By request

When We Have Faces

While cruising through Half Price Books the other day (in search of The Secret Life of Bees), at one point I found myself sitting on one of the stepstools somewhere in fiction P section. I had found my quarry, and couldn't help flipping through a page or 87, after all. In front of me was a push cart with books waiting to be shelved, and I found myself staring at the name C.S. Lewis on the spine of a book I'd never heard of before.

Interesting.

I pulled it free and found myself looking at an illustration of a woman's face. What I'd found was a retelling of the story of Cupid and Psyche, as told by her oldest sister. Do you remember that one? Aphrodite, pissy as usual, gets angry that a mortal girl is being worshipped for her beauty. Thus, she sends down her son (Cupid) with orders to make her fall in love with the basest of men available. Instead, Cupid falls in love with her himself. Cupid, most handsome of the gods. Except, she didn't know that, as he never let himself be seen and warned her not to try. His love was returned by the girl, and she espouses him.

As tends to happen in these kinds of myths, the downfall of their love came from outside sources. Psyche's 2 sisters are invited to her new palace, and they seethe over the riches she has around her. They begin to tell her she is likely married to a monster, the true reason why he won't show his face. They convince her to look that night after he falls asleep, using a candle.

Reader, that night the face she illuminated was perfection. Beautiful. Enchanting. She could not stop gazing at her husband. Then, she is betrayed by a drop of wax falling on his shoulder. He gazes at her sadly, and all around her disappears. Now more in love with him than ever, she embarks on a series of impossible tasks to reunite with him, and succeeds. The sisters perish.

This book is written by her half-sister, Maia. What she sets out to write is a formal complaint that she wishes she could take before the gods. She accuses them of lies, treachery, and robbing all that is most dear to us. She accuses them of interfering and meddling in the affairs of mortals, of speaking in riddles and then punishing us when we misinterpret the signs, and sometimes even if we read them correctly and following faithfully. She accuses them of stealing away the love of her sister, the one she loved above all else. She accuses them of changing the past and perpetuating a tale of infamy.

Interesting.

What it ends up being about is love. Love, which at its best can bring out the strength and courage to face the ugliness in life, and at its worst can lead us to cling on to those it's best to set free. It's a story of how it can lead someone to hurt the ones they love the most, but how it can redeem us in spite of ourselves. I couldn't put it down once I started. It was exactly what I needed to read just then, and I'm glad.

Computer conspiracy

I think it's very interesting that 2 of my 3 active computers decided to crash at nearly the same time, one in the middle of a game and the other in the middle of the song. I think they may be trying to get me to leave the house. Good thing I have the netbook, which is behaving well at the moment. Guess it's time for coffee.

Lovely day

February is a big birthday month in our family. Back before our family started to grow as my brothers grew up and got married, half of us were February folk. Myself, brother Mel, and our dad. 8, 22, and 23. I don't remember ever having a party for Dad outside of singing Happy Birthday and maybe having him pick what he wanted for dinner, but he's never been the kind of guy to make a big deal over anything that was about himself. Now, Mel and I always got some kind of party growing up. Despite the fact that we were dispersed on opposing ends of the month, usually it would be one big bash for both of us. I don't know how he felt about it, but I always liked it that way. We'd get to do the roller rink, or have a big pool party at home. Plus, considering that we (mostly) shared all of our toys and books, it was neat to see what each other got in anticipation of heavy negotiations on terms of use.

Sunday I spent the night at my parent's house where we watched the Oscars, fielded birthday calls from my brothers and uncles (one of which is named Oscar, of course), and ate barbecue that I picked up in honor of the day. We sang happy birthday to Mel a day early when he called, as otherwise he has a bad habit of not picking up the phone. I've already told him he is not allowed to make any lame jokes in 2 years since he didn't let me pick on him at all when he turned 30 last year.

Eating dinner together while listening to salsa music. Mom pulling out some treats she's been hoarding for over a week. Singing Happy Birthday long distance. Staying up watching movies, eating leftovers, and drinking coffee until 2 AM. Sleeping in curled up with my mom. Getting a good back scratch. Drinking coffee with evaporated milk (instead of cream) with a breakfast that includes barbecue, beef and veggie soup, and bread pudding while reading a book. Dancing in the kitchen. Getting fussed at because my coat is old, I haven't been to the dentist or optometrist yet, and I haven't been sleeping enough. Being waved at as long as my car is still in sight. These are just some manifestations of love that I know and love dearly myself.

Despondex

Warning: This clip is funny.

Oh, and it has foul language, so don't watch it around children or at work. Or do it at your own risk.

CrookedTree

It's been a few weeks since an article in one of the many free weekly papers here posted an article about several different coffee houses in the area and reasons to stray from Starbucks. A couple I already knew about and visit sporadically, but one has become my preferred place to go when I need to get out of my apartment and sit somewhere. Crooked Tree is right off Mckinney, not far from my apartment. It brews organic, free trade coffees (although they do use conventional dairy, alas) served by friendly people inside a spruced up little cottage full of mismatched furniture and equipped with wifi. Which, of course, I appreciate much more now that I'm hauling my latest gadget everywhere I go. The current artwork on display is... hmmm. Circley? I don't know how to describe it. It's very colorful.

It's nice in here. Not sure where I'm going next, though. Was hoping to catch a movie today, but I dunno. Should probably get something to eat, but, again, not feeling it right now. Exercise was planned, but the treadmill was taken and I don't like doing the trails alone. Hoping inspiration will strike soon.

My netbook and me

For years, I've idled through the laptop section of any major electronics store. For years, I've been able to remind myself that, really, I would never use a laptop as a portable device, so it was much wiser to spend about half the cash on a desktop with twice the power and upgradable even with my general wariness of hacking around with the innards of an expensive device loaded with years worth of information. Yet, somehow, after years of laptop chastity, I have now thrown myself into a torrid relationship with a behemoth of a machine that now resides on my kitchen table. And if that's not bad enough, a couple of days ago I walked into a store with the intent of getting a phone number to a restaurant and walked away with a midget.

I refer, in case you're wondering, to the Acer Aspire One. It's tiny. It has both wifi and 3G connectivity. It has Microsoft Office preinstalled, albeit a trial version that will require another payment of blood. It's everything I didn't need but have secretly craved to fill my need to Google any time or place. Yes, a smart phone would be more compact, I know. But come on, I carry around a big-ass messenger bag everywhere I go. Might as well have a real keyboard and a screen I can read, right? Yeah. I pretended to get lost on my way to my brother's house in Houston yesterday - "Darn, I guess I should check Google maps and make sure that this is, in fact, the right Spring Cypress Road... yup, it certainly is." I played sudoku and pulled up sheet music while at my niece and nephew's piano lesson and entertained whoever's turn it wasn't. Ah, connectivity.

I'm a happy girl. This has been an excellent first week of being 28, starting with the kicking fondue party hosted by my friends on the actual day, having the week off, reading, eating grapefruit and Reese's Pieces, getting to visit one of my brother's home, and overall being in a good mood. Thank you, guys, for everything. After all, the bulk of the people who read this also happen to be the ones who brighten my days just by being my friends. I hope this year is a great one for all of us and that I can be a part of making it lean heavier to the good.

And yes, this was running through my head when I titled this post.

When it rains

I don't like tornados. I also don't like having a peaceful night at home being interrupted by tornado sirens in the middle of the night and not being able to clarify exactly why they're going off - is there one anywhere close to me, or are they trying to get me to listen to the weather report? Hence why I'm writing this while sitting in my closet. I mean, I don't really have anywhere else that's any safer.

Times like these I really miss one thing about Plainview, TX, and that would be basements. Both our house and my dad's office had gloriously large basements; the one at home was filled with a sleeper couch, ping-pong table, and many toys, and the office one was stocked with supplies bought in bulk from Sam's Club. Either way, when the skies looked nasty, you just grabbed a pillow, blanket, your favorite stuffed animal, a book, flashlight, your favorite pair of socks, a package of doritos, some sodas, the portable radio, Monopoly... well, the essentials, you know?

Tornados freaked me out as a little girl. And still do, admittedly. They come out of freaking nowhere, do whatever the hell they feel like, and can either skip around merrily in their destruction or just plow through. My nearest encounter with a tornado happened in Plainview, when I was about...7? One started forming over our house, ripped off some shingles, but never touched down. And there was that one that rampaged through downtown Fort Worth while I was at TCOM. Since then, I think the nearest I've been was Thanksgiving 2007 while en route to Ville Platte, LA. In that case, I was driving through the absolute worst weather I've ever been through alone on the road for, but it's hard to say whether I was actually anywhere near a tornado that time or not. It was the middle of the night, after all, but the feeling that at any moment a flash of lightning was going to illuminate a funnel of destruction coming at me and wiping me off the face of the planet was, shall we say, unnerving. I seem to recall a couple of panicked phone calls made while on the road that night.

Now back in my living room. If I ever own a house, I want a basement. It's a security blanket that I want back. Even in Wichita Falls, our house didn't have one, but the Fords (the nicest neighbors you could ever want) had a basement that was accessible to all the neighborhood in the event of foul weather. So, yeah. Sign me up for that.