Almost Paradise

She's Leaving Home...or, rather, Home's Leaving Her

2007-04-11T10:16:00.000-04:00

One of the most bizarre things about growing up in Redneckia is the fact that you can identify with people who experienced the Tennessee Valley Authority.

My mom, who has been widowed for 6 years now, was visited last week from representatives of AEP, who are planning on strip-mining the property all around our place, which is in the woods, 1/4 mile from any neighbor, and surrounded on 3 sides by a 50-foot high wall. Below that are "The Strips." As you can tell by the name, this will not be the first time that money-sucking vultures have raped the valley and the land around us. It is just starting to boast topsoil, grass, and mature trees. When I was quite young, I would pretend it was an African plain, with its wild grass, stunted growth trees, and craggy dirt roads. Of late, though, it's pretending to be a proper new-growth forest. Well, no more.

The TVA part is, because our house (my dad & mom bought the land and added the house in 1980, when I was almost 3) is in the middle of their proposed strip-mining venture, they plan to buy our place. We have about a year left. There wasn't really a request there, because they know and we know that life will be miserable for us if we plan to stay. Our driveway gives access to the only two roads down to the strips, one of which basically goes through our front yard. A neighbor that owns undeveloped stripland below us has already sold (I used to think of him as Ned Flanders - he is now Evil Ned) and has sold logging rights as well, so they're going to start logging off that piece before they strip.

No more silent mornings watching the fog lift over the valley between us and Steubenville, no more quiet walks down to the railroad trestle and creek that was my favorite place to sit, no more deer and wild turkeys camping on our lawn. The apple tree that grew the best tasting apples in the world will be gone, as will our black walnut trees and the squirrel colony that lives there. No more black raspberries in June, no more climbing after cats in the rickety old barn, no more double decker playhouse complete with balcony. My dad died here.

My mom will find another house, and it might be nicer or better. It might even have some of the things that I listed above. But how can a person be expected to give up their childhood so brutally? If they don't bulldoze our place, they'll use it for field offices and equipment storage. I lived here.

First my dad, then my grandmother (and father), now this. My heart is well and truly broken. You can stop now, Loki.

Glimpse of the Past

2006-06-26T14:06:00.000-04:00

So it was my Grandparents-in-law's 60th wedding anniversary this weekend, and my husband's family had booked this joint called "The Farm", formerly the Erwin farm, on 150 just outside of good old Mt. P- Ohio (It's going to be a restaurant, but for now you can book it for catered parties.) Although I grew up about 45 minutes from Mt. P-, it was in my school district, and in high school most of my closest friends lived in that area. So I shouldn't have been surprised to run into one of them.

But I was. We had just sat down, after being greeted at the door by a vaguely-familiar looking guy our age, and were waiting to be served our drinks, when I looked up and Melanie S. was at the door to our room. I kicked Lew under the table and jerked my head in her direction, and even he was surprised, which rarely ever happens.

Mel and I had been good friends all through HS, without ever being best friends, until after our freshman year of college. She had spent her frosh year at Wheeling Jesuit and HATED it, as it was far too structured and conservative for her emerging hippie self. I, who had recognized right away the futility of trying to enjoy my college years in a Valley school, had gone to OSU. But we were both in the Valley that summer of '96, free and jobless and pissing off our parents. It was one of the best summers of my life.

We started by going to Myrtle Beach, in early June, with her (sweet, friendly, adorable) cousin Carrie and her other (spoiled, obnoxious, annoying, etc) cousin from A-land whose name thankfully escapes me. We had a blast, while managing to piss off both of her cousins because we would sleep all day, stay up all night on the beach, go out for breakfast, and go to bed. We spent most of our time in head shops and ended up with piercings (her nose, my eyebrow) which was pretty wild for the Valley, and esp. our parents, etc.

We spent the rest of the summer hanging out in D-Vale, a completely sad little Valley town but with a small group of ska-skater punks that DIDN'T include the sort-of-ex boyfriend I was trying to avoid and the formerly preppy friends SHE was trying to avoid, so we loved it. We hung out on the wall by the bank, learned to skateboard (sort of) in the parking lot, scrounged change to get ice cream at Marsili's, and listened to Brian's band practice in the tiny, falling-down-the-hillside 'house' he rented, which was extremely cool as he was 25 (we were both 18) and the only one of us not living with his parents. It was in this group of loveable miscreants that I first met my husband, so that summer will always be a very special one in my heart and memories. Mel and I lost touch after that, as she went off adventuring and I had Lew and didn't need or want anyone else.

So when Mel walked through the door with a tray of Cokes, I was, obviously, shocked. She had moved to Washington state after her wedding six years before, and I had never expected to see her again, as she had always been so vehement about getting out of the Valley.

Turns out she and her husband (the vaguely-familiar guy I had seen earlier) are both working at "The Farm" for cash to support their art careers. They had bought property and chickens, and are attempting to get the money together to buy a kiln. I hadn't talked to her for 3 minutes before she was going on about how much she 'hates everyone here'. The ignorant locals and rednecks, she meant, who wanted her to explain what espresso was when she tried to sell it in her mom's gift shop and who didn't understand her open-minded, West Coast attitude.

The only thought that ran through my head was, 'but honey, you AREN'T open-minded.' For her to hate and be prejudiced against all of the locals we grew up with was just as bad as them disliking her for being a hippie artist with a nose ring. It's annoying, sure, to be home and talking to someone and hear them spouting their racist or misogynistic or homophobic views as if they are common knowledge, but is it any better to have the local kids who went away to get an education return, and instead of using their knowledge to make the place they grew up more like a place they'd want to stay, feel alienated and lash out at the very people who helped them to grow up? A superiority complex isn't pretty, no matter what colors it's painted in.

The upshot is, I was glad and nervous to see her, and I kind of wanted to smack her around a bit. I hope she learns to lighten up, and if I do get to return to live in the valley, I hope that I don't follow in her footsteps. I want to enjoy it, and change it, without necessarily changing the people in it, because despite their 'ignorant redneck' selves, they can also be wise, and loving, and strong, and intelligent, and wonderful. Luckily, I took a geography class in undergrad, and learned the concept of worldview, which has changed me as a person almost more than anything else I learned in school. It should be a requirement.

Trapped

2006-06-21T10:33:00.000-04:00

So I love my job and my husband and my dogs and all of that. No doubt. But I am such a restless, flighty person that invariably I can't go three months without wishing that I was somewhere else, doing something else, without someone else.

How is it that other people can be perfectly content to buy a house, go to the same job every day, shop at the same market, for decades and decades? WHY CAN'T I? I've only been in my job four years and it feels like a lifetime. I've lived in <3ville for five years now. i'm going mad with the monotony of it. Looking at the same stupid buildings every single day on my ride to and from work, the same patrons at the library (no matter how much I may like them), etc. etc.

I can't ever enjoy anything. I can't be content with my essentially happy life. I can't even stick to one hobby for more than a week! I don't know why or what to do about it or how to change it. I don't know where I went wrong, and if someone were to ask me what my ideal life would be, every day I would have a different answer. Is that normal? It doesn't feel normal. It frightens me. I want to be happy.

I don't really expect or need anyone to comment on this. It's just a whiny pathetic rant, I know. But it makes me feel better to get it out somewhere. Thanks.

Foul Weather Blogger

2006-02-28T09:42:00.000-05:00

Hi! Sorry it's been so long. I use this blog to force myself to write if I have writer's block, but lately I've been writing quite a bit. I haven't needed to blog.

I just booked my Amtrak tickets for my vacation this fall. I'm going to spend a week in South Carolina with my sister, and my brother may be flying in from Phoenix to join us. They both think that I'm insane to take the train when I could get there in about 3 hours by air, but Lewis has this phobia about flying that extends to me, so they'll just have to deal with it.

Besides, I love the train. I sit and stare out of the window and read Paul Theroux's train travelogues and have a grand old time. You meet crazy people in the dining car and can get adorable little 12 oz. bottles of wine in the snack car. You see all of the scummiest parts of towns, and see real life just inches from your window. It's insane how close some houses are to the tracks!

The best example of "the wrong side of the tracks" was El Paso, Texas, which is right on the Mexican border. If you look out of one side of the train, there is a normal American western town. On the other side of the train, there are barb wire fences and dirt roads climbing hillsides simply covered with brightly colored shacks. No traffic lights, sidewalks, or anything like that. English signs on one side of the train, Spanish signs (touting American products) on the other. Unreal.

Anyway, this trip I'll be taking the train from Pittsburgh to Washington, D. C., where I have about 4 hours to kill at the National Arboretum or the Smithsonian or something, and from D.C. to Denmark, S.C., which is so small I can't find any info about it on the net!

So anyway, I haven't forgotten about the blog, I just have so many other things to do and think about and write right now. Like getting ready for work.

Alistair Crowley - Reincarnate

2006-02-01T16:07:00.000-05:00

So I've started this Dungeons and Dragons group for my kids. Had one meeting, 12 kids, everyone had a good time. Next meeting's in a week. Out of nowhere, the library is getting complaints from the community about it.

To be honest, what I knew about D&D before I started this program could be fit in a nutshell. I saw an episode of "Freaks & Geeks" where they played it, and some D&D players were arrested on "Reno 911". I knew it was a RPG with funny dice, fantasy elements and a Dungeon Master to run the show. That's about it.

Monday, this chick comes in the library (I wasn't there, thankfully) and asks to speak to the "supervisor of the person that's running that Dungeons and Dragons thing". So she calls my boss, and when I get in later that day they tell me about it. The woman is helping them to research D&D, so that she can be of "further assistance in the stopping of programs such as D&D that are damaging to the children of Mogadore." (That is an exact quote from her email)

Today, we get two more complaints. Apparently, she is calling her friends and fellow church members to put a stop to this evil with which I am trying to brain wash children (none of THEIR children, as they do not even attend library programs). One woman today said that D&D is "opening doors to the occult."

I have researched this myself, and from what I could find out, the only people that have bad things to say about D&D are part of the Christian Reich, and all of their complaints are based on unscientific, 'anecdotal' evidence. I would never do ANYTHING to hurt my kids in any way. I would also never teach them about the occult. Nor would I teach them Christianity. In my mind, they're both about as likely to be true as Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny.

The point is, Public Libraries are just that, and keep away from any biased programming. We don't want anyone to feel left out. We also get pretty upset if people try to restrict others based on their limited world views and moral values. It's part of the whole free speech, right to assembly thing.

So for those of you out there walking through the mall or grocery store, keep an eye on the pretty little mild-mannered librarian types, as they are probably corrupting America's youth in nefarious ways.

Let's hope so - then maybe the kids won't turn into their narrow-minded parents.

Daisy DungeonMaster

2006-01-19T12:39:00.000-05:00

So I've got to learn how to be a DungeonMaster by 5:00pm tonight. Not within the usual job description for a librarian, but hey, I'm nothin' if not kinky. ;-)

Seriously, though, my boys here at the library pestered me about starting a D&D (that's Dungeons and Dragons, to you hip people out there. It's a role-playing game) club. So I'm starting one. I have never played the game, never had much desire, although I thought the dice were pretty cool. That's about as far as I've ever thought about it.

Now, however, I have to hang out for three hours (and it's only the first in a series of 7 meetings) with a dozen teenage boys bent on wreaking havoc and slaying monsters and the like, and I have no idea how to go about it. I'm a pretty creative person, if I do say so myself, and I figured that it wouldn't be all that different from a game of "let's pretend", like when we were little. However, BOYS made up this game, so it is uber-complicated, with (literally) dozens of books devoted to rules and monsters and heroes and their abilities and their weaknesses and it's all numbers and blah blah blah...

You think I would have learned my lesson with the Yu-Gi-Oh! club a few years ago, which was along the same lines, and had EIGHTY boys a week at each meeting, but I assumed that this would not draw a crowd. I was wrong. I am always wrong. I need to stop listening to myself.

Librarians spend tons of money each year going to conferences, buying books, etc etc, to try to figure out how to attract boys to their library. I, on the other hand, can't get rid of them. I think I need to start holding girly programs instead of fun ones, b/c they're (my boys) all driving me crazy. I think that they all have ADHD. Seriously. Even the ones that go smoke pot behind the library before they come in (and it's so cute, they think I'm clueless. Honestly though. Do they REALLY think the Axe Deodorant is going to cover that smell?) are bouncing off the walls with energy. It's like a cage fight everytime they get together, and I'm starting another program. I'm mad.

It won't be long, though. This will be my fourth year, in June, and I will never stay at a job longer than five. I just need to figure out what I want to do next in the next year and a half.

Any ideas?

School of Rock - Now Seeking Adjunct Professors

2006-01-10T13:10:00.001-05:00

So my programs at the library are starting up again, and I have to come up with creative, productive, entertaining ways for a bunch of kids age 9-18 to spend their time. I have decided that part of my program this year is going to be "School of Rock".

I don't know how many teenagers you hang out with, but when I was a teenager, WHERE I was a teenager, Classic Rock was pretty much the best music out there. Yeah, the grunge movement had it's moments, but you couldn't really beat the old stuff.

It frightens me how little my kids (I call them "my kids" but they are not my offspring. Just want to clear that up) know about Classic Rock. They are just 'discovering' the Beatles, for cripes' sake!

So tonight, for our first meeting, I am offering an exchange, of sorts. I (with the help of my husband, who has massive knowledge in punk and a good knowledge of classic rock) will teach them what I think that they should know about music, and they can teach me about the drivel they listen to (I'm trying, really I am, b/c I don't want to be old and bitter and complain about noise and say "now back in MY day--").

If any of you have any suggestions as to what I should include, I'd really appreciate it. I'm trying to be objective and include stuff that had an impact on where we are today, even if I don't care for it myself. Rev, I'd love your input on this one!

-Daisy

On Being Grumpy at X-mas

2005-12-20T15:41:00.001-05:00

Wow! I just read through the last couple of posts and realized that I have been in a really bad mood lately. Either that, or I just don't bother to write when I am in a good mood, which is probably a bit closer to the truth.

The holidays do always get me down, however. My dad died five years ago on New Year's Day, and now with my grandparents gone, it's kind of like, what's the point? Very depressing. I'd rather just not do the holidays at all, since I just get into fights with my remaining family and have no religious connection to any of the holidays.

I thought I'd really try this year - I put up my three (not kidding) Christmas decorations, I ordered my gifts from Amazon three weeks ago (of course, that bit me in the ass as they still haven't come in yet), I haven't thrown away my Christmas cards the day I got them, and I even began baking yesterday, but I still just feel down and miserable and wish that I didn't have to go home on Friday.

I think I need to go home and watch "A Christmas Story", "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas" (The cartoon, not that dreadful Jim Carrey movie), "Rudolph the Red-Nose Reindeer" and the like and maybe that will help me to get in the mood. Right now I'm going to go hang out with my kids here at the library; they're usually high-strung enough to put a smile on my face.

The funny thing is that I'm generally a happy, easy-going person, and the happiest time of year makes me miserable. C'est la vie.

Happy Holidays!

On Being Sick

2005-12-17T09:39:00.000-05:00

You know what really sucks? Being sick when you're a grown-up. You know you're a grown-up when you get a cold and take absolutely no pleasure in it.

I have had the whole week off, this (Saturday) being my first day back. I should have enjoyed it, in a way. I get paid to stay home, wear jammies, watch cartoons, etc. My job isn't the type where if I don't come in, everything falls apart. The few responsibilities I do have aren't all that critical, so when I got my cold, even though I felt miserable, I looked forward to relaxing and lazing my way through it.

Sure, it was nice not to have to deal with a NE Ohio winter cold snap that is more characteristic of February than early December, and it was nice not having to worry about what I was going to wear the next day (was it Einstein that had, like, 10 identical outfits that comprised his entire wardrobe? Because I'm seriously thinking about that). Other than that, it sucked.

For starters, TV is wretchedly bad. We stopped getting cable, and I normally don't even watch TV, so I don't miss it. But when you're home sick and your eyes start to cross after about 10 minutes of reading, TV is a nice option. There is, however, NOTHING ON TV. How do they fill so much time with absolutely NOTHING? When there is a great show, such as "Dead Like Me", "Freaks and Geeks", or "Arrested Development", they cancel it. They are actually filling AD's time slot in January with Celebrity Ice Skating reality show or some shit like that. Who watches this shit? Are Americans REALLY that stupid?

Secondly, my husband has decided to go off his meds. He says that paxil keeps him in a perpetual stupor. Since he's gone off, however, he's constantly pissed off at everyone, and will go on for hours (not kidding. I've timed him) about the Bush "Administration", Republicans in general, world events, and anything else that comes to mind or comes on the news or "Geraldo at Large" (WHY do they keep giving that man air time?). I love my husband and he is really cool sometimes but his rants are so MIND-NUMBINGLY boring that I have actually learned to shut down my ears and go off into la-la land when he starts, which is pretty much constantly now. I don't even pretend to listen, and he knows it, and you'd think that he would shut up. He doesn't.

I know I sound like an insensitive bitch, and with him being home alone all day I realize that he's bored and needs someone to talk to. However, we never go ANYWHERE, we never talk (When he gets on a rant, he has absolutely no interest in my opinion. I couldn't get a word in edgewise if I wanted to, which I DON'T. I learned quickly enough that just makes him go longer as he tells me how wrong or ignorant I am.).

Don't get me wrong, we generally get along OK, have the same taste in movies, same sense of humor, same political and religious (atheist) views, etc. However, he is driving me bloody insane! He has started to say that he's going to run off and live in the woods like Grizzly Adams. I haven't tried to talk him out of it.

Anyway, he didn't take care of me at all when I was sick, b/c he was too busy ranting and feeling sorry for himself, alternately. He could take up either as a profession and go straight to the pros with no time in the minor leagues. So my time on the couch was basically taken up by sleeping, turning off my brain so that I didn't have to pay attention to TV or my husband, and counting down the hours when I could go back to work and take a break from home life. I'm exhausted from all that time off!

Two Reasons Why X-mas Sucks

2005-12-06T17:15:00.000-05:00

Shopping

They should start a service where people will shop for you during the holidays. Like, you give them a short bio about each person, likes and dislikes, and how much you want to spend. The service goes out and buys the gifts, wraps them, delivers them to your house, and presents you with a bill for all the stuff, the wrapping, and of course their time and fees and stuff. It would probably cost a bundle, but it would be worth it.

I have no problem buying gifts for people that I'm only semi-close to, like my teen cousins, my best friend's baby, my husband's aunt. I buy them books. Books I know they'll like. They're inexpensive, easy, and fun to buy. I actually enjoy that part of my shopping. When I have to shop for my family, however, I am at a loss.

I've seen my brother once this year, for a week. We fought the whole time. My sister has been home maybe once, so I think I saw her for a few days. I hate to talk on the phone, so we never do. My mom's been driving me nuts lately, so I don't know what to get her.

All X-mas is at our house is a competition to see who can spend the most and get everyone a bunch of junk that they probably won't even use. I would rather spend $20 and get someone something that I KNOW they'll enjoy than spend $120 and buy a bunch of junk just so that I don't look like the cheap one of the family. And why just get gifts at X-mas? If I see a book someone would like somewhere in August, I buy it and give it to them. Then. I don't wait. I hate feeling obligated to purchase gifts for people. It's absolutely no fun at all.

Nativity

Then I've got my mom asking me if I want a nativity for X-mas, when she bloody well KNOWS I'm an atheist. I told her that if she bought me one, I would buy her a menorah. It would be just as appropriate. She gets all offended, even though my family NEVER (not once in my entire life. I mean it. I'm not even exaggerating) went to church, none of us kids are baptized, and the only bible in our house is probably righting a crooked table leg or something.

Ever since I "came out" about my atheism, though, she's been all holier-than-thou, asking me if she's "allowed to have Christmas" and trying to get me to admit I believe in God. I DON'T! I'M SORRY! I'm not rubbing it in her face, but I'm not going to lie about it to make her feel more comfortable. It is fine with me if other people believe in God. I'm not trying to convert anyone. It doesn't bother me. The nativity doesn't bother me, but it would be kinda pointless for an Atheist to own one, wouldn't it? I am trying to enjoy the holidays as a time to be together with my family and eat good food and give to the poor and all that jazz, but I think that if I spend too much time with my family I'm going to go insane.

I LOVE the holidays.

SHALLOW THOUGHTS

2005-11-16T16:36:00.000-05:00

I was ordered to update, but I have very little to say.

I don't see the point of writing about my everyday life, nor do I want to leave thinly-veiled messages to people that I am uneasy about talking to in real life. I am not angry, depressed, cutting myself (why does anyone do that anyway? I'm such a clutz I get enough scars just walking around), anorexic-bulimic, insomniac, pregnant, outrageously happy. I haven't found religion, I still mistrust the government, and I still bleach my hair, despite all of my organic/all natural tendencies, which is hypocritical, I know.

I don't have anything funny or clever to say. I don't have anything nasty or spiteful to say. The most exciting thing to happen this week, hasn't happened yet. I got some good gossip, but it is about someone that no one who reads this knows, so it's pointless (and bitchy) to spread it around. I'm getting much better about gossiping, by the way. As in: I don't so much. I didn't even tell my husband this one.

I had a good/bad dream last night, but it's too confusing to talk about. I'm not looking forward to Thanksgiving, b/c for the first time I won't be eating at my mom's. I only burned myself once so far this week (ovens hate me, yet I'm a good cook. Ironic?). I hate winter, miss my dad and grandma, and wish I could have a cat.

I'd like to be seventeen again. That was a good year. I'd do that one over. twenty-two was another good year. But seventeen was better. I was thin, happy, had a dangerous reputation I totally didn't earn, read some great books, had - um - interesting - friends, graduated high school, started college, got my driver's license, and had one of those summers that you remember forever. I had one at sixteen and eighteen, too (ESPECIALLY 18). Three in a row is pretty damned good, when you think about it. I haven't had a memorable one since. Even the summer I got married was basically boring.

I just read a beautiful book, "Inkspell", by Cornelia Funke. It's the sequel to "Inkheart", and it looks as if there'll be another one after this. It's the kind of book you can lose yourself in, and it also makes any pathetic attempts at writing I do pretty much pointless. Why spout useless drivel, when people can be reading a book like that? Oh, wait, I guess I just did.

Hope you're happy, Lonnie.

-Daisy

Daisy's Rockin' Halloween Party

2005-10-31T10:54:00.000-05:00

OK. So I am the first to admit that I am no where near cool. I would rather read than get drunk, I drive a Chevy, and my only friend that is my age is a third grade teacher in the school district that we graduated from (mind you, I'm a librarian, so I can't really talk). I don't exactly have wild weekends or wild any other times, for that matter.

But today is the one day a year that, in my corner of the world, things get a little crazy. And no, still not drunken orgy crazy, but fun crazy. Once a year, I hold a halloween party at my library for the kids and teenagers in town.

Yeah, we have a bunch of little rugrats in princess and pirate costumes looking terrified and hyper after having eaten four tons of candy the day before (Can you believe they have trick-or-treat on SUNDAY here. From 2-4. It isn't even dark yet. How boring.) Mostly, though, it's my teens. They still dress up sometimes, usually as punks or goths (and what passes for punks these days. My god.) They come in trying to act cool and within ten minutes, they are whacking the pinata, posing for pictures, having cupcake eating contests and generally acting like four year olds. And they love it.

After the party, they'll help me clean up and slip back into their "cool" mode, but they know and I know it's just an act. And that's why I throw the party. So that once a year, they can be themselves, for an hour.

Plus I get to dress up, listen to Alice Cooper, the Misfits, and Slayer (Is there a better drummer than Dave Lombardo? I have yet to hear him.), and generally goof off for a day and get paid for it.

I love my job.

In Which Writer's Block has Daisy in a Death Grip

2005-10-28T14:31:00.000-04:00

I've got nothing of my own to say. I'm reading love poetry and Bartlett's Quotations. If you want the poetry, go to my Xanga site.

Here's one that will be relevant forever.

"In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up."
-Martin Niemoeller (1892-1984), Attributed

In other words, go Vote!

Here's another good one:

"A bore is a man who, when you ask him how he is, tells you."
-Bert Leston Taylor (1866-1921), "The So-Called Human Race"[1922]

That's all for now. I'm bored. And probably a bore. So don't ask me how I am.
-Daisy

In which Daisy is dull and old

2005-09-22T09:20:00.000-04:00

I don't have a damned thing to say anymore, and I'm not sure why that is.

Yes, I'm writing about writer's block. Boring and trite, but really, I'm out of ideas here.

I visit a lot of other blogs, some of people I know, some of strangers. What I've basically figured out is that either people really have much more interesting lives than I do, or that they are much better at exaggeration and embellishment than I am.

To sum up September for me -

NOTHING IS HAPPENING. I haven't had an intelligent conversation in weeks, I've only read one book worth mentioning (Jasper Fforde's The Big Over Easy), and the highlight so far has been attending a craft festival in Canal Fulton with my best friend, her baby, and her mom.

Gone are the days of seedy redneck bars and guys in John Deere hats hitting on us while some rotten bland (not a typo) blasts bad Blue Oyster Cult covers (NO cowbell??? WTF?!?!) in the background. Such is life in the Valley, but as we're both married and she has a kid (cool as he may be), Hilly's in Cadiz will have to carry on without us.

Some of the kids (I call them kids, but they are 18-20) who hang out at my library came in stoned last night, and I nearly YELLED at them before I realized that I was probably just jealous and missed the smell of pot and the inane conversations Matt and TJ would have in their dorm on North Campus at OSU.

I'm not saying you need alcohol or pot or anything else to have a good time. All I'm saying is, anything that people usually associate with a good time, such as alcohol and pot, is completely absent from my life, along with the people who use such things. All I have now is family, which is nice, but mind-numbingly dull.

Tomorrow is my birthday. Birthdays no longer hold any excitement for me, as I am now deep into my late twenties with 30 looming on the horizon, and I have been responsible and respectable for nearly an entire DECADE. How fucking depressing.

So I plan to do the family togetherness thing, and then the depressed aging loner thing. I'm taking my cousins to see Corpse Bride. I am then going to my mom's, and as she's out of town, I plan (as I have oh so many times before, to no avail) on stopping for DiCarlo's pizza, pulling out the Black Velvet, and getting completely drunk all by myself and watching Harold and Kumar, b/c I have only seen it sober and I imagine a little enhancement will make it even funnier than it already is.

So maybe then I will have a grand adventure involving setting my dad's barn on fire or something and I'll have something to write about next week. But don't hold your breath.

County Fair

2005-08-16T15:36:00.000-04:00

This week is the Jefferson County Fair. At the risk of sounding like a total rube (well, I am, but that's another matter), the fair marks some of my best memories growing up, and the only ones that I can still really hold onto.

No matter how much I changed while I was in high school, or how many different groups of people I hung out with, with the kids in 4-H I could actually be myself (how cliched does that sound? But it's actually true). None of the lame high school posing and game playing. Yeah, the kids drank constantly, started having sex at a ridiculously young age and generally had the common sense God(TM) gave a goat, but I guess that's what made them fun. Whenever I wasn't with my school friends, I was with my 4-H friends, watching them play tractor chicken, take unsuspecting younger sibs snipe hunting in the woods at night, jumping the bonfire at pond parties, or the best of all, hanging out at the fair.

The fair is only 6 days (Tuesday - Sunday) but if you were in 4-H, it was generally much longer, b/c you had to be out there early to set up camp and get your project (ie an animal, like goats, pigs, horses, or steers) situated before the fair actually began. Since my friends and I were all out there all day everyday anyway, we were on Fair Board and hosted the judgings and that sort of thing (you wouldn't BELIEVE how many different kinds of poultry there are!).

The boys all slept in the barn; any girl that did it would have gained a reputation harsh even by our standards. It was complete chauvanism, but that's just how it was, and I honestly never minded, when you consider the smell, the noise, and the discomfort of sleeping on bales of straw or wooden benches. But the boys were usually so drunk they didn't mind; one of them kept a stash cold in the water dispenser above his pigs' pen, so we always had Black Velvet in our cocoa and plenty of other stuff, though the boys would never let us get too drunk (for the above mentioned reason).

It's funny, how sophisticated the kids were in some ways, and naive in others. I remember seeing them at a 4-H dance halfway through my first year of college - I had dropped acid for the first time the week before, and when I told one of the boys I tripped, his reply was, "No wonder! Look at the heels on them boots ya' got on!" This same guy lost his virginity at 13 and had been drinking since age 10.

My cousins are teenagers now, and stay at the fair like I did, but they certainly don't seem to have the fun that I did. They don't stay up for the Midnight Football Game on Saturday night in the horse arena (more dangerous than regular football b/c of the risk of land mines, if you know what I mean) their hot cocoa is REALLY hot cocoa, and their friends seem to change every year.

I have so many good memories with those kids, and they are the only people from my high school years that I am still friends with today. So I go back to the fair every year. I see some of my friends ONLY at the fair every year, and when I'm with them I feel fifteen again, even if I'm dandling someone's baby on my knee or meeting someone else's new wife. I don't worry about what I look like, how much money I've made, how successful I am, or what kind of car I drive. They are genuinely happy to see ME, and vice versa.

I can't wait for Saturday, so I can watch some decent football and drink some Hot Cocoa with old friends.

Reunion

2005-08-09T12:30:00.000-04:00

So I went home to visit my mom a couple of weeks ago and there was a letter sitting on my bed from a guy I went to high school with. I had no idea why he would be writing me, we were never friends, so I opened the envelope and there was an invitation to our 10-year class reunion.

Ten fucking years. How is it possible that it's been that long? As soon as I read it, it was as if the last ten years never happened and I was seventeen again. A ton of wild memories came flooding back to me, and I realize what a different person I was ten years ago. I love the person I am today, but I liked the seventeen-year old me, too.

Ten years ago, my dad was still alive.

Ten years ago, I was looking forward to going to Ohio State.

Ten years ago, my best friend Shannon and I had a wild night involving Puerto Ricans, Strawberry Dacquiris and the slums of Steubenville that we never told anyone about! I never hear the song Mary Moon without thinking about it.

Ten years ago, my parents thought that I was constantly high. So did everyone at school. The sad thing is, I never was. My only experience with drugs didn't happen until college. Looking back, I wish that I would have gotten high all of the time, so that at least I could have had the fun along with the reputation. You live, you learn.

Ten years ago, I was in love with a completely different person, and thought that I would spend the rest of my life with him.

Ten years ago, I was so fucking glad to get out of high school that I knew that I would never go to any lame reunion that occurred. And I'm not going. But it's funny, because a small part of me almost wants to go. I'm not sure why. I think that it has something to do with the fact that, love them or hate them, I would be seeing people that knew me when I was a kid. People that knew me when I was 5, and 11, and 17. I would like to see if they remember me the way I remember me, and I would like to see how they've changed, too. But I don't think that I'm ready for that quite yet.

Give me ten more years.
-Daisy

Follow the Blue Blazes

2005-08-01T14:10:00.000-04:00

I know on the AT, blue blazing is a bad thing, but here in Ohio it's about as hard core as you can get when it comes to hiking.

The Buckeye Trail is a 1400 mile loop around the state, and I am lucky enough to live 1/4 mile from part of it!

I hadn't done anything about this knowledge, however, until yesterday, when I broke out my hiking boots for the first time in almost a year and set out to hike part of the trail.

I love to hike, it's one of my favorite things to do, but my husband is entirely uninterested and allergic to pollen and such besides. So I have no one to hike with, and really nowhere nearby to hike. Not hiking the way I am used to, anyway. In SE Ohio, the foothills of the Appalachians, the most underappreciated area in the Buckeye State, we have thousands of square miles of state forests and strip lands for hiking, camping, etc. I will never get used to living in a town. Never.

So, the upshot is, I don't hike much anymore. But yesterday I couldn't stand the idea of wasting another perfect summer day inside hugging the air conditioner and watching DVD's. So I stuffed my backpack full of water bottles and pbj, laced up the long-neglected boots, and hit the "trail".

I put trail in quotations, because if you've ever been to Ohio, you'll know that it is nearly all suburbia and farmland, with the odd city or wilderness area tossed in for variety. Most of the Buckeye Trail is routed along rural roads, deviating through parks and state forests whenever possible.

I started in a small park in Hartville, right next to the townhouses in which I live, and three miles later, hit an actual trail in Quail Hollow State Park, a small but lovely state park that has a variety of habitats, including tall prairie grasses, sedge marsh, wetlands, deciduous and coniferous forests, etc. After walking for about a mile, in which I saw a fox, three bunnies (whom the fox hadn't seen, apparently), and a really cool red-and-silver triangular spider, I came upon the formal herb garden behind the manor house in the center of the park. I ate breakfast there, replenished my water supply at the Coke machine (Oh, how I miss Coke! But it's been 22 days and I refuse to fall off of the wagon) and pressed on. I traveled through about 3 more miles of forest in the park before setting out on the farm roads that surround Hartville.

I went about six more miles, past the Goodyear Blimp Base (they launched the blimp while I was walking - always cool, no matter how many times you see it) and Wingfoot Lake, before I quit for the day, as my feet were very unused to boots and were screaming in pain. The summer sun had done it's work as well, and by noon it was 89 degrees, which with Ohio's humidity is pretty dam' warm.

Next Sunday, I plan to hike that part of the trail that winds through and around the Mogadore Reservoir, just north of where I hiked yesterday. I've already hiked part of the trail in the Hocking Hills, so although I will probably never hike the Western side of Ohio, I'll have a good start on getting the eastern 700 miles under my belt! I doubt it's very good training for the AT (where it is said that you hike each mile twice - once up, once down), but it's a start. And it's all I can do right now, given what I have to work with.

It's nearly enough to make a girl homesick.

Dancing

2005-07-28T12:37:00.000-04:00

Today I was completely embarrassed when Mr. Paradise rounded the top of the stairs, looked into the bedroom where I was supposed to be getting ready for work, and caught me...dancing.

Yup. I was listening to the Swing Kids soundtrack, which is awesome and always reminds me of my very early college days when I worked in a pizza shop and my friend Matt and I would dance in the kitchen in between orders (He was my then-boyfriend's roommate, so no romance between us, although we did have one of those "If we're not married by 30"...deals).

So, when Benny Goodman's "Sing, Sing, Sing...With a Swing" came on, I just couldn't help myself - hopped up from my makeup table and started jitterbugging around my bedroom.

You have to understand, Mr. Paradise is a naturally cool person - probably the only one I've ever met. He is far too cool to dance in a bedroom in his bathrobe, and if he did it would be to some obscure New York Indie-Punk band from the seventies, so he of course looked at me like I'd finally gone off the deep end.

So I was completely mortified because even though he knows he married a dork, I typically try to hide it from him as best I can. But you know what? The song wasn't over. I'd already been caught, so I closed the bedroom door and kept on dancing.

Obsession

2005-07-19T18:23:00.000-04:00

So I've got this friend...No, really, it's a friend. He's younger than me, only 18, just graduated, with a 16-year old girlfriend. The thing is, he is completely obsessed with her. He's writing on his Xanga site about how his life would be meaningless if she left him, her mom wants her to see other people and doesn't understand the depth of his feelings for her, etc. etc. Really gaggy stuff. I adore this kid, and I don't want to see him get hurt. However, he is running down that road at full speed.

I don't know about you (yeah. Like anyone's actually reading this), but when I was in school, any guy that claimed that he was "a romantic" or acted all intense about me, I couldn't get away from fast enough!

This girl is only 16, she probably wants to go have some fun, and is saddled with this smothery boyfriend who is jealous and possessive AND EXPECTS TO MARRY HER. He can't understand why her mother wants her to see other people. I want to tell him all of this myself, but it's really not my place so I am writing it here. I can't tell him to lighten up and back off of her, because he wouldn't anyway.

Why, oh why, are boys SO dumb?!?! And nearly all men are boys! I can count the number of real men I know on one hand (my husband is NOT a man yet either). I wish women didn't have to always be the sensible, responsible ones, so that we could have a little fun too. But that's a topic for another time.
-Daisy

In Dreams

2005-07-18T12:23:00.000-04:00

Last night I had a dream that I was flying, and it depressed the hell out of me.

I LOVE FLYING DREAMS. I have had several over the years, and they are always completely wonderful. This one, though. I was trying to get somewhere, across a desert, and I had to carry a duck on my back. A talking duck. I think it may have been a person transfigured into a duck or something. I know it sounds ridiculous, but it was deadly serious. So I am on a porch or something, duck on my shoulder, ready to go. To fly in this dream, I have to hold my arms out rigidly at a 90-degree angle to my body, legs locked tight together, feet together and perpendicular to my legs. And it just doesn't really work. I have these little half-starts and stops, I'm dragging the ground, I CAN'T FLY. At some point the duck must have been fed up, because he left and I was in a town and then I was back home, in S******ville, walking to my mom's hospital but she wasn't in the dream in any way.

I hope that this doesn't mean that I will never be able to fly in dreams again. If you lose confidence in your ability to fly IN YOUR DREAMS, does that mean you will never be able to fly or do anything else cool in a dream again? How does that translate into real life? It can't be a good sign. I couldn't even help out the damned duck. All day I have been completely miserable and my day just really sucks, and I think that it's because of the dream.

"For in dreams, we enter a world that's entirely our own." (Albus Dumbledore, POA movie)

Is my world going to collapse like that dream did? I sure as hell hope not.

-Daisy

Daisy Paradise

2005-07-18T12:22:00.001-04:00

Believe it or not, Daisy Paradise is not my real name! I read a lot, I always have, and I took the name from two characters in American Literature that I think that I resemble in some small way.

Daisy is Daisy Buchanan from The Great Gatsby - Daisy appears innocent and naive. Daisy doesn't seem to notice how her words and actions affect those around her. Daisy is much less a personality than the image she projects. Gilded outside, hollow inside.

Paradise, is, of course, Sal Paradise from On the Road - Sal is desperately trying to be a part of something bigger than he is, and it never quite works out the way he imagines. He is an unwilling observer at life, when he would so much rather be an active participant.

"_____ would never understand me because I like too many things and get all confused and hung-up running from one falling star to another until I drop. This is the night, what it does to you. I had nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion."

Both of these characters are kind of pathetic and tragic, in a way, but I don't see myself as either of those things. I see myself as an unreal part of an unwelcome reality, if that makes any sense. That's probably why I read so damn much. I'd rather live in books and at least pretend to live the way I want to live. After all, who wants to settle for middle-class mediocrity, even if that's all they've got to hope for?

-Daisy

Swearing

2005-07-18T12:22:00.000-04:00

Evie: "Do you swear?"

Rick: "Every damn day."

This line from one of my favorite I-don't-wan't-to-think-I-just-want-to-stare-at-a-hot-guy-killing-monsters movie, The Mummy, pretty much sums it up for me. I work with teenagers on a daily basis, so I suppose I should at least try to be a better role model, even on here, as some of them actually bother reading this.

But really, what's the big fucking deal about cussing? I mean, ok, you don't cuss in front of Grandma and other people to whom you wish to show respect, but why do I have to try to refrain from cussing in front of teenagers, for the love of Pete? What teenagers don't cuss?

So, in that spirit, here is the original Carlin comedy routine "The Seven Dirty Words You Can't Say on Television." No one says it better than Carlin, and I hope it pisses someone off.

"I love words. I thank you for hearing my words. I want to tell you something about words that I uh, I think is important. I love..as I say, they're my work, they're my play, they're my passion. Words are all we have really.

We have thoughts, but thoughts are fluid. You know, [humming]. And, then we assign a word to a thought, [clicks tongue]. And we're stuck with that word for that thought. So be careful with words. I like to think, yeah, the same words that hurt can heal. It's a matter of how you pick them.

There are some people that aren't into all the words. There are some people who would have you not use certain words. Yeah, there are 400,000 words in the English language, and there are seven of them that you can't say on television. What a ratio that is. 399,993 to seven. They must really be bad. They'd have to be outrageous, to be separated from a group that large. All of you over here, you seven. Bad words. That's what they told us they were, remember? 'That's a bad word.' 'Awwww.' There are no bad words. Bad thoughts. Bad Intentions.

And words, you know the seven don't you? Shit, Piss, Fuck, Cunt, Cocksucker, Motherfucker, and Tits, huh? Those are the heavy seven. Those are the ones that will infect your soul, curve your spine and keep the country from winning the war.

Shit, Piss, Fuck, Cunt, Cocksucker, Motherfucker, and Tits, wow. Tits doesn't even belong on the list, you know. It's such a friendly sounding word. It sounds like a nickname. 'Hey, Tits, come here. Tits, meet Toots, Toots, Tits, Tits, Toots.' It sounds like a snack doesn't it? Yes, I know, it is, right. But I don't mean the sexist snack, I mean, New Nabisco Tits. The new Cheese Tits, and Corn Tits and Pizza Tits, Sesame Tits, Onion Tits, Tater Tits, Yeah. Betcha can't eat just one. That's true I usually switch off . But I mean that word does not belong on the list.

Actually, none of the words belong on the list, but you can understand why some of them are there. I am not completely insensitive to people's feelings. You know, I can dig why some of those words got on the list...like cocksucker and motherfucker. Those are...those are heavy-weight words. There's a lot going on there, man. Besides the literal translation and the emotional feeling. They're just busy words. There's a lot of syllables to contend with. And those K's. Those are aggressive sounds, they jump out at you. CocksuckerMotherfuckerCocksucker. It's like an assault, on you. So I can dig that.

And we mentioned shit earlier, of course. Two of the other 4-letter Anglo-Saxon words are Piss and Cunt, which go together of course. But forget about that. A little accidental humor there. Piss and Cunt. The reason Piss and Cunt are on the list is that a long time ago certain ladies said 'Those are the two I am not going to say. I don't mind Fuck and Shit, but P and C are out. P and C are out.' Which led to such stupid sentences as 'OK, you fuckers, I am going to tinkle now.'

And of course the word Fuck. The word Fuck, I don't really...well, this is some more accidental humor, but I don't really want to get into that now. Because I think it takes too long. But I do mean that. I mean, I think the word fuck is an important word. It's the beginning of life, and, yet it's a word we use to hurt one other, quite often. And uh, people much wiser than I have said, I'd rather have my son watch a film with two people making love than two people trying to kill one other. And I of course agree. I wish I know who said it first, and I agree with that. But I would like to take it a step further. I would like to substitute the word fuck, for the word kill in all those movie cliches we grew up with. 'Okay Sheriff, we're gonna fuck ya now. But we're gonna fuck ya slow.' So maybe next year I'll have a whole fuckin' rap on that word. I hope so.

Uh, there are two-way words, but those are the seven you can never say on television. Under any circumstances you just can not say them ever, ever ever, not even clinically. You can not weave them in the panel with Doc and Ed and Johnny, I mean it's just impossible, forget those seven, they're out.

But, there are some two-way words. There are double-meaning words. Remember the ones your giggled at in sixth grade? 'And the cock crowed three times.''Hey, the cock the cock crowed three times. It's in the bible.' There are some Two-way words, like it's okay for Kirk Goudy(sp?) to say 'Roberto Clemente has two balls on him.' But he can't say, 'I think he hurt his balls on that play Tony, don't you? He's holding them. He must have hurt them by God.' And the other two-way word that goes with that one is prick. It's okay if it happens to your finger. Yes, you can prick your finger, but don't finger your prick. No, no."

-Daisy

Breaking Up

2005-07-18T12:20:00.000-04:00

I am the last person to ever imagine that I would be in monogamous, committed relationships for the entirety of my adult life, but that's certainly the way it happened. I had always imagined myself as an adventurous single globe-trotting gal, leaving broken hearts at foggy train stations all over Europe as I hurried on to meet my destiny (which, incidentally, was never a man, but an international best-selling novel or maybe just the simple discovery of a hitherto-unknown tomb in the Valley of the Kings or something.).

In fact, I haven't been boyfriend-less or husband-less for more than THREE WEEKS since I first started dating at age 16 1/2. In all that time, I have had only three significant others. My first was a brief, month-and-a-half fling with a hyperactive private school kid who broke up with me, apparently, because he had to drive too far to get me on the weekends and there was a similarly suitable girl only ten minutes from his house (although she was perfectly sweet and they ended up dating for several years, so maybe there was more to it than that).

I was broken hearted for about four days before a make-out session at a graduation party cured me. The sweet simple farm boy with whom I liaised, however, had no more interest in forming a relationship than I did, and thankfully we are friends to this day. He did, however, tell me how incredibly hot I was and helped me to get over that Linsly boy in a remarkably short time.

Two weeks later, however, I was back in the saddle, so to speak, with the Linsly kid's good friend, a guy who went to my school and whom I had pseudo-dated two years before, when I was dreadfully goody-goody and stopped talking to him because he smoked! Oh, the horror! I had crushed on him pretty much ever since, however, esp. since he had become cool in a Judd Nelson-in-"The Breakfast Club"-sort-of-way and started dating one of my friends who was so NICE that I couldn't even hate her for it.

Thus began the most tempestuous relationship of my entire life. Some of my thoughts about it and him are so private that I don't even bring them up to myself, so I sure as hell am not going to type them out for the world to read and ponder over. Let's just say that it was a living hell, and one of the best times of my life, and even though I wanted to kill him at the time, looking back I realize that he had bigger problems than pleasing his bitchy little girlfriend and maybe I should have tried to be more understanding sometimes.

But guess what? That's the way things are. Given who I was at the time, and my life experiences, I couldn't have acted any other way, and I certainly couldn't handle someone as brilliant and tortured and confused as he was (and may still be). I haven't talked to him in nearly ten years, and don't know if he's alive or dead, but I hope he's worked things out. He was too intelligent and creative for the world to waste.

Three weeks after I had finally ended with him (for the umpteenth time) I once again let hormones get in the way of better sense and fooled around with a young skater punk I barely knew at a birthday party (hmm. Maybe I should stop going to parties - or maybe start going again). What I didn't know was that I was so irresistible that he had been crushing on me for a while, and what started out as a fun frolic by the bonfire turned out to be Mr. Paradise himself.

God™ knows I fought it as hard as I could, but there you are. Apparently we were meant to be. As my sister says, "Only you, Daisy, could marry someone with a 6" mohawk and a padlock on his neck." Of course, he had toned down by the time we got married two years ago, and we have now been together for nearly nine years. So here I am, 27 years old, happily married, while every relationship around me seems to be falling apart.

Didn't you read my headline at the top of this entry? Shame on you! I entitled the entry "Breaking Up" because a lot of that seems to be happening lately. My sister, my brother-in-law, various aunts and uncles, and several other people I know are going through stages of break-ups, separations, even divorces. So lately I have been thinking about my life and loves and relationships and stuff like that, and wonder why some work and some don't, and why it isn't easier to tell what's going to happen at the beginning of a relationship.

Was I just lucky to run into Mr. Paradise when I did, or did my troubles with Judd Nelson occur so that I could meet Mr. Paradise? Is there such a thing as fate, and if there is, why are some people unhappy with theirs, even when their particular fate seems to be pretty damn good? Why are others cursed to a seemingly endless string of bad situations? How many licks DOES it take to get to the tootsie-roll center of a Tootsie Pop?

The world may never know.

-Daisy

Kayak

2005-07-18T12:19:00.000-04:00

Time for one more today? Why not?

OK, so it wasn't really kayaking. And I have taken more distant and more adventurous trips in my life. But today I am thinking about a kayak, and the one time I was able to hang out in one for a couple of hours. It was lovely.

I went to Hocking Hills last August with Mr. Paradise and the in-laws. I hadn't been on a camping trip with them before, and not at all since before my dad had died in 2001. So by the end of the first night, I was in tears.

Whenever my family would go on a vacation, my dad turned into Clark W. Griswold. He worked so hard to enjoy himself that he never actually had time to do so, and a vacation wasn't complete without a detailed itinerary that we would kill ourselves trying to complete. Camping was no exception. Even with a huge, top of the line camper with A/C and a microwave and TV/VCR combo so that you would never have to actually worry about seeing the woods, he would still manage to make it strenuous and exhausting, with hiking, fishing, gathering wood for three hours for a campfire we would enjoy for 20 minutes, etc.

To me, that is a vacation. And I loved every minute of it. So when Mr. Paradise and I , his 9-year old cousin, and his parents headed for the Hocking Hills, I had already read every guidebook I could find on the area, and planned each hour of each day, filled with hiking and fishing and Lake Logan and other equally exciting and exhausting activities.

Mr. Paradise and his family, however, have different ideas about vacation. He and his mother both brought their laptops and proceeded to spend everyday, all day, in the cabin we rented, availing themselves of the wi-fi and cable TV. After having been in the Hills for several hours, we had still done NOTHING. RELAXING? ON VACATION? What was wrong with these people?

To give him credit, my wonderful father-in-law noticed my confusion and misery and went on a short hike with me that first night. And over the course of the next few days, we went on several more. The last morning was the only morning I could convince Mr. Paradise to go anywhere with us. We took a short drive to Lake Logan. The boys all went fishing, and no one wanted to actually go out on the lake. Once again, I was completely baffled, but was so fed up by this time that I decided to hell with all of them and rented a one-person kayak.

It was, by far, the best part of my trip. It was so silent on the lake, and after years of canoeing and rowboating at 4-H camp, I had no trouble getting used to the kayak, which sits extra low and glides across the water quickly and quietly. I could get right up to the bank without grounding, sneak up on a flock of ducks, and even pick some late wildflowers on the far shore without leaving the boat. The silence and solitude allowed me to realize why I had wanted to come to the Hills, and made me feel as if maybe Dad wasn't so far away after all.

I even started to feel affectionate once again towards my newly-chosen family, and let Mr. Paradise take the kayak out for a spin (one of our dogs loved it, the other was appalled that we would let her get so close to something so WET).

While it wasn't a backbreaking paddle through a wilderness, it almost did the job. I wish I was in that kayak right now, even though it's raining. I think that maybe I could relax there. I certainly can't seem to relax here.

-Daisy.

Tuffy

2005-07-18T12:18:00.000-04:00

Who, you may be asking yourself, is Tuffy? Tuffy, boys and girls, is my most awesome truck. Yes, a truck. Yes, I named my truck. I never meant to, nothing annoys me more than those cutesy people who name anything and everything, but for me it wasn't a choice.

I bought it off an old man in a small town back home (it took him a while to realize that a GIRL wanted to buy a TRUCK) who was so meticulous that he had a rubber bed liner cut to fit his bed liner. The first thing I did upon driving the truck home was to take off the 12" high bug guard, which was blue to match the truck. I then spent an hour scraping off the myriad stickers with which he had adorned the cap. Aren't conservatives funny, by the way? His NRA and other various gun club stickers surrounded his pro-life, anti-abortion stickers. How can the paradox not amuse these people? Do they really not see the irony?

ANYWAY, so as soon as I drove Tuffy for the first time, I knew that he had a name, and that that was it. Certainly nothing I would have chosen myself, but it's so appropriate. He is now fourteen years old, has never had A/C, "has the cancer," as we Valley kids jokingly label the rust that eats away at vehicles that never see the inside of a garage, is 2WD and spins out on rough grass, but he runs like a trooper, and I love that truck. I have put 70k miles on it in 4 years, and he has never had a serious mechanical problem.

I think that actually, Tuffy is a lot like me. Run to shit on the outside, but inside, dreaming of the day that I will get inside and we will drive somewhere other than work, home, or back to the Ohio Valley to see my mom and the in-laws. Maybe, for me and for Tuffy, there is yet time for an adventure or two.

Know me, know my truck.

-Daisy

Welcome to Paradise...Almost

2005-07-18T03:08:00.000-04:00

So here I am with a new site. My previous Xanga site is still in use, but most of my readers are thirteen year olds from my library, and it's hard to divulge my innermost thoughts to readers whom I actually know. So I'll be shifting all of my relevant posts over here instead. Stay tuned!

London's Falling

2005-07-07T12:21:00.000-04:00

Once again, innocent people are dying in horrible and public ways, hit in their backyard, so to speak. Once again, it is laid to terrorism.

Once again, Tony Blair and our own W. are to blame! When are these atrocities going to end? The fact is, we have blatantly invaded and conquered a country that we had no business entering in the first place. There was NEVER any evidence of terrorists hiding in Iraq, and WMD's my ass! THEY WERE NEVER THERE. Bush used our ignorance about the Middle East to transfer our search for terrorists in Afghanistan into a war against Iraq so that he and his cronies could MAKE MONEY. They are raping Iraq for oil, and worse even than that, after destroying their country and allowing us to pay for that, they give rebuilding contracts to companies THEY OWN.

I'm not saying that 9/11 should have happened or that the London bombings should have happened. No innocent people deserve that. But we need to look at what's really happening here. These are passionate, intelligent people from an underdeveloped nation sick of the great powers of the world, such as the UK and the US, pushing them around, stealing their national resources, and supporting their oppressive governments!

Guess what? In the 1700's a small group of "insurgents" fought the British Army guerilla-style to prevent oppression and guarantee their own freedom from tyrannical super powers. This group later became the UNITED STATES.

Capitalism is not the answer for the entire world. Our government and our economy are not the most important in the world. Our needs are not more important than the needs of citizens of other countries. A bunch of yuppies wanting to buy gas for their SUV's at $1.50 a gallon is not a good reason to invade another country, KILL INNOCENT PEOPLE, and blame that same country for problems we are unable to fix because we don't take the time to listen to the needs of others.

If we are such a civilized country, such a superpower, why do we spend so much more on military might than on making life better for the millions of Americans and people in other countries that can benefit from better schools, health care, basic food and shelter? WHERE ARE OUR PRIORITIES? Why are we paying to allow these simple-minded politicians play war with our money and the lives of our soldiers and the lives of innocent civilians?

This has to stop. Our shitty little color alert system and browbeating Saddam Hussein in his currently helpless state isn't going to do anything (and if anyone should be tried for war crimes, it's Bush). We don't need revenge! We need respect. Respect for other countries, other beliefs, other world views.

My sincerest sympathies to those who lost their lives today in London and the families that have to try to carry on without their loved ones. I hope that their deaths lead to greater understanding and that the loss of lives will not have been in vain. Again.

-Daisy

In the Beginning

2005-07-05T12:17:00.000-04:00

(from 05 July 2005, on my xanga site)

So this is my first blog. I am so sorely tempted to put the word blog in quotations, because it is such a ridiculous word. But I won't, because I am hip and cool like that.

Why am I writing? I have no f***ing idea. I am so bored and annoyed and bored and frustrated and bored and lonely and BORED. I write sometimes and have an incredible urge to do so now, but I am completely out of ideas and can't work on any of my stories. A lot of people (mostly teenagers) that I know have blogs, and I recently and amazingly stumbled across the blogs of some people I hung out with many moons ago, so I guess I was inspired. I don't particularly want anyone and everyone to read my innermost thoughts, or maybe I do. At this point, I have no idea.

So who am I? I don't really know that either. On the surface, here I am - three college degrees, steady job that I love, happily married, two wonderful little dogs and a cheap apartment in a postcard town.

Inside? BORED!!!!!!!!!!!! I had all of these exciting plans and dreams, still do, inside I am fit and smart and adventurous, not afraid of anything. I want to see the world, hike the AT, live in Casablanca, learn a bunch of languages, maybe get caught up in an international intrigue. Guess what? It's not going to happen. Ever. I am STUCK in OHIO for the rest of my frikkin' life. And I am expected to be HAPPY about it.

And why shouldn't I be? I have a great life. I know that. Really. And I love my husband, he's awesome and beautiful and smart and cool and more than I deserve. Some days, though, I want to just drive to the airport instead of work, hop on the first plane to anywhere and never look back.

Sorry for the rant, but hey, if you didn't want to read about the inner workings of another person's life, you wouldn't be reading blogs in the first place, would you?

-Daisy