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My mind just turned off. It will remain off the rest of my life.


Thank you for your attention. Please return to your regularly scheduled activities.

[I have too much to do. It's my fault. It's getting better. Please tell me if/where/why I should go to grad school or if I should be a blueberry farmer. I'm trying to cut back. But there's so much to do. BALANCE, child, BALANCE.]

***
O-kay. That's semi out of my system now. I have a meeting with my research professor in half an hour and I feel behind on my research and I should be writing the article on "health insurance for new grads" that's due, um, tomorrow.


But you know what? I miss this blog. I miss it because it is how I process life, basically, and to just not write for over a week drives me cra-zy.


And more than that, I love you folks who actually read the musings of my crazy mind. Can I take this opportunity to wave frantically at Mr. McKeown and say how thrilled I am that you read this? You are the very jolliest person I know and whenever I hear you laugh (or even think about you laugh) I want to dissolve into laughter too. Please please (please!) come visit us soon.


There is nothing that makes me beam more than when people I love and respect take the time to read this blog. Thank you, dear people.

***
So in the time when I basically have fallen into a very deep hole and am feverishly working (I feel like a meerkat peeping out of its hole whenever I venture into the real world), I have shamefully neglected people. Like Kait, for instance, whose sweet sweet messages I have not yet replied to even though I have read them all, Kait, and yes I've put that on my calendar, and I had the very best time with you last Saturday (I want one of those wok burner things). And I just replied to Anna Rubia last night when she sent her email from Germany, oh, two weeks ago. And I missed Erin's phone call and really want to hear about her time in Italy. And to alllll the other people I have not responded to - know that every time I think about the unanswered messages, it's like a throbbing blister that needs to be cauterized. Sorry for the disgusting imagery.

***
(Yes, the post gets more fragmented.) In other news, I am currently experiencing a tiny bit of the life of a working mom. How so? you ask. Well. My mom has been in and out of commission the past four weeks due to excrutiating back pain (still trying to figure it out . . .). During these incapacitating episodes, I have realized just how much she does. Do you realize? Stay-at-home moms do not eat bon-bons (I mean, have you seen how skinny she is?). She does a lot.

So during an especially bad spell the past two days, I've been trying to balance my class, my research job, an interview for this article, exercising so that I will not gain 30 lbs from stress, fixing supper, and oh yes, trying to figure out God. And doing none of it well (actually, the ginger chicken stir fry last night was pretty good).


But I don't have horrible pain spasms. Please, sweet Mother, get better. We'll even keep on making supper and cleaning and all that, if you'll just stop hurting.

***
If you think this post has a lot of italics, you should see the pre-edited version.
So now I am sitting in the O'Neal library.

I read a chapter of poetry criticism (I disagree vehemently with Vernon Shetley. He wants to give poetry back to the intellectuals. Which is certainly better than having it die completely but I say, Poetry for the Masses!)

I bought a cup of warm lemonade from the curly blond headed siblings outside (2 boys and a girl, e-zackly what I want in that far-off day of motherhood. I asked them to mix the pink and yellow. They were not pleased but assented).

And after I write this article on health insurance, I am going semi-rogue for the rest of the day. Which means I will go home and make supper and work out and craft a Father's day card and chill.

***
P.S. Stay tuned for the next post, in which I declare my undying obsession with the new James Bond movies and how I've been dreaming poems about Confederate soldiers. Ciao.