?  Then again, the holiday and having a house guest has made it more of a challenge, so I shouldn’t speak too soon!

I found another Amish farm to get eggs Thursday and got stuck in the mud leaving the place.  I couldn’t see the drainage ditch under the snow — fortunately it was shallow and “Ben” had gravel to shovel under the tires.  A little pushing helped, too, especially to get up the incline back onto the road.  It was really muddy and slippery from snow.

Ben felt bad but I insisted it wasn’t his fault or a big deal.  “Your car is all muddy!”

“Cars can be washed.”  Little did he know I would put off washing my car just to revel in the manly pride I so rarely enjoy with “Orinoco” my ZX2 Sport.

$2.50/gallon yesterday and falling another dime today.  Probably less than what I was paying when I first started driving 20 years ago (Adjusted for inflation, of course).  And now the barrel is supposed to drop under $40?  Must be the fault of those greedy oil execs everyone is always talking about, LOL.

More of the same. It’s a curse having a philosophy degree, seeing clearly yet being able to do little about nonsense in the greater world of mass sentiment. The frustration comes from knowing the difference between accepted opinions and emotional please on one side, scientific data and rational arguments on the other … when Gore gets his Nobel prize ripped from his hands, the world will be sane again, at least in one small way.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2008/11/16/do1610.xml

A couple days ago, Merry’s friend Dawn lives in Kaisertown and says she saw what looked like Lydia in front of the woods near her house.  She was on her way to work, but reported it to Merry who left me a note.

I spent about an hour combing the woods and field at Mineral Springs and South Ogden, calling her name, and shaking a container of cat food.  No luck.  It was a bigger area than I thought it would be.  We might put out fliers near there.

I’ve never been so happy as I am now at this time in my life.  By happy, I don’t mean ecstatic or exuberant, but blissfully content.  Apart from a few snags here and there, Merry shares in our occasional questioning, “Why are we so HAPPY?”

Having a house is just a thing, but having a home … that is a place, a platform from which to reach from, psychologically, emotionally.  We have a place for each other that we can call our own — something to work for and work on together, building all sorts of dreams that suddenly seem so much reachable.

So when I went upstairs and looked out the window, it took me a moment to see it wasn’t rain but snow, and that the ground was white, not green.  I went downstairs, shouting to Merry to look out the window.  We met at the foyer, and in eachother’s arms, it was like we saw snow for the first time.  “Why are we so happy to see snow?”

Some questions answer themselves, silently, beyond words.