I picked a stellar spot at Terminal 7. It was at the end of the arrivals corridor, within sight line of the heavy metal doors, but by leaning against a column I managed to avoid the collapsible barriers that lined the corridor. At ten to nine, I took up watch. At ten to ten, my lover came through the doors.
After leaping heart false alarms brought on by sudden glimpes of other tall men, of other confident lanky walks, of other curly dark heads, there was my tall curly haired man. And while my three inch heels made it nearly impossible to break into a run, I did my damndest to get to those lips as quickly as possible, to fold myself into that chest, to breathe in the smell of his shirt, his skin, to drink in that smile.
And I haven’t stopped since then. Over french bread breakfasts, over long coffees, around books, after shared tooth-brushings, over hot dogs in Central Park, at the ring counter at Tiffany’s, on little wooden bridges in the Rambles and overlooking a willow-lined pond, under the Roosevelt statue at the Natural History Museum, on crowded subway cars, under reddening trees on our street, under the covers and during a shower or two.
Kisses. Hugs. Laughter. Coffee. Jokes. Stories. Dinners. Breakfasts.
It’s finally here. And I can only pinch myself, laugh, and then kiss him again. Wherever we are.

Work is done.
Friends have been rapid-fire-emailing to distract me all day.
Strange German names have been picked for our inevitable offspring, providing much consternation and amusement.
Desk is clean.
Purse is packed.
Hair looks… well, curly and crazy. That is to say, normal.
Outfit still looks cute and presentable – kelly green merino sweater, brown cord flouncy skirt, jean jacket and brown heels.
Heart is a flutter.
Stomach is a flutter.
Happy.
Happy.
Happy.
Let life begin again. In exactly five hours.

I didn’t really start getting major wobblies until last night. Up until last night, it was a little surreal. For months and months it was like, he was over there and I’m here and all I wanted was for him to be here too. And while empirically, I’ve realized all week that he’ll be here on the 7th, it was like my thumping little heart refused to accept such good news could be possible.
I kept feeling like I was going to wake up, and it would still be July or something.
Then, last night, I was dusting his dresser. HIS DRESSER. The dresser that is in my room, all sanded and varnished by my mom and her master skills with furniture renovation. His dresser, where soon will go his shirts and sweaters and unmentionables. I cleaned our bathroom. I made sure there was half the space on all the shelves.
I arranged the office, leaving room on the bookshelf for his books.
I made our BED THIS MORNING. Our BED. A bed which, in its lifetime, has been mostly my bed, but is now undeniably our bed. I smoothed the sheets and plumped the pillows and tucked in corners.
And then I locked our apartment and left for work, knowing the next time I walked through that beloved doorway, I’d be with Stuart. We’d be coming home. To OUR apartment.
Fixing our apartment last night drove it home, like I thought it would. When I fell asleep last night, I knew it was the last time I’d sleep alone, wishing he was there. Because it’s not July. Because he’s coming home tonight. In ten hours.

I seriously have to remember to keep breathing through the butterflies and excitement.

I’m glad to see that our dear friend CLM posted to his brand-new site about his brand-new adventure, his Big Bike Ride down to Florida. I’m glad because I’m a natural worrywart and I’m perversely fond of the prickly CLM and his odd hobbies and would like to see his health very much intact around Thanksgiving, when he returns to us. While I think biking down the nation’s coast line is quite cool and I wouldn’t consider anyone I know more capable for the adventure, I am also naturally a little worried for him. There are all kinds of things in the South. Bears. Kudzu. Christian Evangelicals. All KINDS of roadblocks, really.
So check his site over the next 6 weeks or so, follow his adventure and leave encouraging comments. Also, if you live anywhere between here and Florida and he’s ever driving past you, offer him a hot meal, or at least let him know where all the internet cafes are. So that we can keep hearing from him.

Well, they say if you want something done, you’ve got to do it yourself. Yesterday, I went home despondent because while on my browser, the banner images and the content block lined up fine, other people said it was wonky. I was furious. There, I thought. I’d tried to take care of something complicated myself, and I’d only managed to screw it up even more.
But today, after a fresh night’s sleep and a coffee-filled, sunny morning, I attacked the problem head-on. And by head-on, I mean, with the BEST TEACHER EVER by my side: Biscuit. With his guidance, I’ve fixed the wonky positioning, and recoded all the back pages into bannerific harmony.
I told him, at one point, after he gently nudged me in the direction I needed to go in order to find the glitch in the code for redoing all the back pages, that he’d make a really good teacher. Running through the problem with him, and realizing that I was at least partly solving it myself, was a good feeling. You know what it was like?
It was like soaring down a hill on my bike for the very first time, and then realizing that my teacher, having faith in my ability to do it alone, had removed my training wheels. And there I was. Doing it myself. So if I never learn how to drum or sew, I know that I’m finally learning something new.
WHEEEEEE WATCH ME GO.
And, before I zoom off too far away on this new bike… thanks, Biscuit.

Little Changes That Bring Me Joy:
1. Organization of the realtime variety – Last night was spent happily going through all my papers and pens and notepads and doohickeys and whosits and whizbangs and whatnots from my incredibly crowded, incredibly messy desk. The four drawers are now mostly-empty, with only blank papers, office supplies, computer supplies, and pens, respectively. My desktop has nothing but a phone, a pen jar, a laptop, and a pod-dock. Very neat. Very clean. Very happy-making.
2. Organization of the cyber variety – Here you have it, people. My shiny new banner, that the great Shivlet designed for me many moons ago, with accompanying buttonage. I just made every change myself. That’s why it’s not perfect, and the back pages are so last design. And the pinstripes aren’t lining up right. But you know what? This was my debut foray into handling my MT stylesheet completely on my own, and I’m inordinately proud of my bumbling attempts. Expect further tweaking later. For now, I’m just proud I managed to change some color tags without setting fire to the place.

Things I’d Like to Learn Before I’m Too Old**:
1. Drums – For some reason, probably because they’re bangy and loud and I’m rather bangy and loud as well, drums have been the only musical instrument that I’ve really had a keen longing to pick up. When I was a wee lass, like any bougie princess, I learned the piano. I was quite good at it, except that because I have a very sharp memory, I never bothered to learn how to read sheet music – I simply memorized the songs. An early indication of my laziness. My piano teacher was a Russian woman, married to a mid-level Ivorian diplomat, who frequently traveled back and forth from Cote D’Ivoire to the Soviet Union during the last few years of the USSR. For these reasons, my parents and other expats were somewhat convinced that she was KGB. I always thought it was a joke on their part, only later did I learn that they were serious in their suspicions. Pretty heady stuff, being taught to bang out Mozart by a Red.
Anyway, drums: I think I would make the perfect drummer, really, because I have absolutely no inclination to become a songwriter, can’t even figure out the process of creating a song, but if a musician told me what to bang out to what beat, I’m quite certain I could sort it out. I’ve got some Brasilian in my bloodline, after all, and we’ve got nothing if not rythym. I’d make a valuable addition to any band, because c’mon, chick drummers are HOT. Now all that lacks is someone to actually teach me how to play. I’m quite certain I’d be stellar, though. Takers, anyone?
2. Sewing – This is sort of a criminal oversight on my part, not being able to sew. My mother is a virtuoso on the Singer and my childhood is filled with memories of sitting on the floor of her sewing room, playing with remnants and scraps of delicious fabrics and exciting zippers and ribbons. Since we lived in Africa and clothing stores were a bit thin on the ground, Mom often designed her own clothes and either made them herself, or, if she was too busy expertly organizing my perfect childhood, often sent the job out to a trusted tailor. She made me Halloween costumes (southern belle, little red devil, big furry cat, etc) and made dresses and skirts and shirts for herself. I’ve stitched a few things here and there, but I’ve got nowhere near her expertise.
It feels lacking, somehow, in my life, because I’m relatively creative when it comes to clothes or design or fabrics. I get really excited and happy in fabric stores, running my hands along various textures and patterns. Everytime I see a beautiful pattern, I think of something great I could make with it, and I get stopped in my tracks because I know I can’t make it myself. There’s an extra sewing machine at my parents’ house with my name on it, my mother says, whenever I’m ready to pick up the mantle of creative stitchy-stitchy. I think I will, someday soon. After all, who else is going to make my future children’s beautiful Halloween costumes?
3. Writing – I know, I know. I’m writing here. I actually do know how to type, obviously, and even string sentences together with varying amounts of success. It’s not about learning how to write, though. It’s about learning how to be a writer. How to trust the outcome of your creative fountain to sound good on the page, to not censor a thought before it even becomes an idea. It’s about learning how to spend hours, typing, not caring if it sounds perfect or flows correctly, but just that it flows. It’s about having the keenest eye possible, to spot a story wrapped in the daily ennui of existing. One of my favourite authors, John Irving, holds that hallowed place because of his ability to make a soaring, weaving, funny, irreverent book out of two or three little incidents – a woman in a bear suit, an abortion/adoption clinic, a game of squash. And another of my beloved, Gabriel Garcia-Marquez, doesn’t feel beholden to the mundanity of realistic plot lines – he’s free to create a world where there are five family members with the same name in every generation, or where magic and love triumph over banality. Or yet another, John Updike, who will take the people you see every single day on a commuter train or a restaurant, and play fly on the wall to their tangled inner lives.
I sometimes think my love of reading, and my overwhelming respect for the writing life, hampers me from writing my own stories. For every character, idea, plot line, complication that is born in my mind, twenty five existing equivalents spring forward to defend their place. Often written better than I could hope to achieve. But I know that if I can put aside this mad drive for pure originality (after all, what is original about commuting or love or bears?) and have a little faith in my imagination, and if I could teach myself the discipline that is so sorely lacking from my talent, I know that eventually, I could really call myself a writer without cringing from the enormous shoes that my size six feet cannot yet hope to fill.
* Yes, I know I skipped Five and Four. Be assured that they did pass, in the way Time insists on doing. I spent the weekend at my parent’s house and there are more important things in life than blogging consistently. Like, for instance, watching Eddie Izzard with my dad or shopping for new carpets.
** And by “Too Old”, I mean, Dead. But that seemed like such a morbid thing to put in the title.

Photographs from Last Night’s Debate Watching, Or: This Is As Political As This Site Will Get In The Next Two Months, Thanks

Nellie spent much of the presidential debates trying to get our attention by meowing loudly and licking herself inappropriately. It didn’t work.

This is one of the few moments that Biscuit did not have his face in his own hands, brought to the verge of tears by President Bush. I suspect it’s because he knew I was about to take a very handsome photo of him.

Wearing one of Mike’s sweaters, drinking out of their oversized white coffee mugs, and sitting on that sprawling couch made me feel about five years old. As did my frustration with the debates.

I was merely taking a pretty photograph of Kate’s composed, calm face during the debate. But then Biscuit yawned. Still, Kate looks very composed and pretty for someone sitting next to a man singing an aria.

I think this picture should be entitled, “Proportion, Or: How a Coffee Mug Can Look Twice the Size of a Normal Housecat”. Biscuit thinks it should be called, “A Montage of Krissa Descending into a Nightmare of Crystal Meth”. I did no drug of the kind, although it probably would have aided the debate-watching significantly.

How much do we all love that snarky face. THIS much.