jamelah.net

can’t stop what’s coming

Posted on August 24, 2010 by jamelah

It’s foggy this morning. I do love the fog; it softens the edges of things and sort of makes it all feel a little bit imaginary, like a film set. The air this morning is pleasantly cool, and even though I know it will be hot by the afternoon, right now it feels like fall. I like fall, but then, what’s not to like? The trees turn gorgeously showy and at the best of times the air has a sharp, almost tangy bite.

This morning, however, there’s an oddly antiseptic smell drifting through the open window near my desk, as if someone scrubbed the sidewalk with Lysol. This is, you know, weird.

I have mixed feelings about fall. As I mentioned, I like it. It’s beautiful. The weather is nice. I get to wear sweaters. I like sweaters. It usually involves a trip to an apple orchard at some point; it usually involves a long aimless drive to look at the foliage gone wild and fiery. It is the season of back to school and fresh starts, even as it is also the season of the last hurrah before the long cold sleep of winter. The days are noticeably shorter, and I have to wear real shoes. And socks. (This is the real tragedy.)

The thing is, fall, as lovely as it is, always makes me a little sad. Just a little. There’s always this vague sense of unease, like there’s something slipping away. It is the feeling of love — you knew it wouldn’t last — crumbling beneath the surface, and you let it because there’s nothing else to be done, you let it crumble, even as you enjoy the super-saturated final act when you love harder than you did before because you know you must.

This morning it feels like fall and it smells like Lysol but the fog has mostly lifted by now and it will be summer again soon, maybe even within the hour. And, despite the tone this post has taken, I’m feeling good this morning, well-rested and all. (That feeling well-rested in the morning thing hasn’t happened much lately so it seems especially sweet today.) I miss writing here. I should do that more often.

Hi. How are you?

Posted in Everything, Photos | 7 Comments

of tomatoes, memory, and broken computers (not in that order)

Posted on July 25, 2010 by jamelah

Well. I’ve been having an interesting summer. I sometimes catch myself in the middle of a moment — I’m outside at night, say, and the sky, not yet quite black, perhaps instead a dark velvety blue, is awash with stars, and there are fireflies twinkling in the grass, in the trees, and I look around and try to memorize each little thing I see — and I wonder how I will feel, years from now, when I remember the summer of 2010. Time periods stick in the memory as impressions. I can always zoom in on my own eras in the past and remember fragments, things about which I told myself Remember this forever, but overall, when I flip through the years of my life, there’s always a general feeling that accompanies them, . Spring 2002: afraid and sad. Winter 2006: disappointed. Summer 2007: hanging onto a cliff by my fingernails. Et cetera. So I think about this summer that has been so interesting, and I wonder what impression I will come away with when I come away from it. Winter was awful and dark, spring felt like standing in the middle of a promise as it was being fulfilled and I felt strong and beautiful and alive every day, and summer… well. I’m still in summer so I don’t know yet. So far it’s been great and also difficult. Emotionally overwhelming, mentally exhausting. Work has been hard and stressful, but I’m not going to complain about it, because overall, I have to remember that it’s the first time in my life when I’ve had a job that actually challenged me every day. Creatively, it’s been a dry spell. I’m still doing the photo-a-day thing, but I can’t say I’ve really put a whole lot of thought or effort into the photos for quite some time. Despite myself, some of the photos have turned out well anyway. And as for writing, well, ha. Someday, I tell myself, you will figure out how to have time to do everything you want to do on top of everything you have to do. But that day hasn’t come yet.

Someday.

Anyway, I’ve been drifting away from the internet for most of the year, and I’m not really sure why — it’s nothing personal, Internet, I still love you and all — and then a couple of weeks ago my computer crashed and I haven’t had time to figure out if it’s fixable or if I have to buy a new one, and the truth is, I mostly don’t miss it. Except for iTunes. I miss that. (Fortunately it’s backed up.) I miss people and I wonder how they’re doing, what’s going on, etc., but while I can read my email on my iPod (which I do once a day), I don’t really like browsing the internet on such a tiny device and so I’m even more woefully out of touch with what’s going on with the people I used to keep up with. Flickr streams go unvisited, blogs go unread, and I’m totally afraid of what it’s going to be like when I finally decide it’s time to take a look at what’s piled up in Google Reader. Eventually I’ll get the computer issue sorted out (I’m borrowing one right now, and I decided I’d finally update my blog), and maybe in the fall, when the weather is cooler and I won’t feel like spending every single one of my free minutes outside in the sun with a book I’ll return to this side of life again. I think I kind of miss it after all. Except for Facebook. I can’t say I really miss Facebook.

At first, when the computer crashed, I realized that I was a tool because I hadn’t saved another copy of my book anywhere. What kind of idiot doesn’t back up a novel? REALLY, JAMELAH? WHAT IS YOUR PROBLEM? I admit that I cried. And I spent a day feeling that feeling, you know, when it’s like some strong invisible hand reaches inside and eviscerates you? Like when you get dumped by someone you really love or someone dies or something. That’s how I felt. But I managed to get back into the computer and I think perhaps I have my drafts saved now. I could plug the external drive I was using into another computer and check but I haven’t. If it isn’t saved, I don’t know if I want to know. And for now I’d rather just float along with a maybe being good enough. I’ve had terrible losses of stuff before, and I’ve always recovered: there’s something to be said for detachment after all, but still. It’s my book. Even if I have neglected it over the past few months, it’s mine. My thing. The thing that reminds me that there is more than getting up every morning and driving to an office. There is wordplay and creativity and that is really what I’m after.

I don’t know. I guess the fact that I know that there’s something else keeps me going when I feel like there really isn’t anything else.

Anyway, I’ve got some stuff to do this afternoon, and I should get to it, but I have one more thing to write about. It’s no secret that I do not love tomatoes. I have a list of foods I think are vile and tomatoes go on that list. Raw tomatoes are gross, though I have made exceptions for fresh salsa, if the tomatoes are cut up really small. I like roasted tomatoes, and so I am now capable of admitting that tomatoes are not vile in that form, but still, raw ones make me want to die. A little. But anyway, now I am growing tomatoes! I didn’t mean to grow tomatoes, though. Here’s what happened. Last summer, I decided to start composting. So hurrah for compost and all. And earlier this year, I was working in my flower gardens and I thought I would get some of my compost to mix into some of the potting soil I had in some flower pots, and I got a bucket of rich black dirt out of my compost bin. (Hurrah!) I set the bucket on the porch next to the flower pots and I fully intended to go buy some flowers to plant in said pots but for one reason or another, I kept not being able to do this. Then one day I was outside and I looked at the bucket of rich black compost dirt and I noticed a couple of plants growing in it. At first I thought they were weeds and I almost pulled them, but then when I looked closely, I noticed they were tomato vines. I roasted enough tomatoes last summer and threw enough kitchen scraps into the compost bin to have plenty of tomato seeds, and so basically, I ended up accidentally growing tomatoes.

They were like this:

And then they were like this:

And now…? Oh hells to the yes, nephew, I got tomatoes:

Right on.

So there’s that.

Anyway, to bring it back to what I started with, my hope is that when I remember this summer, I will remember that I was peaceful. I’ve never been good at being content. I usually find some weak spot I can kick until it breaks, but this summer I’ve been pretty relaxed. There are all kinds of things up in the air, questions I have, decisions I need to make, stuff I want to change, and I know I’ll get to those things, because they’re too important to leave alone, but for now, I guess it’s good enough to have a beer and put my feet up and read for awhile. To drink iced tea in the summer sun and let my skin turn brown(er). And sit outside at night and watch the fireflies, oh the fireflies, how I love them. And have those long rambling conversations that meander along amiably like a summer afternoon. And listen to those violent midwestern thunderstorms and revel in the electricity buzzing in the air. And all these things. And in spite of the things that are difficult, the things that challenge and tire, this is the summer when I learned how to relax and be at peace with myself, to dismiss the thoughts of ways I need to improve, to put them away for another time, and for now just to breathe easy.

Posted in Everything, Me me me, Photos | 10 Comments

technology brings us all together

Posted on June 28, 2010 by jamelah

My first love broke my heart a thousand times, and now we are friends on Facebook.

Posted in Everything, One Line | 1 Comment

i’m taking it as a compliment

Posted on June 9, 2010 by jamelah

“You’re like the conversational equivalent of a prison riot,” he said.

Posted in Everything, I'm A Jerk, One Line | 1 Comment

the boy i was going to marry

Posted on June 3, 2010 by jamelah

When I was, well, according to the date in the corner of this photograph, it’s August 1982, which means I was not quite 3, my family went to Arkansas. I don’t remember much about this trip, because I was not quite 3 at the time, but I do remember a few things about it. I remember following my uncle Ted (actually my great uncle) around like a puppy because I thought he was THE COOLEST. EVER. And I remember learning that you can’t actually sit on the surface of water without something to hold you up. (Yes, I tried to sit on water.) (Of course I did.) And I met the boy I was going to marry.

In that photograph, that’s me and the boy I was going to marry. He was maybe 4? So my theme of liking older men has been lifelong. He’s related to the Jewell family, so I’ll refer to him as That Jewell Boy. I don’t remember why he was the boy I was going to marry, I just remember that he and I sat together in that chair (there is another photograph of us in the same chair, probably taken moments later, and we’re holding hands, though I couldn’t find it last night, and so there’s a part of me that wonders if I’m not hallucinating it, and maybe we weren’t holding hands, maybe I had my hand on his leg, which seems to be one of my signature moves) and my grandma said something to me and I replied “I am going to marry him.” I was so certain about everything in the universe when I was 2, so it stands to reason that I’d know beyond any shadow of a doubt that if I sat in a chair with a boy, then he and I were obviously meant for each other.

The following morning, we went to church. A photograph I am absolutely 100% certain I am not hallucinating is one of me and That Jewell Boy standing in front of the church in our Sunday best.¹ We are smiling in that way that is more like we’re squinting into the sun. It was the last time I ever saw him, the boy I was going to marry. In the intervening years, I have forgotten his name, though suddenly my brain just said “I think it’s Nathan,” so maybe his name is Nathan? Which is perhaps a better name than That Jewell Boy. If it is Nathan, I wonder if he would ever find this post if he Googled himself. Hm.⁵

Anyway, in the years that have come and gone since that summer when I was two and in Arkansas and sitting in a chair with That Jewell Boy: Perhaps Nathan Edition, my grandmother, whose greatest desire⁶ is to see me married off to some nice young man so I can start having babies already because I’m not getting any younger, you know⁷, has brought him up from time to time, usually at family gatherings, with all the tact she can muster⁸, “Do you remember when we were in Arkansas and you were going to marry That Jewell Boy?” “Yes.” And then there is a pointed look.

And oh, isn’t it adorable, being 2 and certain that you’ve met your future spouse? Totally. I mean, they say that when you know, you know, so there’s that, and furthermore, I’ve never been so certain that I was going to marry someone ever again in my entire life.⁹ Except it should be taken into consideration the fact that my concept of marriage was that when you were married that meant you sat together and also you rode in the same car when you went places.¹¹

And so, even though I’m not going to marry that Jewell Boy Who May or May Not Be Named Nathan, I figure if two-year-old me could give the world any advice, it would be this:

If you’re going to marry someone, you’d better make sure you like sitting together and riding in the same car. That’s as sound advice as any, I think, which just goes to show you that I have always been a genius in the ways of love.¹²
___________________________________________________________

^{1. Here’s a little bit of trivia for you. The church was located in Dyess, Arkansas², which is where my mom’s family used to live back in the day before they wound up in Michigan. For that matter, the chair that I sat in with That Jewell Boy was also located in Dyess. So it’s a magic place, where I met my first love. It is also where Johnny Cash³ is from, which I thought I’d tell you, so if you’re ever having a conversation about Johnny Cash (I imagine this happens all the time), and the person you’re talking to thinks Johnny Cash is from Memphis, because people think that, you can be all “Nuh uh! He was from Dyess, Arkansas! GOD, YOU DON’T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT ANYTHING.” Like maybe this would come up in Trivial Pursuit or something? I don’t know.}

2. Just in case, pronounce “Dyess” like “Dice” sort of, more like if you were saying “Dice” but you were from Arkansas.⁴

3. Total badass.

4. What’s the protocol on footnotes within footnotes?

5. On second thought, I’m pretty sure it’s not Nathan. Maybe not pretty sure, maybe only kinda sure. Maybe I just think that his name is possibly not Nathan. But it could be. For that matter, almost anyone’s name could be Nathan, but the percentage of people named Nathan out of the set of people who could potentially be named Nathan is reasonably small. I bet I could illustrate this with a Venn diagram. Like so:

I know a guy named Nathan. I never thought I was going to marry him, though. Note also how much dust is on my camera sensor. Damn.

6. Okay, I’m not so self-centered as to believe this is her greatest desire, so let’s go with maybe it’s in her top 100.

7. She should trademark that.

8. For someone so concerned with being a proper lady, it is amazing how little tact this involves.

9. Of course, part of this stems from the fact that my attitude toward marriage as a concept and a pastime has become something along the lines of “I would prefer not to.”¹⁰ Though the comment thread on this photo may perhaps make me reevaluate my position on the issue, because, um, ROBOT.

10. Bartleby, the Scrivener, represent!

11. I also thought I was going to be a brain surgeon.

12. I can’t even tell you how hard I laughed just then, but I may possibly have snorted.

Posted in Annotated, Everything, Photos | 5 Comments

random question of the day

Posted on May 13, 2010 by jamelah

So. It’s been awhile, eh? How are things? Good? Fantastic. Here, things have been busy and a bit stressful, but overall, I can’t complain. I tend to thrive on stress, actually. (Yeah, I’m one of those people.) So it’s been one thing after another, all the time, which, come to think of it, is how it goes even when it’s not stressful. Life is a series of events, one, then the next, then the next. Oh gosh, how deep. But really, even though there are days when I’m tired and grumpy, mostly I feel pretty good. Energetic. Happy. Like this:

People ask me a lot if I’ve had too much caffeine. The answer to that question is usually a resounding YES OH MY GOSH I LOVE COFFEE.

May I also mention that Sweet Pea, my dear darling bug of a dog is lying on the floor at my feet right now, farting continuously? I can’t breathe. I might die. What a horrible way to go, really, but OH MY GOD SWEET PEA WHAT DID YOU EAT? I have opened a window in the hopes of keeping myself alive long enough to finish this post. This is not really the way to set up the question I wanted to ask, because the question, it’s going to be about food. So I guess I’ll stop writing this paragraph about my dog’s noxious gas bombs.

Alrighty.

So today I was on my lunch break –

True story: when I told a co-worker I was finally leaving for lunch, she said “Maybe you shouldn’t go, because if ever there was a day to leave here and immediately start drinking, today would be it, and what if you got so drunk you couldn’t come back?”

– and I was on the phone and somehow the conversation ended up being about breakfast and for one thing, this person I was talking to seemed to be unfamiliar with the concept of breakfast for dinner which means that he must be an alien, because who doesn’t ever end up in a diner or other diner-type establishment around suppertime on occasion and say “Yes, by Jove, I WILL HAVE AN OMELET,” really? Breakfast for dinner is one of those things that bind us together as human beings, along with being unable to resist loving the song “Don’t Stop Believin’” and having opposable thumbs.

Anyway, my question, which is very very important, and I have brought myself out of my quasi-retirement from almost the entire internet for this, but if you have a moment to answer me I would greatly appreciate it:

Pancakes and bacon is a natural combination, yes? They go together, right? Like peanut butter and jelly. Like Hall and Oates. Like He-Man and The Power of Greyskull. Like a jar of Nutella and a great big spoon. (Oooh! Nutella!) Like…

Okay, you get the idea.

It is the sweet of the syrup and the salty of the bacon, together, like magic. Right? I mean, we can argue about whether or not I’m a total weirdo some other time, because this isn’t one of the things that makes me a total weirdo. Pancakes and bacon: that’s like that moment at the end of Jerry Maguire when he’s all “You complete me” and she’s all “You had me at hello.” (I can’t believe I am using a Tom Cruise movie to argue a point.)

Have I actually asked a question here? I don’t even know. I’m a little rusty at this whole blogging thing, which I think is fairly obvious. The point is that pancakes and bacon — that’s normal, right?

Discuss. And thank you.

XO,
Jamelah

Posted in Everything, Photos, Random Question of the Day | 9 Comments

kitchen nightmares, or how to make a lemon-strawberry trifle with ginger and thyme

Posted on April 4, 2010 by jamelah

Alright, so today is Easter, which means ~~church with the family and dinner to follow~~ family dinner. And I am in charge of dessert, because dessert is what I do. And I tried to think of something to make that wouldn’t be too heavy, because it’s spring now, and spring doesn’t feel like heavy dessert time to me. So I thought about it for a few minutes and decided to make a trifle. My aunt Martha makes this one with strawberries and pound cake soaked in orange juice and IT IS SO GOOD but my cousin’s birthday is also just around the corner and I know that he’s a big fan of lemon so I thought I would come up with some variation on the theme. So I thought… strawberries? Yes, please. And strawberries go very well with lemon. My two favorite gelato flavors to get together? Fragola e limone. Ay ay ay.

Anyway, so I didn’t want to soak a pound cake in lemon juice, because, um no. And I know how to make this amazing lemon glaze, but it is so full of sugar that it would just be too much for this particular dessert, so I scrapped that. And then I decided — oh! Lemon pound cake! Of course! Now, I’ve never made a lemon pound cake before, but I know the principles of pound cake and I further know that in order to make something lemony, all it takes is adding lemon to it, so I was pretty much all set. Also, you know what I love with lemon? Ginger. The ginger tempers the zing of the lemon a bit and adds a lovely note to the flavor and I know this because I make these lemon ginger shortbread cookies that are, not to brag, AMAZING. So I checked a pound cake recipe for ratios (baking is a science, and ratios must be correct) and then I decided I didn’t need butter AND shortening and instead of milk wouldn’t sour cream be better and also, you know, it needed lemon and ginger. So is the recipe I ended up with:

Flour mixture:
3 c. flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

The rest:
3 c. sugar
1 1/2 c. unsalted butter
ground ginger to taste
5 eggs
1 c. sour cream
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
zest and juice of one lemon

Normally I’d just give you the basics — oven temperature, pan size, baking time, etc., but today I have to tell you the story about how this cake came into being because it’s such a good story, you guys. Why don’t I have my own cooking show? Call me, Food Network!

Okay, so I combined the flour mixture. (You can sift or whisk or stir with a fork. I don’t care.) And then I began the task of creaming together the butter and the sugar. I like to start with cold butter, though I’m honestly not sure if this makes a difference or not. But I pretend it does and is worth the extra trouble. (I know it makes a difference to start with cold cream cheese when making cream cheese icing, and maybe that’s ~~where I got this notion from~~ from whence that notion came. Prepositions.) So okay, creaming together butter and sugar. You want to do this for a long time because this is the base of your cake batter and you want to get air into it. (This is another reason to start with cold butter, because if you start with room-temperature butter it’ll be runny and gross before you’re done.) You don’t want to overwork batter once you’ve added flour because this makes batter tough instead of light and airy. Light and airy — that’s the goal. Some advice from me to you.

Once I got the butter and sugar combined, I added the ginger. Then I added some more ginger, just for the hell of it. Not a ton, but you know, yay, ginger. At this point, I added the eggs (one at a time — v. important!) and added the vanilla and zested a lemon and added that and then juiced the lemon right into the mixing bowl (squeezed over a strainer, because you gotta watch out for seeds). Everything was combined, everything was looking the way it was supposed to look, so hurrah.

Then I started the next step, which was to add the sour cream and the flour mixture, alternating each about a third at a time. So, sour cream, combined. Flour, combined. More sour cream, combined. Then I added some more flour, and this is when disaster struck. I don’t even know what happened, honestly. I was apparently momentarily distracted, because that happens on occasion: my thoughts will shoot off to some sideways direction without warning and I’ll lose myself in the middle of wherever I was, in favor of saying “Oh really, brain?” Sometimes I snap myself out of this quickly and sometimes I follow one rabbit trail and then another and then another and then three hours later, I’m all, “What was I doing earlier, anyway?” I prefer to believe this is part of my charm. Anyway, so I guess that’s what happened, that my thoughts wandered off and I wandered with them instead of paying attention to the matter at hand. I don’t know how long I might’ve stayed distracted, but I was snapped back to the cake goings-on because suddenly there was a loud crash. I looked up and the mixer had done some kind of kamikaze dive out of the mixing bowl, winding up on the floor — still on, mind you — beaters spraying cake batter all over the kitchen. I’m not sure what I said at this moment, but it’s likely that it was in the vein of “Oh, fucking hell!” That’s me. I always talk like such a lady.

So I turned the mixer off and threw it into the sink. I think I said “I’ll deal with you later.” Because apparently small kitchen appliances need to be spoken to like they’re misbehaving children sometimes. And then I noticed that I had cake batter all over my arm and sprayed up my shin and thigh. Nice, right? I think so too. I figured that was as good a time as any to do a little taste test so I licked some of it off my hand. (What? My hands were clean. And also Classy is my middle name.) Not bad, I thought, all things considered. And then anyway, I had to wipe up the batter from the kitchen floor and cabinets, then I had to mop the floor, then I had to dump out the mop water, then I had to wipe down the countertop, then I had to deal with the mixer. And by the time I got all that done, I was fucking exhausted (it was also about 11 p.m. by that point) but I still had to finish combining the flour and sour cream. Which I finally got done and then I poured it into a sheet pan and baked it at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for approximately 25 minutes. (Why a sheet pan? Because I wanted it to be relatively flat so I could just cut it into small squares for my trifle. If I’d been making the cake to be a stand-alone cake, then it would’ve gone into a different pan. Mind you, this makes A GIANT AMOUNT OF CAKE.)

After the cake was out of the oven, I chopped some strawberries and threw them into a bowl with a spoonful of sugar and the leaves from a few sprigs of fresh thyme. Then I made some pudding. I put the bowl of pudding and the bowl of strawberries into the refrigerator. Then I did some other stuff for awhile and somewhere around midnight though I can’t remember if it was before or after, the cake was cool so I covered it and then I finally went to bed.

And now. The trifle part.

So. You start with a trifle bowl:

(Let’s pretend that’s not blurry.)

Trifle bowls are so pretty, though they seem so unnecessary because what are you going to use a trifle bowl for except for trifles? But still, I am happy to have a trifle bowl because it is so trifley.

And then there’s the lemon pound cake:

Of course, first I had to test it to make sure it was okay, considering what an adventure it was to get it made. So I sliced it up into small squares and took one. OH MY GOD YOU GUYS. It’s lemony. It’s gingery. It’s dense, but not heavy. It’s airy. It’s very moist (I can’t even tell you how much it pains me to use this word, because as you know, it is one of my least favorite words of all time. OF ALL TIME!) and has a fine crumb and is perfect in every way. Which is good, because oh mercy, I have so much of it.

So anyway, I cut the cake up into squares and tossed them into the trifle bowl to make the bottom layer. Like so:

And then this is how much cake I have left over:

Yeah. Um, who wants some leftover pound cake?

The next step is to layer pudding (you can also use some kind of custard or something):

And then the strawberries:

And then whipped cream, more lemon zest and some fresh thyme leaves:

So easy. Haven’t tried it yet, because it’s for dinner this afternoon, but how could it be bad?

Happy Easter, kids.

Posted in Everything, Food, Photos | 12 Comments

now with more boobs

Posted on March 21, 2010 by jamelah

I thought maybe when I finally decided to update my blog once again, it might be about something deep or important, but this is me we’re dealing with, so… really. Boobs. Of course.

So, okay. I have boobs. Two of them. I’m mostly indifferent to them, because I’ve had them since I was 10, which means that I’ve been lugging them around for 20 years, and at this point, my attitude is that, well, whatever. They’re there. Despite the fact that I had to start wearing a training bra when I was in the 5th grade, I never really was a particularly large-chested girl. I wasn’t flat-chested either, just kinda… in between. Even though in most ways, I was done growing by the time I was 13 or 14 (I hit my permanent height of 5’6″ in eighth grade or maybe the beginning of 9th grade and never grew another inch), my boobs have experienced a few unexpected growth spurts since then.

I don’t really know what this is all about. It happened twice while I was in my 20s, and I thought it was a little weird, but then discovered that this apparently happens sometimes independent of weight gain or anything, just waking up and noticing that “Ta-da! My rack is bigger!” Pretty much. And it wasn’t really that big of a deal, because mostly the changes were subtle, although by the time I’d gone through the second spontaneous boob embiggening, I had gone up an entire cup size. So I started my 20s at one size and ended them at another. Fine, boobs, if that’s the way you want it to be, then okay, sure.

Having thought of my 20s as Puberty 2: Electric Boogaloo, I figure that this is okay and probably happens to several people and I dealt with it and bought new bras last summer and everything was fine. But I’m 30 now, so my 20s are happily a thing of the past. And because I’ve been 30 for six whole months now, I’m a pro at being 30, and I figured perhaps now I am entering the phase of my life when I could stop worrying about things like my boobs spontaneously getting bigger, because while I understand that our bodies change until we die, don’t we ever just get to settle in a little bit? I thought perhaps. But then, this past week happened. And if this past week were to have a theme, it would be OH FUCKING HELL. And I can deal with all of that okay because life has turned me into a tough broad, but on top of everything else, I really didn’t need all of my bras to be suddenly and uncomfortably too small. I mean, cut me a little slack, life. Okay?

Dang.

So, it’s not like wearing a bra is that great anyway, and I don’t know about anyone else, but that moment at the end of the day when I can finally take the damn thing off is probably the best thing about wearing a bra. But wearing a bra that’s too small is a singularly uncomfortable experience, one that seems to involve a lot of squirming and adjusting all day long. I got a few hours into my Monday, and thought to myself “I wonder if I accidentally shrank (shrunk?) this when I washed it.” It seemed to be a reasonable possibility. And I could deal with it for a day. But then on Tuesday, different bra, same problem. And I KNEW that one didn’t go into the dryer, so I thought “Really? Again?” And finally, on Friday, after sneaking off to the bathroom to readjust the girls, I thought “Huh.” (And I also looked at myself in the mirror and thought, “This sweater makes my boobs look fantastic.”) (And then I readjusted the bra again and thought, “I wish this bra didn’t have to be such a jerk.”) (And then I thought maybe it was time to leave the bathroom.)

Basically the point is that I was in need of some new bras.

I hate bra shopping. Though does anybody really enjoy bra shopping? It’s such an annoying chore, especially if you dare to look for something specific. Like, okay. I just wanted a plain black bra. I didn’t want anything too fancy because I like to be able to wear bras under knits without the lumps or bumps or fuss that basically announce to the world, “Hello! My breasts are covered in ribbons!” Simple. I am a fan of simple. I mean, I understand that there are times for fancy underwear, but most of the time is not one of those times. So why is it so hard to find a simple black bra that isn’t an old lady bra but also doesn’t have those micro-thin straps that dig into the shoulders? WHY? And why are they all padded now? People. I do not need a padded bra. It’s not like I have an enormous rack, because I don’t, but, um, it’s… it’s… substantial enough on its own without additional padding, okay? I can’t wear turtlenecks all year long, and already, anytime I wear anything with a scoop neck or a V-neck, I have to wear a camisole, because basically, the height difference between my desk at work and anyone over 4 feet tall who might approach it is such that whoever does approach it and might be so inclined basically gets a free view down my shirt. And really, I’ve already had enough of weirdo crazy guys looking at my boobs in my dating life, so I don’t need it in my professional life too.

So anyway, I hate bra shopping and I try to avoid it as much as possible, but there are times when it is necessary. Like now. I have a hard time with it, because I always have in mind what I’m looking for and then I have to be horribly disappointed by the fact that what I’m looking for doesn’t exist. Things are always too fussy or the wrong color or padded, and then when I finally find something that might work, it’s always the wrong size, though I’m sure 8th grade me would’ve appreciated the large selection of B-cups. It’s just a neverending string of frustrations, all to find something supportive and not horrible. Which also sounds a bit like dating, come to think of it.

All that written, my latest foray into bra shopping has a happy ending, and now all I need is for my boobs to stay the same size. I’m not pregnant (and have no intention of ever being pregnant, either) and I’m not gaining weight, and even though sometimes before my period starts I tend to retain water as though water retention were an Olympic sport and I was going for the gold, I don’t think I retain all that water in my boobs, so it should be fine, right? Or should I expect this to continue happening on a sporadic basis until I can’t stand upright?

I’m turning to you with these important questions, Internet, because you know everything.

So in case you’ve been wondering, that’s what’s been going on with me: spontaneous boob growth and subsequent frustration. I hope you and your racks are fantastic.

Posted in Everything, Me me me, Things I Shouldn't Have Written About | 11 Comments

state of jamelah, state of the blog

Posted on February 27, 2010 by jamelah

It’s been awhile. At this point, I’m not even sure what to write, but I figure I’ll put something here, leave it like a note for anyone to find, if anyone wants to find it. I know it’s not really necessary to offer an explanation for my absence — sometimes I feel like blogging, and sometimes I don’t — but that explanation feels like a good enough starting point, so I’m going with it.

I hate winter. I know that there are people who love winter, and I’m glad that they are able to derive joy from the season, but for my part, I hate it. Hate. It feels like an endurance test, or a long, slow, unrelentingly gray and dark form of torture. Winter depresses the hell out of me. The sunless days and the ever-present cold and the colorless palette combine into a force that make me feel heavy and gray and dull. I bundle up, I keep my head down, and I trudge through, one day at a time. Winter is to be survived.

But in my focus on making it through the season, just making it through, I tend to forget myself. I have good days and bad days, I still smile and laugh, I’m still able to force myself to function normally, but there’s something within me that seems to go missing this time of year, and it seems to take all I have to keep going. This happens to some degree every year (some are harder than others), but it always seems to take me by surprise when I find myself in the middle of it, when I recognize that my listlessness, my lack of interest in almost everything is nothing new, it’s just that same old winter death march, played out one gray day after another.

This year has been especially rough, and I haven’t had much left over to devote to being clever or anything else. I started a new 365 Days project in an attempt to force creativity on myself, and promptly stopped caring. It became an endurance test too, and the only thing that’s kept me snapping a picture every day is the fact that I’m stubborn, that I know that this too will pass and it will be warm again someday and I will, at some point, have fun with it. Possibly. Until then, I slog through, and that has to be enough. Add to this the fact that sometimes I have to drive in terrible weather, that it can take more than an hour to drive a little less than 30 miles, that there are times when it feels like I have to concentrate with every cell in my body just to keep the car on the road, and there are days when I am nothing less than exhausted.

The job itself, though? I’m pretty happy with it overall. Since I hold fast to my rule of not writing about work on the internet, I’m not sure if I’ve ever mentioned what it is that I do. So. I work for an outpatient mental health facility. It’s kind of like a huge doctor’s office, where people come for therapy or for psychiatric services or medicine check-ups. While a lot of what I do is just busy-work, the fact that almost everyone who comes in the door is mentally ill sure keeps me on my toes. Every person is different, of course, and some people are easy to deal with and others are like… OH MY GOD, but it’s a pretty constant, fascinating parade of humanity and it keeps me engaged. Plus, I finally seem to have gotten to the point where I feel like I can handle most things that come my way. There’s always that initial part of learning the ropes at a new job where it’s hard not to feel like a useless idiot all the time, but I think I’ve finally gotten past that and I feel like I’m actually helpful. That’s probably the most I’ll ever write about where I work. I have all kinds of interesting stories, of course, but I can’t write about the people who come in, both because I’m bound by law to maintain confidentiality, and also because I somehow feel oddly protective of them (even the ones who are so frustrating they make me want to bang my head against a wall), so I’ll keep those interesting stories off the internet, but I guess my point is that despite the fact that in many ways, I’ve been feeling like my ass is kicked, in this regard at least I am satisfied.

I also in general spend a lot less time on the internet, so I’m not running into blog material or sitting here thinking of stuff to write about. I don’t know what that means in terms of this blog and what I typically write. I’m sort of over being cleverly and ironically detached from things, making fun of them from my superior distance. That leaves me at somewhat of a loss, since clever and ironic detachment is kind of what I do, but I guess I’ve come to a place where I’d rather engage than intellectualize. So I haven’t really figured out what it is that I write about here anymore. It won’t be Cosmo anymore, though, that’s for sure.

When I figure it out, I’ll let you know, and you can read along if you still care to do so. In the meantime, if this field lies fallow for awhile longer, be patient with me. I’m just deciding what to plant.

Posted in Everything, Me me me, jamelah.net-ish | 7 Comments