the adventures of finding the perfect dresser.

I phoned Bill on thursday morning. He'd posted about three dressers he had for sale. I'd been looking for a dresser; looking for one ever since my feet fell on denver soil. about 10 dressers had fit my narrow preference and each one had, also, gone beyond my gaining. so this finding-a-dresser deal and calling-the-seller deal were very anti-climatic. i kept my expectations low. at 11:30 i'd come by to have a look.

Bill was a classic: a plaid, flannel button-up, trucker hat sitting not-quite on his head and cocked to one side, massive hands that spoke of years of hard labor, a full, white beard and the distracted gaze of man whose lived a simple, satisfied life. he had stacked his garage tetris-style full of old furniture. mostly dressers and coffee tables with a few scattered end tables and chairs--all lovingly beat up and carefully repaired to whatever extent he could. dutifully, he pulled each piece aside to uncover the three I was there to see.

after one such pull i was suddenly staring at the beautiful blue face an old, beat-up dresser. something about it reminded me of my mother and my grandmother and was freckled with all sorts of small, curious stains. it was perfect!

i'd forever been conjuring up an image in my head of what kind of dresser i'd want, trying to figure out what exactly i was looking for as i scrolled page after page of Craig's List. which dresser was MY dresser? one i'd never get tired of seeing everyday and would house my clothes without complaint.

A black, sleek dresser always came to mind, preferable from IKEA with silver, sharply rectangular handles perfectly aligned on each of the four drawers. no chipped paint, no out-of-date features. modern! from a cute couple who were about to have a baby and didn't need it anymore. it was brand new! never been used! and only $15. and it was totally me and it was mine.

this perfect, black dresser evaporated from the little thought-bubble above my head as soon as i saw this little dresser sitting in the back corner of this cold garage. it was a few shades darker than a blue sky with rusted handles on all four of the drawers that did or did not fit back into their slot. the top had been sanded off revealing a strange and wonderful mix of reds and tans. wood stain had been spilled on the lip of one drawer making a shiny, dark brown, endearing blob.

i was noticeably giddy. i think i told a confused Bill five times that it was "perfect!"and "so perfect!"

so you can imagine my disappointment when Bill, bless his honest heart, told me someone else wanted it and he intended to keep it until that somebody came by to look at it. "really?" A huge grey cloud had situated itself right above me and had started to rain disappointing thoughts all over me. that somebody, Bill continued is coming by in one hour. If she didn't show, the dresser was up for grabs again. there was another blue dresser next to MY blue one but it wasn't the right shade, it was too long and every single handle was middle from it's front. so i decided to wait an hour. it was a very long hour. I ate lunch distractedly, talked to eric distractedly. I checked my email and watched tv with unengaged thoughts. at 12:20 i jumped out of the passenger seat, raced back up Bill's dusty drive way, yelling before I'd arrived at a normal talking distance "Is it still here?"

It was. she hadn't shown up! it was sitting right where I'd left it, just waiting.

It was perfect and it was mine.

one of those days

wires.books.my bedside table. but mostly my reading lamp which shines down on "bird by bird" every night before bed--a new habit of reading before bed time. very nice cause i drift off to sleep SO fast cause my eyes get tired. a good idea for any insomniac.

this bird gives a false impression of what january is really like. but i'm grateful nothingtheless to know that at least someone is cheerful about the cold days of january:)

snowed 9 inches today. thought i'd be snow bound all day. turns out, colorado had no idea it snowed at all. everything proceeded as usual.

to cut on utilities we're not using the heat. so henry wrapped the windows in plastic. works well!

heater. green piano. damp socks from the snow.

middens the cat. you'll either find her here or looping herself in and out of my legs getting cat hair all over my pants. i'm become nothing short of obsessive with the lint roller.

and ofcourse, eric. doing his homework like a good boy. it's the first time in about a year that we've done homework together with summer and him being off school last fall. today was a good doing-homework day:)

I've gone to 8 different schools so far. here's my latest:

he's a rock star

a race eric did this weekend with his dad. a run, a bike ride, another run, another bike ride, and a sprint to the finish. people kept asking if i was going to race, or if i was going to do the next race.

uuuh, no.

check my flickr for more!

"Here's the thing i know about public school lunches: it only looked like a bunch of kids eating lunch...there was a code, a right and acceptable way. It was that simple. Your sandwich is the centerpiece, and there were strict guidelines. It almost goes without saying that store-bought white bread was the only acceptable bread. There were no exceptions. If your mother made a wheat-bread sandwich instead, you could only hope that no one would notice. You certainly did not brag about it, any more than you would brag that she also made headcheese. And there were only a few things that your parents could put in between the two pieces of bread. Bologna was fine, salami and unagressive cheese were fine, peanut butter and jelly were fine if your parents understood the jelly/jam issue: grape was best, by far, a nice slippery, comforting, sugarly, petroleum-based grape. Strawberry jam was second; everything else was iffy. Take raspberry for instance---"

-Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird

I started looking for a house today. an apartment, a duplex, and room--somewhere where i can set up my picture frames, put my clothes inside drawers, unload my craft box and generally make a mess if i want. it's proving to be a very grey endeavor. i've only gotten two replies back, neither of which look promising and both of which want more money than i want to give (which is not hard since i'd rather not give any at all). it's usually in these situations that my mind starting flying out of control. one little worry makes me worry about everything and i suddenly start thinking that nothing will work out and nothing ever has. but i'm very conscious of this irrational-ism (?) so i tried to find something that would tame my wild thoughts.

so i started to reading where i'd left off in "Bird by Bird" by Anne Lamott. On page 33 Anne launches into a description of school lunches. it's the same school lunch i had all through 5th and 6th grade and never realized it. and i think it's the funniest little description ever. suddenly me and eric were talking about the anxiety of having to bring a plastic bag lunch to school instead of the much more acceptable brown paper bag lunch, and how his can of coke was the only thing that got him through those lunches because it was the only thing 'trade-able' he had. really anything packaged, processed and with a recognizable food brand on it (think doritos, cheetos, lays potato chips) would give you right of passage in the lunch room world.

anyway,
it really did the trick.