Small Town Wren

I finished packing the backpack today. I was very surprised how not heavy it was when I hoisted it up on my shoulders and strapped it to my hips. It was pleasantly surprising, for sure. I also fit all the things I’m dropping off for my sister in, too, without a problem.

This is it. I’m finally leaving the country. I will finally get a stamp in the passport I received four years ago. The thing I’m most happy about is how affordable this trip has become. I’m going to be there and back on less than $1500. I’ll be there 10 days, so less than $150/day to cover all travel expenses, lodging, food, purchases, classes, etc. Who knew it could be so reasonable.

I’m starting to see my mother’s slight agoraphobia as what it is: completely ridiculous. Even money can’t be claimed as a reason not to go. It just makes me sad. I’ve wanted to roam the world since I was a little girl, and I’ve never been able to until, well, tomorrow.

I have been neglecting my blog for some time now. It turns out I’m pretty diseased. Considering I’m trying to take as few sick days as possible and still get to all of my classes (one of which is in finals right now), it has left me with very little energy to do much else.

You know it is bad when even your mother is concerned by just how much TV you’ve been watching and not much else beyond it. We’ll see when I make a return to regular posting, but as of now, I’m sick with that dreaded disease Mono.

I either got it from or gave it to my sister. She was even more of a mess than I was for awhile. She hibernated for a week while the whole family moved her out of her apartment. Me? I’ve just felt awful for two weeks now and don’t have the ADD energy level to which I usually have access.

Having known an implausible number of writers, I’m acutely aware of the quirks and phobias many of these odd but wondrous creatures hold. I can certainly tell you about one of mine, and it’s a pretty common phobia: fear of the blank page.

Blank pages are pregnant with possibility. You could put anything down a glaringly white (or ivory, or whatever) piece of paper, and it’s exactly that potential that is so exciting and alluring. It’s also terrifying. Why, what is one to do if one puts the wrong thing down on that precious paper? What if you make a mistake? Or worse: what if it’s stupid? This is perhaps the single reason why I respect any artist: they all are putting themselves out there and opening themselves up to ridicule. It’s definitely the hardest part of the process for me.

I know I am a capable writer, and most of the writers I encounter in workshops and what-not tend to agree. And yet, every single person I have ever been in a workshop has, in some form or another, encountered the irrational fear and shame that I have in my work. Though I am proud to say this has improved greatly over the years, especially the confidence I have in my criticism. In a shocing reversal, Wren the Critic is more confident than Wren the Writer. This must indicate that I’ve grown more confident as a writer, too.

Back to my original point: blank pages are frightening things to deal with. The boxes and boxes of blank notebooks in my parents’ basement can attest to this. I’ll fully admit I’m a bit of a perfectionist: revision-as-process is my modus operandi. Yet another thing I’ve been working to change in my approach. My academic writing is always a one step process. I’ve never done a full revision of anything academic. Ever. And I’m sure that comes out in my blog posts, as well. How many times have I gone off on a tangent in this post already?

What really made me start thinking about all this is that I bought a new notebook today. A new notebook that prompted my mother to chastise me about all the boxes in the basement. It’s no secret I have trouble marring pages. Especially in purposeless books.

But this moleskine has a purpose. I’m consolidating my life into one place: calendars, planning, writing, ideas, random notes, etc. Not exactly an original idea for a moleskine, but it’s an effective plan. I slapped some indexing tabs on (in?) it and have broken in the spine. It’s all ready for some ink.

And I did the most important thing: I marred every single page. There are no blank pages in my new notebook now, which means there is nothing to fear about sullying them more. And I’ve already gotten some meaningful use out of five pages. I don’t want to be afraid anymore.

I finally got that bugger H1N1 vaccine today. Du Page County has been using the appointment system that Kane County finally moved to after the major disaster I previously encountered. I live in Batavia, which straddles the county line, so I figured out I could actually get a Du Page appointment.  It took about 20 minutes from arrival to departure. I laugh at the long lines others braved only to be turned away.

I did the flu mist. My mother wanted me to get the injection under some fantasy that they’re safer, but that’s pretty damn unethical. Not everyone can use the mist, so to take an injection I don’t need takes it away from someone else. Oh morals. Why does it seem like I’m the only one who has any anymore?

Almost three years in the making, I finally finished The Beauty Myth in the wee hours of the morning. It’s just a shame that the most dated part of the book is the last chapter. It is an artifact of a past that already seems like ancient history.

The Beauty Myth was originally published in 1991, when I was four. The vast majority of my life has been spent in a world where Naomi Wolf’s rallying cry had already been heard. I think I’m much better off for it, too. The way my mother approaches her body and the way I approach mine are in two completely different categories. The biggest feature of note is that my mother flat out refuses to leave the house without any makeup on; it’s an odd day when I leave the house with makeup on.

I never bought into it. I was always part of the rebellious crowd, but somehow the parts of the myth that latched on to my sister and my peers never found its way to me. I don’t know if it’s because I never wanted to feel like anyone but myself, or if it’s because I’ve spent half of my life with some form of overt baldness. It’s hard to feel shame for your looks when all of your shame and self-consciousness is rooted squarely in your hair.

Or maybe it is because I was blessed with a naturally slim figure and a rightly colored face. It was a running joke at my boarding school: I’d devour six plates of food at dinner and the health services ladies would still think I was anorexic. They weighed me constantly, and lectured me on how eating is good for you, thinness isn’t everything. They had no idea I held the candy arsenal in my dormitory or that I routinely won eating contests against the burliest of the burly men on campus.

This isn’t to say weight hasn’t been a big part of my life. My mother had to defend herself when my elementary school thought I wasn’t being fed due to being so underweight. I ate ice cream every night and was part of that dreaded “Clean Plate Club” at dinner. When I shot up to 5′7″, girls began poking at my sides in the locker room and asking me how I did it. I didn’t know. I still don’t know.

A lot of it has to do with my mood. When I am happiest, I tend to weigh more. Depression makes me drop the pounds as if they were nothing. I started this past summer out at 145 pounds. Depression clubbed me over the head in September and by mid October I was hovering at 123. While the sadness has eased its grip again, the new medications I’m on are of the sort that make you lose weight. I’ve lost two more pounds in the past week. I haven’t seen 120 since I was 16.

It frightens me. I don’t like being this skinny. Once you are of a certain thinness, the pressure is on to keep it. People tend to leave you alone though if you’re even 5 pounds heavier than that thin. I’m not anymore, though. My skinny jeans are just straight legs now, and I have to belt them in so tight to keep them up. I eat, but the weight keeps falling.

Today marks a big day in our house.  We switched cable companies, and my mother finally let go of her infernal VCR.  And by let go, I mean we ripped it from her cold, dead hands.

Okay, not quite, but she only let it go due to not having any other choices. Though can I point out that it’s still sitting under our television, not hooked up to a damn thing?  Change can be oh-so-hard in this house.  She’s still skeptical of the DVR that arrived, even after I on-the-fly recorded a rerun of Law & Order for her.

I, however, am one happy camper.  We finally have The National Geographic Channel!  Oh how I have missed it’s educational and somewhat silly programming since I left New York City.  Bonus: our internet seems to (finally!) work properly, too.