love that

Back to normal.... love that little quip from the last post. There is one part of life that is always dramatic-stressful, and so this week, I have to guffaw at "back to normal." Yet it's off limits because it isn't directly related to us, so what's a girl to do?

Find things that she can control-- and exploit them...

Back to WeightWatchers online, of which exploitation will only help, I guess.
Back to serious time at Lifetime, of which exploitation will only make the $69 bill more worthwhile. (Actually, swimming with Abbey always makes it worthwhile. And Friday night hottubbing....yeah, worthwhile!)

And these are things I have been aiming at anyways, so that when we get preg., I will be healthier...

Of course my ill temper comes only from sheer frustration.
And so I try to focus on other things...
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Like the completely cool poets we saw last Sunday night who have been competing this week in NYC at the International Youth Poetry Slam Festival. Stephen, Abbs, and I caught them at Macalester along with an acting class from a HS in St. Paul performing a play that they had written about the govts response to Katrina.

Which reminds me of my favorite adult slam master.... Taylor Mali... and some of his spoken word, which of course is better live.

Totally like whatever, you know?
By Taylor Mali
www.taylormali.com

In case you hadn't noticed,
it has somehow become uncool
to sound like you know what you're talking about?
Or believe strongly in what you're saying?
Invisible question marks and parenthetical (you know?)'s
have been attaching themselves to the ends of our sentences?
Even when those sentences aren't, like, questions? You know?

Declarative sentences - so-called
because they used to, like, DECLARE things to be true
as opposed to other things which were, like, not -
have been infected by a totally hip
and tragically cool interrogative tone? You know?
Like, don't think I'm uncool just because I've noticed this;
this is just like the word on the street, you know?
It's like what I've heard?
I have nothing personally invested in my own opinions, okay?
I'm just inviting you to join me in my uncertainty?

What has happened to our conviction?
Where are the limbs out on which we once walked?
Have they been, like, chopped down
with the rest of the rain forest?
Or do we have, like, nothing to say?
Has society become so, like, totally . . .
I mean absolutely . . . You know?
That we've just gotten to the point where it's just, like . . .
whatever!

And so actually our disarticulation . . . ness
is just a clever sort of . . . thing
to disguise the fact that we've become
the most aggressively inarticulate generation
to come along since . . .
you know, a long, long time ago!

I entreat you, I implore you, I exhort you,
I challenge you: To speak with conviction.
To say what you believe in a manner that bespeaks
the determination with which you believe it.
Because contrary to the wisdom of the bumper sticker,
it is not enough these days to simply QUESTION AUTHORITY.
You have to speak with it, too.

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You do. And you have to learn to let things go. So that life can be, in fact, back to normal. Which is my personal lesson for the week. Do the best with what you have where you are...