Zeitgeist

Well. We made it through NaBloPoMo. Me as a writer, and you as a poor reader, someone who had to slog through gimme posts and barely coherent scribble, with a worthwhile thing or two in between.

I got the email about the end of NaBloPoMo today, and it had the topic for December (some people try to write every day of the year, with themed months -- I am not once of those people). And the topic is "zeitgeist," the challenge: " You have 31 days to try to capture the mood of your culture and your life as they exist right now. Use every tool in your blog box: words, photos, music...?"

Which sounds like an awesome challenge. So, although I won't be writing every day in December, I do hope to crank out a good 10 or 12 (hopefully worthwhile) posts on the topic. And, for ease, I'll tag them all zeitgeist. That being said -- so long, November!

Peace in Paperback

If you catch me and I don't escape you...

I would probably read a lot more books if I didn't love to re-read books. When I try to decide what to read next, I stand in front of my bookcase, head tilted. My hands float involuntarily up to the spines on the shelf. This one worn, this one ruffled at the bottom from being dipped too many times in the bathwater. My fingers run along the top edges, getting caught up in the bookmarks of half-finished reads. Maybe I'll return to this one or that one. Maybe I'll start something new -- one I got for my birthday this year or last year, something I picked up from the used book store on vacation.

I contemplate. But more times than not, my hand grabs something I've read before. My mind refused to take on the impossible unknown in the stead of the magnificent known. These words will be more than enough. I know they will.

***

Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,

Missing me one place search another,

I stop somewhere waiting for you

I've been re-reading Middle Age: A Romance by the ever incredible, ever amazing, ever human (and superbly so) Joyce Carol Oates.

The amazing thing about books is that they never change; but reading them multiple times over the years, you always see something different. Books hold up a mirror to your own changes. There are two books for which this is especially true for me -- Middle Age: A Romance and A Girl Could Stand Up. Both are books about unique friendships between a boy and a girl. Before I made the friendship that would change how I looked at every friendship, both those before and after. Between the first time I read them and now, reading one again, having read the other again, I see how important these books are.

"Marina understood that Adam had many friends, and he was a man who enjoyed plying them with sudden sharp questions. It was known that Adam's interests were impassioned but curiously impersonal You would never get to know the man intimately. But you might get to know yourself."

Have you ever read a sentence in a book so familiar, you think it's been written about yourself? Get the feeling that somewhere out there, you're just a character in someone else's novel. This whole beautiful wild infuriating world, built and created just for you?

Books can be spooky like that. Can catch your breath up in the back of your throat. Are you breathing? Do you want to be? It's like a conversation with someone who understands you more than you thought possible. Like reading your own thoughts written down in a diary and sent back in time, de-identified or classified for your protection.

***

If you catch me and if I don't escape you...

Without even trying, I found the Adam Behrendt to my Marina Troy, the Raoul Person to my Elray Mayhew. The things I first found beautiful, infurating about those relationships, I find here. I read the lines and I am reading about myself.

There is peace in paperback, in reading lines to a story that is about you. One you didn't have to bother to write, because it's right there. Waiting to be discovered. Or re-discovered, as the case may be.

Spoiled and Melting

"Then looking upwards

I strain my eyes and try

To tell the difference between shooting stars and satellites

From the passenger seat as you are driving me home."

I got in the habit, years ago, of riding in the passenger seat. Two years of being here, alone, without Joey. In the habit of riding in cars with other people, people who love to drive. I got spoiled, never having to drive, always being in the passenger seat.

I like to relinquish control. In this way, and in other ways too -- forever, I've assumed (I've written about this before, I'm sure) that it's a reflex, a "fuck you" to the control I have in my professional life. I can't tell my boss to fuck off when he tells me I need to do some work that will, surprise surprise, take up much more of my holiday than I want. I have to be there late. I do things that require a lot of self-disclipline. There.

But here, I don't want to take control. Don't want to be in the driver's seat. Literally.

But Joey also doesn't like to drive, and he usually sleeps in the car, so I end up at the wheel, listening to Death Cab or TV on the Radio, my hand on his leg as he drifts off.

But sometimes, I'm lucky. He's awake, takes the keys in his hands. I sit in the passenger seat and relax. Spoiled. Melting. I'm not too hard to please, really. Sometimes, I just want to be a passenger. This, and nothing more.

"With my feet on the dash

The world doesn't matter.

When you feel embarrassed then i'll be your pride

When you need directions then i'll be the guide

For all time."

ZZZzzzz

Today is the only true day of vacation I have -- read: the only day of vacation when I don't have to go to the lab and feed cells. I've celebrated by sleeping, sleeping, and sleeping. I woke up at 11:30 AM, took my first nap at 1:30 PM and my second nap at 5 PM. Now it's 9:15ish, and I'll be asleep before too long, I'm pretty sure.

This day, by the way, has been really telling. I apparently live life on the fringe of exhaustion. I think I already knew that, but days like this remind me of how close I am to the edge. And really, I don't mind that much. It's just weird to have a day like this and realize -- Man, my life is insane.

Oh well. Carry on. C'est la vie.

Smokey, this isn't 'Nam. This is bowling. There are rules.

My life is run by a series of very serious rules. If by serious, I mean arbitrary and nonsensical rules that don't dictate anything of significance in life. And they mostly have to do with food.

Rules of Starbucks drinks: I cannot drink Pumpkin Spice Lattes until the first day of fall. I cannot drink Peppermint Mochas until after Thanksgiving, and I cannot drink them after New Years Day (this being a rule that is mostly in place to save my poor waistline).

Rules of holiday plates: Nothing should be touching anything else. This is an impossible rule for follow, but I strive for it every year. This especially goes for cranberry sauce and sweet potatoes. I failed on both fronts last night.

Rules of Reese's Holiday Shapes: The higher the peanut butter: chocolate ratio, the better. Eggs are the ultimate in Reese's holiday shapes. The big eggs, not those mini-shit one they started rolling out in later years. Also, the more traditional ones trump the newer versions. Christmas trees are classic, so they also place high. Eggs > Christmas Trees > Pumpkins > Hearts.

Rules of flavored candy: The acceptable method for eating flavored candy is least favorite --> favorite.

Sweetarts: Yellow, orange, blue, green, pink, purple. (Purple recently and unexpectedly overthrew pink for first place. I'm not sure how that happened.

Starburst: Lemon, Orange, Cherry, Strawberry

Skittles: Lemon, orange and lime eaten three at a time (one of each flavor) until all are gone. Then purple (grape, I guess?). Then red.

Tootsie Roll Pops: Grape, Orange, Cherry, Raspberry, Chocolate. Once, in high school, I went through a big Tootsie Roll Pop phase. My mom kept buying bags of them for me, and I kept eating my least favorite first. However, just as soon as I finished my two least favorites, she would bring a new bag and I would have to eat all of the least favorites from that bag before I could eat the good ones from the other bags. Eventually, I had to get her to stop buying them, because I was only ever eating the terrible ones, leaving quite an untouched stash of my favorites.

Basically, what I think I'm trying to say: It is exhausting being me.

Live From The Lab, It's Thanksgiving Night

So, what does the girl who just dismantled the cell shaker with a hex key at 11 PM on Thanksgiving have to be thankful for?

A cell shaker to dismantle. Cells that go on that shaker -- an 120 mg yield of cells, more than I've had in a long time. Thankful for a lab to go to -- a lab that pays me to go to school. I'm thankful to escape from higher learning with very little debt. I'm thankful that I live in a country where I, as a woman, can be freely educated. Can be free, period. I'm thankful for all of the women scientists who've gone before me. All of the women who've gone before me.

I have a full stomach, and I'm thankful for that. Thankful for a local family full of friends who invite us for Thanksgiving when we have no other place to go. Thankful for all of the people here who love me with a crazy powerful love. Thankful for getting hugs from their mothers when we leave. Thankful for hugs from mothers.

I'm thankful for my lab mates, for all of the people who know me. Really know me. Thankful for text messages and Facebook messages. Thankful for phone calls and emails. Thankful for laughter and sorrow, and for those who share equal parts in those emotions. Thankful for unending patience. And more patience. And more.

I'm thankful that we'll be able to go home tomorrow to see parents, siblings, cousins, old friends. Thankful for having those people. Thankful for close family. Thankful that I am old enough to know that not all families are close and, then, thankful for knowing I ought to be thankful. Thankful for a boy to warm my feet in bed. Thankful that he's still here after Thanksgiving 2006.

Thankful that I made it out of sickness and into (relative) health. Thankful for a strong mind, for strong quads and strong lungs, a heart that pumps strong despite the murmur found in March. Thankful that I could have, so many times, fallen out or down and didn't. Thankful for titanium rods and mood stabilizers. Thankful for living in a time when my hardest medical problems don't have to kill me.

Thankful for all of the beautiful things in life -- for health and balance, for love and its derangements. Thankful, always, for friends. For family. For good coworkers and people who care.

Despite the fact that I am at work on Thanksgiving night, I don't really mind that much. I have so many things to be thankful for. Who am I to complain?

(Today, at least. Tomorrow, complaining is certainly back on the table. I'm not a saint, after all).

One of My Favorite Things

Once upon a time, I stumbled onto this gem of an essay by Kevin Keck. Entiteld "Lost In Translation," it is one of the best essays I've ever read about the connections (and misunderstandings) of a family.

Each year I spend away from the home where I grew up, I get a greater understanding of what this essay is really about. Right now, much of my life is un-translatable to my parents. We first reached this point when I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. I was in a situation -- a bunch of situations, and they were all shitty -- where my parents could offer no guidance. I was suddenly out of the realm of their experiences. We were lost together. And though we both ended up finding our ways to deal with those new things, we still can't effectively find a way of translating that to each other. It was scary to be a daughter with fucked up feelings, who'd almost trashed the best things she'd had in life for those feelings. It was scary to have a daughter who'd always seemed to capable and high achieving, with a solid life and a sweet fiance, turn into a tornado of emotional destruction. We were both scared, but unable to translate that fear into comfort with each other. Even now, as I can intellectually describe what that time must have been like for them (terrifying, disorienting, helpless), I will not be understand what it likes to fear for my child until I have a child. Keck's assertion that we will never quite speak the same language is such a spot-on observation. And a hard thing to admit. There will always be things between us that we don't understand.

My favorite part, the point that brings it home:

Thinking of all this, I am filled with remorse — a beautiful word that comes from old French which literally means to be bitten again. And I am bitten continually. When I see my parents with my children, I feel trapped as a thought between two languages, with no adequate word in either tongue to express what I am feeling.

The idea of being bitten continually -- by heart-wrenching love, guilt, fear -- is such an apt one. And the exposition of the word "remorse" as being bitten again -- by these things, and others -- is one that follows me often. This phrase is forever in my head. Because the emotion I most often feel with respect to that time in my life (which was, coincidentally, smack-dab in Thanksgiving 2006, easily the craziest I've ever been) is remorse. I am sad that I waited too long to get help. I am bitten by love for my family and friends who supported me. I am bitten by guilt that they had to do it, for me, in the first place. I am bitten by fear that they will someday have to do it again. I am bitten by hope -- blind beautiful hope -- that I don't have to worry about that fear. I am bitten by so many things. And, I think, partially due to this essay, I am able to recognize how often I am bitten, and how lucky I am. How lucky we are, as family, to have each other. And how family -- beyond blood -- is about trying our best to translate. Even if we fail miserably. And we do. We often do. But we keep trying.

(Note on the author -- Last year after I posted this here, Kevin Keck sent me the nicest email saying he had read what I had written about the essay. I love it when an author reaches out to his or her readers to make a connection. He seems like a truly stand-up guy. Also, everything I've ever read by him has been equal parts hilarious, thoughtful, and touching. This, I've discovered, takes much skill. Take some time and check him out.)

From The Vault: The Hues and Overtones of Manic Depression

[Note -- This is from this current blog and it was cross-posted to Real Mental. However, I wanted to re-post it because I think it is my favorite thing I've ever written. I have to admit that I am not always as clear-headed as I am in this post, which was written at the end of a time when I had been less effectively medicated. It's about my decision to stay medicated, and I like to go back and read it when I'm struggling. The urge to feel super-human still comes, sometimes. I'm glad I wrote this post when I did, as both a note of understanding to my past and a note of hope to my future.]

Being an Art Star is about struggling to remember.
[Rev Jen]

So, the experiment is over. But I still haven't finishing processing the experience. I've been mulling over it in my head for a few days, now, turning it over and over. Last night, as I drove home, I had a series of small revelations.

Bipolar disorder gives me colors, hues that "normal" people can't understand. My mania is the color behind your eyelids when you look at the sun with your eyes closed. It burns brightly and strongly, and it is hard [so hard] to turn away. You can't move--it's just there.

My depression is the black-blue in the center of bruises, the color that sits dully, the one that makes you cringe when you press it. It reminds you of pain. It is tender to the slightest touch.

I told Joe that I wanted to stop feeling the feelings the other day, and most of that is true. But a small part of me, the smallest part per billionth aches for the feelings. It's the part that relished their return, the part that wanted to get out of bed and drive around the city, the part that wanted to drape itself down a staircase and cry. It's the part that feels most alive when it feels sick, the part that wants to smile at the cars that drive by. The part that wants to break itself into pieces, the part that wants to fuck and fight and talk shit and sleep and cut. It is self-destructive and can be [was once] all-consuming.

So we talk about why I want to take more medicine. Yesterday, I had some depressed moments. I thought of driving to the lab, stealing one of the razor blades. The fantasies expanded, more than they ever have [I've never cut]. I thought of which one I would chose, the one least likely to have chemicals on it. I would boil a pot of water and drop the razor in. I would wait, slowly, patiently. When it was done, I would lift it up. When it cooled down, enough to use but still warm with the memory of water, I would press it in. Where? Somewhere less noticeable. Not the flashy, needy, begging wrists, no matter how much that vein shines and pulsates out. No. The ankle, perhaps. The upper shoulder.

The upper shoulder--when I first started treatment, I would write on my left shoulder in brown thin line Sharpie. I would remind myself that there were four things that were important, that I wanted, that I needed: prayer, honesty, fidelity, love. The things you turn to when razors cut across your mind, the things you turn to when you are stuck.

So I remember that the only thing that can fight a broken mind is that same mind, wanting to be fixed. That same mind, that same ache for things to be ok. It's the aching yearning mind that reaches out for help. That mind compels you to talk when you don't want to. That mind helps you remember that the palette you have in your mind is beautiful but poisonous. Bright things usually are.

So, with one part relishing the darkness, wanting desperately to succumb to the heaviness of depressed eyelids, the other parts push back, open the mouth, and say--to whoever is listening, but mostly to that one rogue part--"I want to stop feeling that being human is an irrevocable injustice."

This is why you keep living. This is why you keep shaking the pills into your hand. This is why you torture yourself with therapy, why you eventually give up all of the bad thoughts you've been hoarding. For true happiness and true sadness, for human emotion that your human peers can relate to and comfort. For this, you give up being a superhuman. For this, you finally become what you're meant to be. Yourself.

The Important Things

My brother is visiting. Unexpectedly, kind of. I told him he should just ride back with me on Saturday. He did. Today, he drove me to work.

After work, we all went to our favorite tacqueria, because it's cheap fish taco night. Then, we came home, threw hot chocolate ice cream in the blender with milk, graham crackers, marshmallows, Hershey bars. Drank s'more-flavored milkshakes out of blue plastic cups with straws.

Then, we watched 4 episodes of How I Met Your Mother.

I could probably think of a better way to spend an evening if I tried. But I'm not trying

Zen and the Art of Emotional Maintenance

The leaves are finally changing colors and beginning to fall off the trees. I've been waiting for this, the explosion of reds, oranges and yellows (my favorites, easily). The colors are consolation for the impending cold. "Yes, you'll be freezing your asses off soon -- but look! Red!" And like a sucker, I take it. Even stevens. My heavy coat, your insistence that my entire world be orange.

And the weather, hot damn! This afternoon, I drove through town with the windows down, AC on. This evening, windows down, heat on. The hot humid breezes of the summer have given way to real breezes, to something cool that snakes across my skin. The air smells smoky, delicious, full-bodied, more substantial. Promising.

***

I spent last fall unhappy at work. "The Autumn of My Discontent," I may have said once or twice, or twenty times. I wasn't at all happy with the second lab I'd been saddled with; as it became more apparently how much I was a member of that lab, I became even grumpier. I spend months being nothing but grumpy at work.

I spent my time outside of work getting suh-massshed. Every weekend, stumbling in and out of bars, taking drags on clove cigarettes as we weaved our ways home, stopping to take pictures. My initials carved into tables in bars. Hopping back and forth, and then back again to the first bar, hours later. Guinness. Shock Top. Yuengling. Soco and Diet Coke. My consoling solutions to my discontent.

I don't regret those evenings spent drinking, not at all. From what I remember, they were all a blast (until I inevitably puked). I don't pretend that my life now is even more reasonable (believe me, it's not). I'll still get trashed at holiday parties. I will most likely puke on New Year's. But the in-betweens are still much calmer. I crave cloves, but don't acquiesce because I know I'll regret it later when I run -- I've traded one dopamine high for another. The same with the booze -- it doesn't make sense when I have to run the next day. I've done it once or twice. And felt so dumb later. I'm not the best at learning my lesson, but I'm trying. I've tried.

***

Self-medicating. We all do it, right? With food, with booze or pot. With sex or sleep or exercise. There's always a tipping scale, a balance that is most difficult to hold. All of these things, in balance, are fine, good, beautiful. A good dark beer, a good crisp crust on a creme brulee. An afternoon nap, a good long run.

But in excess, they leave you heavy or nauseous. I'm not saying I can always tell the difference. I've spent my time vomiting off porches or unbuttoning my jeans, icing knees that could have taken another day of rest, sitting sluggish for an evening because I've slept too damn long. Dopamine can be a cruel mistress. Ask your average crackhead; they'll tell you.

Small doses, my dear, my self. Baby sips. Function over form. Quality over quantity. If no other rule, then this.

***

There is zen here. Underneath electric blankets, riding the about-to-be-cut tags of new clothing. In cardigans and boots, in the coffee I've been drinking way too much of. Each white tablet, double what I was taking last year at this time -- zen. The beat of my feet against the sidewalk, a music player full of songs that make me want to move. A life that makes me want to move.

For now, a balance. For now.

Nostalgia

I went to the mountains last night with some of the members of my family, spent the evening playing Trivial Pursuit with my brother, his awesome girlfriend and one of my best friends from college. Woke up and ate Golden Grahams, a cereal that I haven't had in years (it was delicious), and watched Toy Story 3 with my dad while sitting underneath my new heated blanket. The air was cool, but not too cold, and when I was moving between the house and my car to load more suitcases, I ran down the stairs to the house -- one foot on each long step, running until I reached a complete stop and almost fell over at the bottom -- like I've done one hundred (or more) times in my life.

The house changes, mutates each time I go, each time I sleep on a different couch or bed. I've never noticed, until now -- when I have my own home, when I would love to buy a home -- how charming the house is, how lovely it would be for entertaining guests. And how well laughter carries out of it, across walls and down the pipes into the downstairs bedrooms.

Few houses come into your life and stay there, holding tiny pieces of your memory and personality. Stepping into them is like falling through time, settling in and smiling. Hitting a "reset" button. Sometimes, life just needs a "reset" button.

Shit My Coworkers Say

"Good morning, Baby Jesus!"

***

"Hey, uh, it looks like you have some more bottles to wash."
"Why don't you go fuck yourself!"

***

"You know, we're supposed to feed the cells every day."
'Yesn"
"You know what the problem is with your cells?"
"No."
"You need to feed them every day."

***

"Get off my nuts!"

Eff PETA, Support Animal Research

Rebekah over at Dusting Myself Off (otherwise known as My Oldest Friend In The World, Because She Was Born Twelve Days Before Me and Our Parents Were Friends) wrote a post yesterday about PETA's ad that plays off of the new TSA scanners. While I have many many bones to pick with this particular ad (and other PETA ads that body snark about how vegetarians are thin and more fit than omnivores), I was reminded that I've been meaning to write a post here about a topic close to my line of work: PETA and animal research.

I'll start, first, by telling you how much I love animals. All of my life, I have had animals. We had our dog Arthur since before I could remember. After he died, it was a string of other dogs (Hershey, Ezra, Joy and Jill, Oliver, Heidi, Dr. Octopus, now Annabelle and Al Godfrey). Many of these were strays who wandered into our yard, some of them old and decrepit. Dr. Octopus, my favorite, was obviously abandoned by someone. He was ancient, with a gray muzzle, missing teeth and a bum back leg. We didn't think he'd live very long, but we loved him into another three years. He was smart, obviously trained -- he came to us knowing how to catch things we threw, how to shake hands. I loved him so much and was so sad when he died; he was so old, but so full of life that I'd somehow become convinced he would live forever.

It's not just dogs, though. My mother is an elementary school teacher, and we've gone through quite a few small mammals and reptiles -- turtles and lizards, a snake, countless guinea pigs, hamsters and gerbils. My favorite of these was Junie B, a rat she had acquired from who-knows-where. She was one of the best natured animals I'd ever met (though, actually, all of the rats I've worked with have been mild) -- she even won over my not-usually-taken-with-animals father, who fed her cereal and Cheetos when my mom wasn't watching.

Me & Junie B, circa 2006. I am wearing clothes, I promise -- it was an unfortunate decision to take this picture in a tube top, I'm aware.

And there were the rabbits. From the age of eight or so, through about 12, I raised a series of rabbits. The first one we bought as part of Mission India, a mission my church participated in; the idea was to make a fifteen dollar investment, and then to grow this investment and donate the money to the mission. My parents decided that my investment would be a pregnant rabbit; I would then raise the babies and we would sell them. This plan was working swimmingly until my parents let it slip that my buyers might want to eat the rabbits! I threw a fit, and my family ended up giving them to a man who raised rabbits in his barn. Although, recently, thinking about making this blog post, I thought to myself: "My mom said he was a man who owned a lot of bunnies, and they just ran around free in his bar--fuck, those rabbits totally got eaten."

Another time, I adopted a bunny that had been won at a carnival and were unwanted by the child who won them. I remember at that point that we weren't prepared to take her on, and she had to stay outside her first night, and she were already sick. And the next morning, before anyone was awake, I slipped outside to check on her, and she was cold. I had already named her Sarah Louise, and I was devastated that she was dead. I cried at school all day long; this memory is still as vivid to me as if I'd lived it yesterday.

I love animals. I even love rodents, rats, rabbits. And now, I do animal research. I do it unabashedly, unashamed. And I do it for one reason -- as much as I love animals, I love humanity even more. I want to be helpful to society. I hate that I have to kill animals; but more than that, I hate the people have to suffer for years and die because their kidneys fail and never recovery. Anything I can do to alleviate that suffering, I will do.

I have never witnessed anything unethical in all of my time working with animals. There are strict rules that MUST be followed, and anyone who does not follow these rules can get banned from doing animal research. There are rules about euthanasia (for example, carbon dioxide euthanasia can only be used in rodents, and it is mandatory to do either cervical dislocation or thoracotomy after they stop breathing to make sure that they do not wake up during organ harvesting. I do all three: carbon dioxide, cervical dislocation, then thoracotomy). There are rules about pain management -- every time I do a survival surgery on a mouse, I give it Buprenex, an opioid pain reliever. I have been taught the signs of distress in animals, and I've been taught how to manage that distress. I separate mice who fight (and it's always mice; lab mice have aggression bred into them accidentally, unfortunately). I have had, all told, probably 24 hours of animal care instruction. Imagine that -- an entire day, sitting in front of a monitor, learning how to properly care for these animals that I use.

Even rabbits. Yes, the same animals that I kept as pets when I was a child -- at least once a week, I walk to the animal facility. I use a badge to enter the room where the rabbits are kept. I choose the calmest one, walk over to it, pet it on the head and then grab it to move it to the cage. It's not always pleasant. Sometimes they are scared, no matter how soothingly you talk to them. Sometimes, they are so distressed, they scream (yes, rabbits scream, though very rarely; yes, it's unnerving; yes, I choose another rabbit because I don't want to exacerbate a screaming rabbit's distress). I put them in a small cage, cover their eyes, walk out of the room with their heads tucked beneath my arm, because it comforts them. Once in the surgery suite, I pet their heads and call them "baby." I lie to them and tell them everything will be ok. Then, I inject a needle into their ear and wait as my partner slowly pushes a barbiturate into the vein. I wait for them to heave a big sigh, then slowly stop breathing.

Then I take their kidneys back to my lab, and I spend hours getting them into a cell dish. And then, I do experiments that I hope will one day lead to better treatment for human disease. The primary cells are preferable because they act most like human cells, physiologically. We take great care to make sure they respire correctly. The thing we want to avoid is injury to humans. This thing is the one thing that informs all of our animal research.

PETA paints us as killing machines, monsters who refuse to use other methods. They suggest we use cell lines -- transformed cells that often do not behave like the human cells in a human body. They suggest that we do epidemiological studies (some do, but that doesn't get us closer to new drugs); they suggest that we do clinical studies. We all HOPE to do clinical studies some day, but there is such a high burden on us, the evil scientists, to make sure that our drugs are as SAFE AS POSSIBLE before they ever pass into a human body. And even that system is not perfect -- not a day goes by that I don't see some advertisement: "Do you have heart failure/vomiting/intractable depression/a child with a birth defect? That might be due to a medicine you took! Hop on the bandwagon and get your money!" More than half of all drugs designed and tested in animals fail in humans; can you imagine what would happen if we didn't do animal testing? Thousands and thousands of drugs that were aborted before they got to humans would not have failed; more humans dead, injured, as a result of negligence. That's what it boils down to.

It takes approximately 17 years and 2 billion dollars to get a drug from its first stages of development to the market. Animal research is an integral part of that process -- it provides a necessary bridge between cells and humans. A bridge, I promise you, that every human wants to be in place. Our animals do not die in vain -- they save human lives. Either by leading us to a new drug, or leading us away from an ineffective or, worse, harmful drug. They save lives.

Animals have been responsible for some of the most life-changing advances in medicine. They brought around insulin (which saved the lives of how many diabetic children?) and heart transplants. They help us understand complicated neural processes, like what goes on when a child is abandoned. Animal research has not always been ethical, but so many steps have been taken to make sure that these animals are well cared for. And care, we do.

For example, PF (our lab tech) accidentally killed a mouse in an anesthesia induction chamber while he was teaching me a common surgery we use. He pulled it out of the chamber and begged it to start breathing, using one finger to do chest compressions on its tiny heart. And our post-doc once spend 5 minutes trying to get a mother rat to recognize some abandoned babies. "I need to tell someone," she said frantically, "or they'll die from neglect." She later laughed at the irony, that she was so worried about them when they would eventually die. But it's not surprising, really. We aren't heartless cruel people. We all wish that it wasn't necessary. But we know that it is. We have intellectually separated ourselves from the process. We acknowledge the sacrifice that these animals give, and we respect them for that sacrifice.

PETA would have you believe that we are all terrible robots who don't give a shit about animals. They somehow try to hammer in this point by using oversexualized ads that don't even begin to touch the surface of the issues. They invade labs and release animals that have been institutionalized, not realizing the cost of that action. They protest with visceral images of animals that have been stripped of all of their context. They are sensationalists. They don't ask for dialogue. They have never learned how to pick their battles, how to separate animal research for cosmetics (which I'm not particularly in support of) from animal research for medicine (totally necessary). They get it all wrong. They don't even try to get it right.

And still, I have a job to do. And that job is to help people. To save lives. To alleviate suffering.

So, once a week, I go to the rabbit room, and I choose one from the wall of cages. I pet its head as I put it down. It should break my heart. But by virtue of emotional distancing and knowledge of a bigger purpose, it doesn't.

How Joey Feels About Blogging

"I'm going to bed."

"Ok, I'll be there soon, I need to write a blog."

"No, you don't."

"Yes, I do, you know I have to write each day in November."

"....BLOGS ARE FOR WUSSES."

Odds & Ends

1) There Is No Me Without You

I was lying down in bed with Joey, just now -- I'd been gathering laundry to throw in the washer, and he'd been going to bed, and he pushed me over onto the bed (laughing) and threw his arm over me. "You're in bed, now," he said, "now you have to go to sleep with me!"

So, I threw my legs over his for a few minutes and we talked. I'd rather not mention how we got to this lame topic of conversation, but we were talking about Pokemon and how he and my brother used to collect the cards. "Jim called me one day," he said smiling, "to try to sell me a card, because your mother was doing a Pokemon card purge."

I remember that time in my life. He remembers it too, from the other side.

It's funny to me that he knew my brother long before he knew me, that they were friends before I knew he existed, before he knew I existed. I look back over the long long trail that took us from that point, not knowing each other in our teens, to meeting each other in high school, going to college together, moving in together. It's hard to imagine him, a boy, sitting talking on the phone to my brother. It's hard to remember that there was a point where he didn't exist for me, where I didn't exist for him. That we were so close to each other -- and yet, it seems, so far. That I would one day be sleeping in the same bed as that boy my brother was talking to on the phone -- in the scheme of everything, it would have seemed at that point an impossibility. Time has a way of shaking things out.

Sometimes the things that we thought were impossible were just waiting in the wings, sitting patiently around the corning waiting for us to come along.

2) Sisyphus, revisited

By the time I had read yesterday's Sweet Juniper post (today, at around 6), a picture had already been taken of the horrible state of affairs of my desk. Two weeks ago, on a day when I was home sick from work, Janet took the opportunity to clean my desk:

She did a great job, as you can see. Unfortunately for both of us, it didn't take me very long to restore it to its previous condition:


My desk stays like this for a reason...it's because I can find everything more easily this way. I never pretended that my life is anything other than barely controlled chaos. Still, the pictures tickled me, incontrovertible proof that I am (as two people who barely know me have recently commented) a mess, most definitely a mess.

Also, check out that sweet computer monitor! I take very intricate pictures of cells, and you can't imagine how awesome it is to see a giant image like this one:

Rabbit kidney cells I imaged on a confocal microscope -- the red structures are filamentous mitochondria. Aren't they beautiful!

3) Baby, I Got A Plan, Run Away Fast As You Can

One of the feelings I used to get with the mania was a restlessness, an itching in my nerves that made my feet twitch and my fingernails press into my palms. At night, I would lie in bed and imagine myself just taking off, running as fast as I could through the streets. I thought that this idea was just a fantasy, that I would never be able to just take off like that and run for hours. I would want it so bad.

Now, I'm not manic, but I can run for hours. I lace up my running shoes, step out into the darkness of the evening, and just take off. I run down near the river, where the moon reflects out and water sometimes splashes up the sidewalk. I run through tourists, college students. I run, and I keep doing it until I'm done. Until I stop, exhausted, after 3 miles, or 5, or 8.

Tonight, I couldn't go running because it was about to rain, so I walked to my car. The air was so comfortable, warm with a breeze that made me wrap my cardigan a little more tightly around me. Almost reflexively, I thought, "I want to go running in this. This would be so perfect."

And the knowledge that I can -- if I so choose -- take off into the night and run for hours, that feeling was so different, so much more pleasant that anything I ever would have imagined.

My Celebrity Fantasy

So, last January (as I've previously mentioned), I participated in a 10 week weight loss/fitness program at my gym. In this program, groups of participants (10-ish) are paired with trainers and mentors who've been through the program before. These teams do several weekly workouts together, and during the program, I was working out every day, sometimes multiple times a day. (I was a beast).

After the program ended, I kept my gym habits pretty high -- step, spin or pilates at least 3-4 times a week, often more. However, in August, I moved out of the gym and out to the street/greenway. When I started training for the run I'm doing in January (originally a marathon, although the goal has been amended to half-marathon), I stopped going to the gym, instead running 4-5 times a week. I've been to a few step classes here and there, because I miss my ladies, but other than that, I've mostly been absent from the gym.

However, in the last month or so, I've been hearing news about the gym. And that news is that a celebrity is using our gym now.

(image source)
Hint: it's one of these guys.

So this celebrity, we'll call him Phil Blurry, has been hitting up the morning classes for the past month. Spin classes! My spin classes! And Zumba classes! My Zumba classes! My trainer even had to frantically take Ghostbusters off her spin playlist the week before Halloween because Phil Blurry unexpectedly showed up. Phil Blurry! Up in my hizouse! Although I'm never there anymore to see him! Fate, you are such a cruel cruel mistress!

Lately, I have to admit, I've had a pretty vivid and constant celebrity fantasy going on in my head --

Next January, Phil Blurry decides to do the same fitness program I did. He happens to be put on my trainer's team, for which I will be mentoring. And we BECOME BEST FRIENDS. We go to spin classes and for runs with the rest of my team. When he is frustrated and exhausted, I encourage him to keep going. He spots me when I do bench presses. When I toss out the phrase "workout partner," casually, everyone knows I mean Phil Motherfucking Blurry!

Honestly, the fantasy keeps getting more vibrant and vibrant in my head, like it's actualy going to happen. I should probably start seeking professional help soon, right? Yeah, that's what I thought.

I'm also considering the possibility that my gym is paying Phil Blurry to work out there because they want more people to be physically fit. I mean, if you thought you might get to run into Phil Blurry, you might make a bigger effort to make it to the gym too. I know I am.

A Series of Absolutely Unrelated Open Letters To Things That Frustrate And/Or Enamor Me

Dear Moped Man,

Dude. You have a moped. I have a car. We are in a strip mall parking lot. There is bidirectional traffic on the road that runs through the mall. That road has a speed limit, presumably a low one, presumably because people need to be able to back out of the parking spaces without being jammed in the ass. I don't know who you think you are, but swerving around cars is a bad idea. One (me) presumes that you are on a moped because you have lost your driver's license; in my experience, that is how these things work. And I'd believe it, based on the way that you stupidly passed me going 25 miles an hour because you're impatient. For future reference: my vehicle, 2000 lbs; your vehicle, 200 lbs.

Love,

Me

Dear Bra That I Accidentally Bought From Target,

I was looking for a different bra last week at Target, when I saw you. I've been buying the same bra from there for years, now, and I even cheated on my I-Should-Be-Boycotting-Target-Because-They-Support-Anti-Gay-Candidates Boycott because I desperately needed a new one of you. Well, not you, exactly.

Here's the problem. I buy demi-plunge bras for a reason. 1) The cup doesn't show over tank-tops. 2) The plunge allows for a lower cut of tops, like in certain dresses. I'm young, I'm kind of cute. So, you know, those things work for me. I like my straps to fit under tank tops. I don't wear them often, but I like to be prepared.

While frantically looking for this style of bra, I found you. I picked you up as a "Just-In-Case," as in, "This-Would-Do-In-A-Pinch-If-I-Can't-Find-That-One" option. But then I found that one. In the right size and everything. So, satisfied, I put down the bra I would no longer be needing as a back up. Or, so I thought.

When I got home with you, I realized I had made a grave mistake. But I wore you anyway. You have super thick straps. And you are way too high up on my boob. And this is not working out.

I'm really sorry to break this to you, but you are an old lady bra. And you won't stop staying under my tank top today, so you are making me look like a trashy old lady. And it's really not working out for me. So I'm afraid we may need to break up. It's not you, it's me.

Well, it may be a little you too.

Sorry!

Me

Dear Target,

Alienating the gays was probably one of the dumbest things you could have ever done. I love your designer lines dearly -- how many of those were designed by awesome gay dudes? I bet a lot! Figure it out, and stop being a homophobe. Quick. I need a new bra.

Seriously,

Me

Dear Fellow Wal-Mart Customer,

I have no idea where you would possibly go to purchase a (non-hooded) sweatshirt that reads "University of OZ" with a picture of Toto on it. No, seriously. Where could you have possibly purchased that? And for what reason? I saw you 24 hours ago, and I can't stop thinking about you. My mind is completely blown.

Infatuatedly yours,

Me

Dear Marijuana,

If you were legal, I would probably smoke you more than the occasional hit once a year. In the mean time, thanks for helping me have these conversations with my stoner friends.

R (stoned): How strong are pheromones?

Me (not stoned): Uh, I don't know?

R (still stoned): Pheromones are very strong.

(30 minutes later)

R (pretty stoned): We might not have enough paper.

Me (still awfully sober): We have plenty of paper.

R (sooo stoned): We might have too much paper.

Keep cool (and I know you will),

Me

Giving Thanks For...

We had the first of three Thanksgivings this year -- a friend from the lab's parents are in town to do "their" Thanksgiving, so he and his wife (also in my lab) decided to invite over a lot of friends from the labs to do a proper Thanksgiving dinner.

There are few things as joyous as a big table of people eating delicious food that they've all shared a hand in preparing. Compliments are thrown out between bites and sips of wine. We burn off all the calories with laughter. During the more than four hours we were there, places at the table were continually swapped, and three or four conversations were going on at once. At one point, the father who was visiting asked us to introduce ourselves and explain how we know each other. This was one of the most fun exercises I've ever had to do, actually -- tracking how everyone got to this point, where we all know and are comfortable with each other, was surprising.

My favorite part, though, was all the absurdity. The only fight of the night was not over politics, but over which Star Wars movie is the best. We told long drawn out stories that ended up in hysterics. And one of our friends said, in utter seriousness, "Well...I think if Anne Hathaway and I ever met, she'd be really into me."

The Memory Keeper

A conversation between my brothers on Facebook sparked a memory --

When my youngest brother was small, maybe 4 or 5, he went through a movie obsession where he watched Home Alone multiple times a day for weeks. At that time, we had some VHS of Home Alone that had been taped off of the television, and the same cassette also had Kindergarten Cop, and the label on the tape had "Home Alone Kindergarten Cop" written on it.

And even though he only watched Home Alone, Jacob always called it "Home Alone Kindergarten Cop" like it was one movie. And it was charming and adorable, and he was charming and adorable, and he still is.

***

It's funny to be the oldest, isn't it, the keeper of memories. I'm the one who remembers when the others (with the exception of Jim) were born, where I was -- eating a Happy Meal in the hospital room, or waiting at Grandmama and Granddaddy's. I remember the quirks, the misspoken names of things -- the "sadpoles" in the baby pool, the "ambliances" that would hurry past, sirens wailing, followed by police who would put the bad men in "hand coffees."

I taught my siblings how to pump their legs on the swings, how to ride bikes. I would ride in the car with Jacob when he had his learner's permit. Almost everything important in life, I either learned with or taught to them. I changed diapers, especially with Jessie. I gave baths. Since their beginnings, I've been there. Their beginnings were my beginnings.

***

The last phrase there is one I've linked, to the essay where I first got it. I think that essay is the reason I've been reminiscing about siblings this week. Because it's true. Their lives have given shape and structure, purpose to my life. The years between us continue to flatten out, and the age differences feel less real. Siblings are the ones who are there to stick life out with you -- even after your parents are gone, your siblings keep you tethered in a way I imagine even your spouses and children can't. Our shared memories bind us in like strands of silk in a mysterious web.

***

My entire life, my mother and her sisters have called each other "Sis." Casual, tossed out like nothing -- "Here you go, Sis," "What do you need, Sis?" and so on.

Lately, my brothers have picked it up too.

"Here you go, Sis."

"What do you need, Sis?"

You, my darling boys, my one darling girl. I have always, and sometimes only, needed you.

Five Things To Read

I'm constantly making lists in my head -- favorites, least favorites. Things to do, places to go. Movies, episodes of television, books.

Not long ago, I made a definitely list of my five favorite short stories, in no particular order:

1) "Rape Fantasies" by Margaret Atwood

Although it sounds like you know what this story is like, I promise that you don't. It's a story about a woman who is told by the other women at work that all women have rape fantasies, and then she elaborates on how hers are different from those of everyone else. The would-be rapist who has a cold is my favorite.

2) "Lust" by Susan Minot

(full text can be found here, although I do find the interspliced pictures a bit distracting...)

We waded into the sea, the waves round and plowing in, buffalo-headed, slapping our thighs. I put my arms around his freckled shoulders and he held me up, buoyed by the water, and rocked me like a sea shell.

Of all of the books and movies out there about growing up and discovering one's sexuality as there are, none (in my opinion) are as simple and poignant as Minot's.

Even now, I've forgotten how real it feels, reading it:

They look at you seriously, their eyes at a low bum and their hands no matter what starting off shy and with such a gentle touch that the only thing you can do is take that tenderness and let yourself be swept away. When, with one attentive finger they tuck the hair behind your ear, you— You do everything they want.

3) "Hills Like White Elephants" by Ernest Hemingway

(full text here)

I don't think it's possible to read this and not think that Hemingway was a genius with words. It's all set up as a conversation between two lovers; the writing is subtle and beautiful. You can almost see them sitting a table beside you; you can almost see their faces.

‘And we could have all this,’ she said. ‘And we could have everything and every day we make it more impossible.’

‘What did you say?’

‘I said we could have everything.’

‘We can have everything.’

‘No, we can’t.’

‘We can have the whole world.’

‘No, we can’t.’

‘We can go everywhere.’

‘No, we can’t. It isn’t ours any more.’

‘It’s ours.’

‘No, it isn’t. And once they take it away, you never get it back.’

4) "The First Seven Years" by Bernard Malamud

One of my favorite stories about love and sacrifice, about our parents and how they want the best person to fall in love with us, ignoring the perfect person who is there already.

5) "The School" by Donald Barthelme

(full text here)

Simultaneously one of the funniest and -- later -- existentially sweet stories I've ever read, this one starts with a classroom of kindergarten students whose classroom pets keep dying and ends with their demand for an explanation about death, and about the meaning of life. It's absurd, yes, but absurdly beautiful too.

The Names of Things

I was talking, the other day, about the gross anatomy lab. It's come up in my mind several times in the past few days. It's a weird time in a girl's life, the semester she spends pent up with cadavers on weekends and late at night, holding organs in her hand, trying to figure out how everything goes together.

I'm forgetting the things that I learned back then, taking apart Edna and putting her together. I am forgetting the names of things. There are so many of them, inside us -- so many things, named long ago by the men who first took us apart.

The ones I remember best are the ones named after objects. Pes anserinus, the goose's foot where three tendons come together. The sella turcica, the Turk's saddle that holds the key to the door we unlock between childhood and adulthood. The falciform ligament, sickle-shaped and slicing across the liver. Pterion, the weak wing of our skull, the place where we are the most vulnerable. Two muscles twisted together like twins.

And then the brain, the organ that most fascinates me because it is the key to everything. In my head, I wander around my brain and wonder where things sometimes go wrong, spark out. Does my mental illness lie in the star-shaped cells that dot the sky of my consciousness? What goes wrong with the bitter almond of my emotion?

And what about my memories, wild and sweet, when they are swept out to sea?

From the Vault: "Repair Guide for a 1998 Chevrolet Lumina"

[This was posted as a guest post in July 2008 on another blog. It was a follow-up to my previous Repair Guide for a 1991 Buick LeSabre. Unfortunately, I think a lot of misguided people have ended up here actually looking for advice on car repair. And to those people, I whole-heartedly apologize!]

Problem: Knock off driver’s side mirror while maneuvering backwards through gates surrounding the driveway and talking on the phone.

Solution: Well, that was a shitty mirror anyway.

Problem: Turning right occasionally causes CD to spin in the CD player.

Solution: Get really good at anticipating the effect on the CD; continue singing, including the skips.

Problem: Cupholder console is not strongly attached to the floor separator it sits on. In fact, it doesn’t appear to be attached at all; instead, it is simply sitting on the separator, held in place by magic and sunshine.

Solution: Try to duct tape the console down and realize that duct tape, which is supposed to stick to everything, does not stick to carpet. Leave the console to magic and sunshine, watching helplessly as it throws Route 44 drinks across the carpet in heavy traffic.

Problem: Console throws Route 44 drink across the carpet in heavy traffic.

Solution: Start swearing to your friends that you keep your car so dirty to absorb the imminent spills.

Problem: Man rear ends you in another city.

Solution: The problem is not so bad, because the man was in a high-sitting truck. There is almost no damage done to the bumper, and his insurance promises to fix it.

Problem: The repair company accidentally gets a new trunk with a spoiler on it.

Solution: You are offered the choice of leaving the spoiler on or having it taken off. You opt for the later, because—really?—you don’t know what spoilers do. And you probably don’t need one for your daily excursions to work, Target, and the cupcake place.

Problem: While sitting at a red light, there is a knock at your window. It is the man from the car behind you, who informs you that your brake lights—yes, all of them—are out.

Solution: Ignore until you have money to fix.

Problem: Before the next paycheck arrives, your friend sends you a text message as you drive to school, asking if you have your brake lights fixed yet. When you reply “no,” he asks you if the money saved is worth crashing your car.

Solution: After briefly considering answering “yes,” you consult both the friend and your father, who posit that the problem is not the lights, but the fuse. You drive to the local Auto-Zone, where a nice man who likes your Green Lantern shirt helps you check all the fuses and change the one that’s burnt out. But you totally could have done it by yourself.

Problem: While your boyfriend is visiting, his car decides that it doesn’t want to go above forty.

Solution: Seriously? You’ve got to be shitting me, right?

Problem: Still in the time before the next paycheck, your car starts to shake and grind. But not in a good sexy way.

Solution: You turn around and call Daddy’s Long-Distance Car Repair Consulting Company. After five minutes of imitating the problem and making “Reerrr Rerrrerrerrerrr” sounds into the phone, you are relieved when he decides that the problem might be transmission fluid. Tapping into your craftier side, you make a funnel out of purple cardstock and staples, then pooouuuur the transmission fluid in, making sure to get it all over everything.

Problem: Has that paycheck arrived yet? No? Good, just in time for your rearview mirror to fall off of its exalted place on the windshield.

Solution: Start to feel like a contestant on Every Day You Don’t Get Paid, Something Fucks Up On Your Car. Arrive home to find a rebate check from Verizon in the mailbox.

Problem: You don’t have a local or national bank account, so you can’t cash your check, not even at Wal-Mart.

Solution: Surprise, new checking account! And this one almost has as little money as your other checking account!

Problem: Epoxy you bought with money from new checking account does not work. Mirror continues to fall off, threatening to hit you in the face every time you try to see if it may be sticking.

Solution: Return to Wal-Mart; buy new epoxy with a side of Triscuits and hummus. Sit in the car at home, listening to Frou Frou and folded up into a position that makes it comfortable to hold the mirror into place. Listen to Track 6 repeatedly and ignore the stares of people who look at you through the glass, eager to behold the Amazing Frustrated Pretzel Woman who Smells Like Cheap Glue and Desperation.

Problem: Your friend says you can’t drive.

Solution: Try to prove him wrong by driving a mutual friend around town. Hint that this guy may want to tell your friend that you CAN drive. Punctuate this hint by running up onto the curb. Give up. Give up. Give up.

[Ed. to add -- that rerr rerrrrr rerrrr sound was actually my transmission slowly dying. Two months after this blog was posted, the transmission crapped out completely, and was repaired. Only to have something else go wrong with it later...]

Things That Grind My Gears

Isn't hate one of the most delicious emotions? Seriously. I know, I know, I know that I'm not supposed to hate people or things. But it's such a self-indulgent emotion. I would be lying if I said I don't relish it sometimes.

I have a long list, believe me, of things that I hate. But these three are at the top of my list, things that I hate and am -- even worse -- constantly exposed to.

1) People who wear exercise clothing in public when they have no plans on exercising

I work in a lab. Which is by no means a professional environment. I am always in jeans, often in a t-shirt. Sometimes what I am wearing is holey; sometimes a perfectly fine item comes in and leaves holey. But I am a grown up. I always manage to make it to work in something other than glorified pajamas.

In all honestly, I'm not a big fan of anyone wearing workout clothes anywhere that's not the gym. I admit that I am sometimes responsible for wearing gym clothes to the store after a workout, but it's not my preference and I usually have on some sort of large shirt or jacket to cover my ass. (Because, fact: I don't have gym pants; my ass has gym pants, and I don't need everyone to see my business. It's different when I am at the gym -- everyone can see everyone's business, and so it's ok.)

Because I work out pretty often, and often for decently long periods of time, I can sometimes spend 3 or 4 hours of time in my gym clothes. But those hours are NEVER the same hours that I'm in my lab with my co-workers. And certainly never just hours when I was just too lazy to wear clothes that have buttons on them. If you want to wear exercise clothes for a living, then be a personal trainer or a junky housewife.

(in interest of full disclosure, I often give my best friend a pass on this rule. however, in her favor, it's usually because she has to go to a doctor's appointment or to get an MRI and she doesn't want to have any metal on her)

2) People who ask me when I'm getting engaged or -- worse -- when I'm going to have children

First, I'll cover the baby-having portion of this. Number one -- Have you seen my house? I'll give you a few clues. Weeks after Halloween, it still looks like the Hobby Lobby took a giant shit in my living room. I've been eating with plasticware for the past few weeks because we have no clean silverware. We are still sleeping on our mattress and boxspring on the floor, because we never assembled our bed after we moved. We are in no way prepared for the responsibility of a little person. Number two -- Have you seen how much money we make? I'll give you a hint: one of us is a professional student on a (low, living wage) stipend. The other one of us is a department manager at Wal-Mart (with a college degree that would have gotten him a job, fast, any year of graduation before 2009). Although we live relatively comfortably -- can pay bills, are able to go out to eat at relatively nice places and buy most things (within reason) that we want -- bringing a child into this world would be complicated. Number three -- bipolar disorder. I am on a medication that is not approved for use during pregnancy and has shown some teratogenicity. Although I'm not jazzed about going off of it ever, I will one day when I chose to have little people. But it will take extensive planning, and extensive coordination of resources. I'm not ready to do that, yet. I don't think either of us is.

Number four -- we're not married. I would like to be married before I have kids and/or buy a house. All other things are negotiable.

So, all of you who ask me when I'm getting married (including those of you who want me to get married solely so you'll be able to wedge yourself into my wedding planning; actually especially those of you who want me to get married solely so you'll be able to wedge yourself into my wedding planning), the answer is Whenever Joey and I Damn Well Please. Everyone acts like it's so easy to get married. But it isn't. There are a lot of things to consider.

Like. 1) What type of ceremony to have? I am at least moderately religious; one of Joey's favorite things to say is "That's a trick question, there is no God." 2) Where to have it? We are from the same town, but most of our friends live somewhere else. Since our general idea of a wedding is "Bigass Party Where We Give Friends Lots Of Booze (and declare undying love for each other)," we'd like to have it here. But here is very expensive and is a popular spot for destination weddings. Which brings us to 3) See above where I mentioned our salaries. My parents have five kids, and they are still in the process of putting some of them through college. There isn't an ample amount of money, and we kind of want to wait until we are in a financial situation to have the wedding of our dreams (and that includes an open bar with good alcohol).

But the biggest thing is this: we were engaged before and it ended kind of poorly. Yes, it ended poorly because I had a mental illness. Yes, it has been a very long time since that awful awful time in our lives (as much time now since we broke the engagement as the time before we got engaged). But the wounds that were there were so deep. We are doing so well, having so much fun together -- and we have been for a while now. And it is disrespectful to his patience, to all of the work I've done in therapy and with psychiatrists, disrespectful to the busted road of love that we traveled until we reached something better, to imply that it's really not that important until we're engaged or married. Yes, the ring is beautiful; I've worn it before and I hope one day to be lucky enough to wear it again. But it's nothing in comparison to his comfortable and broken-in love, which I wear every day.

So, yeah, sometimes I really want to silence those who keep asking with, "Well, we were engaged before and I was crazy and fucked around on him with several different people in a short amount of time, so I kind of understand his reluctance to put a ring on it, if you know what I mean." Seriously, people who have no idea what they are talking about are cordially invited to get the fuck out of my face.

3) Traffic

Number 3 is such a constant source of my displeasure that my friend Joe used to call me the "Jenny B---- Traffic Report" when I would start a sentence with, "Do you KNOW what happened TODAY?" When I go flipping through notebooks -- both old and current -- there are crude drawing of traffic situations I have witnessed. I am serious about traffic.

I am part-time driver and part-time pedestrian. So I am sympathetic to both sides. And over the past 3 years (the number of years when I've been equal parts drive and pedestrian), I have developed two rules for etiquette. Rule one: Pay attention. Rule two: Don't be an asshole.

Honestly, people break rule one much more often than two. Most of us aren't assholes, most of the time. We are nice people, who will let someone over or cross the street. The real problem is that, a lot of the time, we aren't aware that those people have those needs because we aren't paying attention. For example, I used to have to merge left very quickly to get to my parking lot -- the left turn lane arose out of a lane that joined mine only 100s of feet before the turn. I cannot tell you how many times I needed to get over to the left and sat there with my blinker on, waiting for the person behind me and to my left to look up from their phone and let me in.

Although people often do appalling things in their cars to other people in cars, these are no comparison to some things I've seen while being a pedestrian.

Being a pedestrian is scary. I have a pretty fervent respect for the rules of pedestrianism -- not because I'm scared of being hit, but because I'm all the time in my car waiting for some errant pedestrian who is not following the rules and it irks me. Everyone is big on "Pedestrians have the right of way!" and we do. We totally do. However, that means "When pedestrians are in the crosswalk and have the 'WALK' light, please don't hit them in the ass with your bumper." That does not mean, "Pedestrians can cross in heavy traffic wherever they damn well please, and scream 'WE HAVE THE RIGHT OF WAY!' as drivers hope that theirs brakes are tuned enough to not make them vulture feed." So, pedestrians, follow the rules.

However, drivers, you have to follow the rules too! I am totally over drivers who ignore the pedestrian walk sign. I am also over drivers who get pissed and gesture at me to hurry up when I slow down in the crosswalk -- pro-tip, I slowed down in the crosswalk because your bumper is in it and I thought I was going to get hit. When I step four feet into the crosswalk and you gun your engine, what am I supposed to do? Slowing down is a pretty reasonable response. If you pull into the crosswalk and I slow down, you are not allowed to yell out of the car, "COULD YOU GO A LITTLE FASTER?" Reap and you will sow, bitches.

Also, if you are following a car into a crosswalk and you can't see over that car, then you might want to go ahead and assume that there might be a pedestrian there. There is all the time some tiny ass car that almost hits me because their driver goes blazing into the crosswalk while following some SUV into it.

So, please be respectful, and please don't kill me or any of my fellow pedestrians.

And one last thing. When I'm crossing a highway with four lanes that all go the same direction, as I do (legally, in a crosswalk with signs) several times a day, then I have no problems with you pulling into the first two lanes while I'm walking across the last two, or vice versa. However, if you choose to not do this and wait until I've completely crossed to start turning, I will love you forever. And I will smile and wave to you, and mouth "Thank you!" to you. I promise your actions will not be unnoticed.

And if you are a PA student who is in the same parking lot as I am, and the school oversells your parking lot, and you are left as baffled as I am when you pull into a full lot 3 minutes after I do, and a spot opens up and you are in a position to snatch it, but you let me have it anyway because I was "here first?"

Then I will tell people about you all day, and no one will believe you are real. But thanks for the spot anyway, traffic fairy.