A Very (W)right First Dinner Party - Today, April 19th, is my father's birthday. I always remember this because it was the day of The Battle of Lexington, which is the day after Paul Revere's Ride (as memorialized by the opening lines'Twas the 18th of April in '75 ...). Honestly, it would be much easier to remember his birthday based on the fact that my birthday is August 18th, my non-marital anniversary (read artbirary commemoration of our first official coupledom celebrated these last four years) is June 18th, Andrew's birthday is May 18th, and my mother and her partner also have an 18th anniversary... But I'm a complicated person.
At any rate, we had our own little miniature celebration last night. Though it was his birthday, he brought us a housewarming batch of new flowers. They are now very jealous of Molly's daisy, since it still has its roots and will likely outlive them by some time - well, honestly, a few days since I do exude an air that is utterly noxious to flora. But they are getting along quite nicely in their short time together.
Boy do I throw a fancy party, lemme tell ya. I mean, I provided a whole ziploc bag of paella that we'd frozen from the non-rehearsal dinner celebration! And I let him microwave the paella with some chicken he'd brought over. Oh no, it doesn't stop there: I even chopped up some cabbage and sprinkled almond slices over the spinach that he'd also brought over (along with his own dressing). And we ate the salad on plates! I know, right?? Not cardboard pizza boxes, not tupperware containers, and not handfuls from a common baggie, but actual plates! And while sitting on stools at the kitchen island, because the living room is currently the chairless cardboard storage locker (plus comfy couch, which is currently kind of a post-modern coat and bag rack).
I'm proud to say that I succeeded where others had failed, and managed to plop several precariously rammed birthday candles into his fancy Bliss cupcake, and belt out the birthday song. I figure such leniency was accomplished due to several factors: (1) the being the darling daughter who must occasionally be humored under parental law, (2) having set the cupcake ablaze and thus preventing meaningful access to the chocolate nirvana that lay beneath.
Andrew, alack, narrowly missed the entire event by about five minutes. I say this is sad, but it had its fortune as well. I have no idea where he would have sat! We may be primed for dinner parties, but they are going to have to be quite exclusive dinner parties until that living room situation is sorted out (or involved some kind of rotating schedule for chair usage on perhaps a five minute switch-up cycle?). On the other hand, since I eat every five minutes or so, it meant I got to go from one dinner party to another like the party animal I am (hey, I don't have leopard print flannel pjs for just any old reason). And yes, Andrew and I throw pretty awesome dinner parties. We even included some fabulous party games like "sneak the paper recycling into the neighbor's bin, since our is missing," and "spot the differences between my Disney VISA debit from Chase and Andrew's Mastercard from Chase (I just wanted a pretty picture on mine)" and "get distracted with other things and nearly completely burn the rice"... I'm telling you, once we have chairs, we can have really awesome party games with our cardboard recycling and furniture construction! People might even get their own ziploc baggie of food (I'll take it out of the bag for the microwave, I promise!).
The Living Room: It's Alive!! It's Alive!! Or more accurately, it's actually coming together as a living room/dining room. We have - hold onto your hats, your toupes, and your soon to be skyrocketing eyebrows - four chairs and a LAMP! The chairs are loaners from my father. He has helpfully informed us that they're likely broken and will need wood glue. So far, they appear to sit up on their own and bear some weight, so I'm not entirely sure what we'll be gluing, but perhaps we can just glue the chairs to the table so that they never get lost? They currently are sitting near the table but all in a group and facing the window. Perhaps they are a bit lost. Poor souls.
Handy-Andy (who shall most likely never be plagued with such an epithet again, since it really doesn't seem to suit my little loris, despite his handiness) also put together our final gift-card sponsored Target. That would be the lamp featured above. As you see, I've wasted no time in co-opting the bottom shelves for my heavily cropped but still extant dvd collection. And Lawrence, our pet loris, also decided to hop over from the mantle and check it out. In our livability surge, we may even have taken the cardboard carpeting sitting behind and around the couch to a recycling dumpster. There are still cardboard islands, but the room is almost navigable and quite a bit more livable than previously.
This morning was my (almost) final blitz in name changing shenanigans. It started at the DOL/DMV. There are now lines to get into lines there. I'm not exactly sure if this is such a horrible idea, but it did seem congestive and not entirely efficient based on my observations of the flow of traffic. Also, the first line pushed every one back awkwardly into the entry doors, making ingress and egress virtually impossible. Not necessarily ideal, but certainly supportive of the general push to get people to do as much as humanly possible online and not in person. Name changes, unfortunately, can't be done online, so I couldn't help my contribution to the glut.
I made it through one line, got to wait for a good half hour, and then was called up for my second line experience. The name change part was pretty simple, but the vision test was nervewracking. The light that shows the letters only comes on when the forehead is pressed aggressively against a pad (not thinking about the myriad germs and bacteria lingering on my forehead), and it wasn't working very well. Perhaps I'm still more near sighted than I thought, but the letters weren't super focused and seemed to be impacted by the slightest change in forehead pressure. I'm pretty sure that I just free-associated random letters for half the test and I doubt - barring some late blooming psychic abilities - that I got any of them correct. But I think it's just the ritual of having done the vision test and not so much your accuracy. Also, I'm not sure why they have several lines from which to read when they only ever actually make you read the top line.
Turns out that the photo on my old license was scandalous - it allowed me to be looking at the camera from a slight angle and while smiling (retrieving smelling salts for y'all now). The lady helping me called over somebody else and they conferenced tersely about the card. I'm pretty sure that somebody was about to get fired, and I got shuttled through to another line for my new photo. That was a blessing, since the last photo looks positively nothing like me and I was beginning to be concerned that I'd be accused of using another person's id if I ever got pulled over or tried to buy alcohol with it. The new photo looks like me - if I were just about to get booked in jail. Which is hopefully not a harbinger of traffic stops to come. I rather like the mugshot element to it, but this is because it makes me feel like a celebrity (they always seem to have widely published mug shots - mine is definitely worthy).
Out with a lovely paper print-out of a pretend license, we made some stops at Value Village and the aforementioned cardboard dumpster in our ongoing struggle to purge the detritus from our lives (and thus living room). From there, it was on to the BANK for one more name change errand and many more minutes of aimless waiting. At least the bank had coffee. Which goes beautifully with aimless waiting. Beeeautifully. I am now almost ready to update my credit card information online, get the WSBA to change my lawyer-info and say adios to my maiden name... Almost. There's still this passport nonsense. Turns out that the "passport offices" in Bellingham don't actually do anything but give you the forms you could have printed out online. So I still have to mail that application and supporting documentation in.
Also, I still accidentally introduce myself as "Adella Thompson" on the phone. Habits are hard to kill. And when I do say "Adella Wright," I giggle uncontrollably. Because let's face it, you never do feel any less like the fourth grade girl of comic book lore who doodled her crush's name + hers + her with her crush's last name + several hearts and a 4 EVAH...
I also returned home with bounty far more prosperous and far less sired by tedium and strife. That's right, I know I've made it to DINKYdom now that I have the following electronic devices: a kindle, a 7 inch tablet, a smarter-than-all-your-honor-students-combined phone, a leviathon laptop/multimedia paradise, a netbook, and drumroll please a new ultrabook. I basically have a cute smart-device farm at this point. I plan to retire from the proceeds of my DMV travel log and write children's stories about little Sammy Gal, the tab, and her shenanigans with Ultra-Dell, Toshi, and Hewletty Packard. Mr. (W)right brings in a Brady Bunch flavor with his own smart phone, kindle, tablet, laptop and several smaller athletic devices that still retain the "smart" of several of me on a good day.
In the words of the Talking Heads, you do ask yourself how did I get here? Well, the netbook is a relic of lawschool. My older laptop (which may still be kicking around, thus adding to the pile and becoming sort of the loving grandmother of my farm kids), was burdensomely heavy and tended to freeze up when used. I sprung for something I could use for notes (and/or online shopping - never!! Not me!! Just Every one else in class) in classes. The smart phone, of course, is a matter of course in modern society. Especially since I had no working internet at home until recently. And the huge laptop is mostly for dj-ing, and the burdensome processing and storage requirements attached to such. Then there's the Galaxy Tab, which was a gift and originally intended to be a replacement for the netbook. It's more becoming a replacement for the kindle (especially now, since my kindle seems to have the melty screen of death again and I've already had it replaced once).
And now the ultrabook. Which apparently my father bought for work. He's a doctor and of course the big thing in medicine is electronic records, portable access, etc. etc. Unfortunately (1) the wifi at his office is laughably bad, and (2) he just can't figure out the confounded device. This was evidenced from his giving me the computer with the wrong password and requiring about a day to remember which password he'd used soI could change it. I, however, love it. I am too compulsive a writer (as in, "one who performs the verb to write" and not "one who adopts the mantle of the purely be-nouned write" although now I shall consider myself a wrighter bwahahahaha) not to have a keyboard. I am also a bit too lazy to carry around my 18 inch laptop everywhere. My netbook is elderly, and mostly consigned for travel purposes. And I'll admit that the whole laptop-with-a-touchscreen-thing deeply appeals to me. And yes, yes, maybe +Andrew Wright and I spent some of our afternoon using our devices and gchatting with each other. I am already excited for the day when we have a couch in the "study" so that I can sit on behind him at his desk and we can chat with each other from two or three feet away.
Needless tech-deluge aside, it was Mr. (W)right's three-hour ride day and he merrily plugged up to the top of Galbraith, while I chopped a bunch of vegetables and quite possibly snuck over to my mom's to watch Hannibal. We reconvened for dinner, followed by some dancing.
Dinner was the every elegant Old Country Buffet, which is possibly one of my favorite restaurants over. Andrew can consume three plates of cardiac bypass surgery and I can eat a medium sized garden. Who could possibly complain?
Dancing was our monthly Tango Experience. The lesson was lightly attended enough to be non-existent. I suspect this was due to the longer daylight hours and inevitable excitement to be outdoors in April. If I recall, our attendance was abysmal last April before picking up again in May (and flatting our again in June). The milonga itself was well-attended, however. I'm proud to say that my efforts to remember somebody's name were vindicated as the Glen I met in January actually did return to dance and had impressively also remembered my name (I am telling you, nothing will ensure remembering somebody's name as much as insisting you could never possibly remember anyone's name). There was also a newer dancer who I never formally met, but her name was Sierra and I will remember that because I immediately thought of Sierra Mist. Helpful use of brain storage, of course.
I made the rounds in tidy pace, and thought I was bailing quite early. I actually left about a half hour before the end, so I suppose getting tethered into conversations and fifteen minute tandas can fill an evening rather quickly.
The dancing, itself, was nice, but my real accomplishment was finally figuring out how to wear these shoes. I know it's silly, but I've had them for years and rarely wear them. They just never seem to quite match the outfits I've chosen for dancing. I adore them for their Pretty Woman sort of polo-match feel, but they're a little too mellow for most of my socks, and much of my classier wardrobe is more black and grey scale. Last night I said screw it and embraced the polka dots. Well, my skirt was leopard print, but I do own a polka dot purse and wallet as well.
I figure on nights where my teaching services are not called into use, at least I can contribute some interesting visual diversions. Or perhaps, I'm just happy to have long outgrown any benighted urges to look elegant, authentic, or tango-trendy. There are many beautiful young women who've handily filled that niche these days. I'm thirty, now, thoroughly comfortable with my near decade of not-so-intensive dancing status and I have other niches to fill! While we may both be rocking comme il fauts, I figure there are enough harem pants and sultry dresses to satistfy the lustiest of evenings. It's nice to just go with my sartorial caprice.
We were talking once again about embellishments at the non-lesson last night. Celie was asking about certain embellishments I had done while warming up with David. Again I could not remember for the life of me what I had done. She said she noticed that I never did the same exact one twice, although David noted I had certain signature stylings in each movement. It continues to strike me just how personalized the dance becomes after the intermediate hump. When you begin, you have little technique and you do not look like other dancers, but your movements are lucidly idiosyncratic. When you begin to learn, you constantly fight those habits and begin layering on imitations and standardizations of movement. When you are a little more advanced, you get a big toolbox for building your pieces of flair (yes we want you to wear all 37 pieces of flair even if it's beyond the minimum). Finally it all melts away and you realize you just dance in a way that could be identified across a football field or felt from the first step of an embrace. And it's not conscious. It's just your body feeling what it feels and letting the music and the moment move through you. I figure my dancing is uniquely me, so why not let my dress go there too? Although perhaps my dancing is sometimes a little less I-just-raided-the-dress-up-pile-in-the-kid's-room... but not if a milonga has come on!
Mr. (W)right stayed admirably almost awake the entire evening, despite his post-workout torpor. We were, of course, accosted by congratulators in various locations. Apparently he and I got married with a real ceremony and everything. I'd been starting to forget this. We also got kudos for being one of the only weddings some guests had been to in which a discussion of metals and material science featured heavily in the ceremony (hey, lawyer gets a contract and engineer gets a brief symposium on the virtues of stainless steel... and every one gets challah bread and oreo ice cream cake!!)
And today we're off to Seattle for lunch and the ballet! Date night bleeds into date afternoon! That's a true honeymoon for ya!
Of Swans, Socks and How Domesticity Beats Trolling for Cute Birds in the Forest - Yesterday was our Seattle date afternoon. Our ballet calendar has been pretty heavy recently, due to the cycles of a subscription season. This time around, though, was a little different (for better and worse). Instead of the more frequent repertory performances, this was the money (literally, judging by the crowds) production: Swan Lake.
The place was writhing with little girls in tutus, let me tell ya. I'm not sure how I feel about that. It's not exactly a positive message for little girls. I've previously remarked (also after seeing a production) that the major theme of most classical ballets is that men cannot keep it in their pants (perhaps because they rarely are wearing any... huh...), and this causes the sweet selfless women who love them all kinds of horrible consequences (usually in the form of being consigned to dance in forests among several other women in white). In one of the cheery versions of Swan Lake, the prince gets to save Odette at the end by fighting Rothbart (I accidentally wrote Rothbone, which would be an intesting twist: Sherlock leaps into the scene and discovers it was Prince Siegfried who killed the Countess!). To me, that just piles on one more grrrrreat message for little kids: men will sleep around, but then they'll fix it with acts of violence, externalizing the consequences of their actions, and otherwise not actually suffering for their lapses in judgment, while the women will stand around and wait to be rescued and forgive completely.
I'll say that I've had mixed feelings about Swan Lake generally. I tend to think that a lot of the story ballets have far less story to them than some of the modern pieces. As Andrew is wont to point out, the "royals and main characters sit and let random people dance for them" trope can wane a touch tedious compared to the thoroughly visceral emotional impact of some of Christopher Wheeldon's shorter pieces, for instance. The music is naturally exquisite and can elicit a tear even heard from down an alley in daily life. The costumes are always sumptuous. The choreography is rightly classic (I doubt there is a single person in the audience who got past their early childhood in ballet who hasn't studied at least segments of the Swan Lake choreography). And the dancing, itself, is quite impressive. But, when not done right, Swan Lake can still be a bit ... meh. As I say, it takes an entire forty-five minute first act just to get to the first plot point that the prince gets a bow so he can go hunting. And, the characters can be a bit one-dimensional to the point where the only one I really like much is Odile (gee, a coy, competitive, flirtatious, sassy gal who looks good in black and doesn't get suckered in by wandering prince's immediate declarations of love? Of course I relate). And the FAAAABULOUS nature of Rothbarts crazy costume needs a pretty fabulous dancer not to be thoroughly ridiculous.
I give kudos to the PNB for getting this fairly right. Perhaps this is a sign of ballet-heathenism and/or ballet-hipsterism, but I still certainly could have skipped the first act, despite some solid performances and some of my favorite music. The rest of the production improved exponentially with each subsequent act. In Ken Stowell's version, some things are moved around, but it's the final act, which is most touching. In it, the prince and Odette reunite in the forest, but recognize Odette is forever consigned to her fate, and they will never see each other again. The choreography as they part is deeply moving and utterly in touch with the rapture of orchestral surge. While Odette never becomes a fully fascinating character in her own right, the prince seemed very young, sincere, and naive. His folly was far more relatable than cockier Siegfried's of other productions.
After the ballet, Andrew had some final things to retrieve from that-home-that-shall-not-be-mentioned (ok, fine, Andrew's old place in Seattle). This of course set off the Adella clock-ticking-anxiety and perhaps inspired me to maul a few older women attempting to leave the ballet in timely fashion (before the surging crowds). In my defense, this one woman had to have been the hardest person to walk past that I have ever experienced in all my years of theater going. I had attempted to get out during intermission, and I don't know what she was doing but while her friend did that typical half-standing posture for me to get by, she seems to have planted herself firmly across the entire alley-way. Fortunate for my own dance training, I managed to do an odd little maneuver over her without harm, while Andrew used his cyclocross training to just climb over the back of the seat. It was a little more brutal during the curtain. First, they may have been the only able-bodied people not in the midst of a standing ovation. And she stayed planted of course, except this time, she moved her feet while I was halfway over her, so I stumbled right over her. I think she muttered something disapproving at me while I broke a world record for number of times somebody can say sorry in a five second span (a lot).
Nonetheless we survived. Andrew packed up his stuff, while I battled the depraved anomie of a Whole Foods on Sunday afternoon to retrieve some dinner for the ride home. We made it back in good time and celebrated our marital bliss with parallel laundry folding. It's always fun living with somebody full time and having their little quirks and habits on full display. Andrew finds it amusing how differently we approach our dresser drawers. He folds his shirts far more crisply than a bank folds a twenty-dollar bill (GAP employees would be severely jealous). He also stacks his t-shirts in a manner that allows for a rotation of shirts. He works his way down from the right pile and moves piles to the right as they deplete. I have a slap-dash folding approach, and any clarity to such folding is muddled within the first two days of want to find something to wear. Usually, I pull out a shirt and pants from the dresser the night before and leave them in the laundry room, so I can change without waking Andrew up. I may not be particularly respectful of any ordinal stratification that has evolved in any of my drawers.
Neat and tidy in the drawers, but many other clothes find their home in piles on the bed or other places, so we're not talking too much neatness here. And, I find it amusing that he never folds towels on racks, something I usually do in my consistently slapdash but passable fashion. He also threads towels onto racks from beneath, which was something that caught my attention. I tend to fold them and then lower them onto racks. Of course, in the age old divergence of habit, I tend to set things to dry face down and he sets them all face up. No judgment, as I keep assuring him, but it is fascinating to watch how differently all these little quotidian rituals can play out. Makes one stop and wonder how any particular personal habit developed in the first place.
Having discovered that the Bellingham "passport offices" basically can only give you the same forms you could have printed off online, today is my day to get another copy of my marriage certificate so that I can mail in an application to get a passport with my new name on it. I'll already be at the courthouse for our Collaborative Law meeting, fortunately. After that, joy of joys, I have another bank to drop by and slurp tepid coffee at while waiting to stare at somebody with a computer for a while. In celebration of my new name, I even introduced myself as "Andrew's wife" when I noticed Andrew's old landlord looking quizzically at me when I approached them outside the house. I didn't even titter uncontrollably (just a teeny bit)
No comments:
Post a Comment