A Thousand (and Outta Here)

The time has come.

You’ve seen it coming and so have I. 

One friend said:  don’t stress it, just stop it.  Meanwhile, my brain said I had to give you an explanation of why I’m stopping it while my gut told me to not be an overdramatizing cliché.  In the end I wanted to write 1000 words for my 1000^th post but then feared that might end up being tedious and nauseating to all of us.

(FYI:  It’s 754, give or take a few. Feels long enough, right? Right!)

So instead:   I’m hoping what comes out here on the Friday night before summer, from the 28^th floor of the John Hancock tower looking out onto a purple sunset, strikes the balance.

Starting with me thanking you for reading this blog.  You did.  You let me overuse ellipses and sentence fragments and declarations starting with "and".

You tolerated my training for 4 of 9 marathons ... Boston, Philadelphia and DC and, almost, Stockholm.

You liked my legs. (1000 pageviews, baby.)

You read a whopping 43 posts about my insomnia, as well as all the ones I forgot to tag because I (obviously) hadn’t slept enough.

You sat on my patio with me at 1:24 a.m. and admired the basil and impatiens.  Once we listened to Jethro Tull together and I’ve not listened to them since.  (Have you?)  

You let me sell you on Charlie Brown and Secret Garden and Jason Robert Brown musicals and, occasionally, showed up at the shows.  You saw me buy my first piano.  You believe I can play the piano (don't you?), many without ever having heard me do it.

You tolerated my bikini challenges and my weight loss attempts and my cereal binges (and my copious apologies for them after the fact).   You tolerated 18 (and maybe more) Inexplicable Photos of My Feet and never asked why.  (Still inexplicable, BTW.)  You let me use the word penis as often as I wanted.

You looked at pretty much every photo I have of Henry and Oliver.

You heard me say kissing C-2 is better than just about anything in the world and didn’t throw up because of its idealism….or at least hid it from me if you have.  You didn’t chastise me for going back to him, and back, and back. You didn't know his name doesn't even start with C.  No, I'm not going to tell you what it does start with.

You didn’t ask for more information about the Man from San Francisco, despite my reticence to share details about him.  He is still in the picture, by the way. 

You didn’t give me a hard time for having (at least) 86 weekends where I was without a date.  Or for shamelessly transcribing OKC Instant Messenger chats.

You let me turn 36. Then 37. Then 38.  Then 39. 

You’ve met my mom.  Bobbo.  (The ever-awesome) Martha, on many occasions. The sisters older and younger.  Joshua.  Justin.  Student Driver.  Balint.   Bill.  Cousin J. The CFO.  Many, many others.

You let me bitch about Southie.  And an ancient vehicle I refuse to replace.  And parking tickets.  And parking. 

You took my recommendations for good songs.  Sometimes for good poems.  You never told me if you liked them (or even read them) … but that’s ok.

You went with me to Hungary, San Francisco, west coast Florida, Minneapolis, the North Dakota prairies.

You tasted Pretty Things Baby Tree and PBR and homemade Altbier and Grain Belt and Left Hand Milk Stout and Guinness.  And Guinness.  And Guinness.  And Guinness.  And Guinness.  (Yeah.  Guinness should have had its own tag, I'm seeing.)

And for all that, what is there still to say?  But thanks.  For being my friends, my critics, my motivation for observing.  My motivation for drinking too much.  For staying up too late.  For whining.  For chatting with 21-year-old penis-pictures and female wrestlers.  For trying to be good at things.  For trying to get better and for trying to excuse bad habits and for never really trying to sleep enough.

I'm still (sorta) single.  Still thirty-something.  Still renting.  Still in Southie. 

It's time to go. 

You can write me at sage (dot) risotto (at) gmail (dot) com (if we’re not already Facebook friends) and you want to stay in touch.  I promise to write back if you promise not to creep me out.  I promise to tell you when the inspiration returns and when I start writing .... something ... again.

And with that, this blog is over and out.

J

Karin -- May 21, 2012

Working Hands

Per rough calculation, I played piano for The Longwood Players -- much of it pounding Jason Robert Brown soul-chords -- for 27 hours last week, ending at 11 p.m. on Sunday night.

Woke up Monday with blood swelling and throbbing through both hands -- my right, particularly stiffened into a rigor mortis claw. Could not grip my toothbrush. Riding the bus to work, standing, I could not get purchase on a seat-back with either hand, resorting to straddling a pole with armpit and calf to keep standing. Today, typing is more comfortable .... although the computer's mouse is still my sworn enemy, as the area between index finger and thumb is puffed up like a bruise and resistant to that reclined angle.

Thankful the hands survived this week's (unusual, due to the concentrated confluence of auditions and rehearsals and shows) onslaught.  The thumb will recover, the stiffness will undoubtedly subside because nothing is injured.

I'm reminded again how nice it is, and how grateful I am, when these wonders of God's creation work correctly.

A little metta with my coffee...

If I were to write here what I was planning to write --

-- which was that at 12:45 this morning I was running 8-minute miles through Southie, in shorts and baseball cap, through the most unlikely of hurricane-strength downpours (never a sentence I'd expect to write on the first day of winter in Boston) and how even though I was drenched, I was invigorated, and how even running uphill into the rain and headwind and with water squishing in the lining of my shoes from the massive puddles felt good in that "I'm running through a metaphor about perseverance and overcoming adverse conditions and enjoying it" kind of way --

-- you'd probably correctly guess that I did not sleep enough last night, that I felt restless and wired from too many Christmas cookies and joy over having (amazingly, before the day itself!) completing my Christmas letter, that I stayed up way later than I should have and woke up pretty out-of-sorts.

Arriving in the office, though, I found a "Seasons Greetings" e-mail from my only known friend who embraces Buddhism in a real and comprehensive way-- a former co-worker from Minnesota, go figure.  Here were his greetings. 

Metta

"Monks, whatever kinds of worldly merit there are, all are not worth one sixteenth part of the heart-deliverance of loving-friendliness; in shining and beaming and radiance the heart-deliverance of loving-friendliness far excels them.

Just as whatever light there is of stars, all is not worth one sixteenth part of the moon's light; in shining and beaming and radiance the moon's light far excels it;

and just as in the last month of the Rains, in the Autumn when the heavens clear, the sun as he climbs the heavens drives all darkness from the sky with his shining and beaming and radiating;

and just as, when night turning to dawn, the Morning Star is shining and beaming and radiating;

so too, whatever kinds of worldly merit there are, all are not worth one sixteenth part of the heart-deliverance of loving-friendliness; in shining and beaming and radiance the heart-deliverance of loving-friendliness far excels them."

Buddha

Wishing you a metta, metta christmas and a metta new year...

In case you've not heard of the term metta, it has a lengthy definition, in part:  "a multi-significant term meaning loving-kindness, friendliness, goodwill, benevolence, fellowship, amity, concord, inoffensiveness and non-violence ...  the strong wish for the welfare and happiness of others ...  altruistic attitude of love and friendliness as distinguished from mere amiability based on self-interest." 

Richard's sentiments brought down my heart rate and shored up my focus for this last, hectic day before the holiday -- for which I'm grateful -- and reminded me of the many multi-significant and lovely people in my life I should also be grateful for.

Thanks-Essay 6: Grateful...

... today.

For:

Shavasana.

Steam room.

Stravinsky.
(Specifically Dawn Upshaw's singing some from A Rake's Progress.)



Snickerdoodles.

Sneakers.

Spring weather in Fall.

San Francisco, Man From.
(Arriving Saturday for a long weekend.)
(Requiring great patience for 3 days more.)

Spilled ginger ale on Macbook keyboard.
(From Sunday night.)
(So machine stays powered-down for 3 days to dry.) 
(Freeing evenings ((from web-surfing habits)) for making snickerdoodles.)
(And ((more)) sleeping.)
(i.e. small blessings.)

Thanks-Essay 5: Mondays, mortality

I read on Facebook this morning that a girl (woman now of course, mother of 3 teenagers) who went to high school with me died yesterday of fast-moving colon cancer. She and I were always just acquaintances and not friends and were never really in touch, but she was a good friend to many of my friends, and since I read the news her face as I knew her then, back in Cando, keeps floating up ... blonde, boisterous, saucer-eyed wild child with the biggest laugh ever, bangs teased to a tower, cadre of equally boisterous and loyal girlfriends with whom to cruise Main looking for the parties, her 80's era sports car a fixture at Bob's parking lot for years.  She could not have known then that this would be how her life would end 20 years later ... although of course, none of us can know the hour or the time of our own ends.

Concurrently, today has turned into a very hard day for 2 of my other friends, coping with their own crushing loss of a similar sort. Watching, listening, wanting to help in whatever way but not knowing how, I am humbled (again) by the resiliency of the human spirit when faced with the things in life that can quickly become awful. These friends are able to, as they often do even in benign circumstances, approach the day with grace and selfless consideration of where it will fit into the larger scope of their lives -- and that in this case, it will somehow shape their futures in the way God somehow means them to be.

Again, can I possibly always remember this -- even in the good times? -- this edict that seems so obvious today, this necessity to live as if you can't know what the next day will bring, or how your life will change, or shape others, or end?

"There are only two ways to live your life.  One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.” -- Albert Einstein

Thanks-Essay 4: To Not Griping

Got into work quite late today ... the result of staying up very late.  As in sun-coming-up late and not because I wanted to be.   As in:  for the first time in months being up with heart-racing insomnia that didn't abate with a hot bath, with rereading transcripts of past fond chats with MSF, with the eating of a plate of cold turkey breast at 4:30, or even pulling out EB White's "One Man's Meat" for folksy storytelling distraction.

I'm blaming Jon Krakauer's Into Thin Air, the account of a Mt. Everest expedition featuring loads of high-altitude frostbite, delusions, and death.  I love the book and have already read it 3 times -- and for reasons unknown, last night was the night it decided to disturb the living shit out of me. 

It took pulling the laptop into bed, queuing up the cartoon Ratatouille, and letting the happy rat chef make some splendid soup before my brain shut off and heartbeat relaxed and I drifted off at about 6....only to wake myself up with a dream about riding bike across an f#$%ing ice bridge while looking down at an endless crevasse in either direction.

Oy. Hope the pleasant dreams MSF wished me before we said goodnight at least came true for him.

Not to gripe, though.  Last night I guess I could have been at Wal-Mart, getting pepper-sprayed by a fellow video-game shopper.

It's in this context -- a bit sleep-deprived, a bit sated from the food and fellowship of yesterday, a bit daunted with the to-do list that awaits these last November days -- that I was grateful to see David Brooks' Times column today editorializing on his project, "The Life Reports".  His request:

"If you are over 70, I’d like to ask for a gift. I’d like you to write a brief report on your life so far, an evaluation of what you did well, of what you did not so well and what you learned along the way. You can write this as a brief essay or divide your life into categories — career, family, faith, community, and self-knowledge — and give yourself a grade in each area.

Of course I read most of these essays this morning, here at work in our sparsely-populated office after having death dreams and not sleeping... and promptly started crying.  But even if you had productive slumber and are reading this blog entry in your pajams with coffee and curled up in front of a fir e... I highly suggest them for your post-Thanksgiving glad-you're-not-out-shopping-instead reflection.

Thanks-Essay 3: Garlic Mashed

I hereby declare there has been too much talk of weight loss, exercise and healthy eating on this blog. 

I also hereby declare that if you have never tried my sister Missy's legendary Garlic Mashed Potatoes recipe, you are Missing Out.  Full Stop. 

It is not too late to get to the grocery store for an extra block of cream cheese. Go.

Garlic Mashed Potatoes

Ingredients!
  5 lb bag of potatoes – russet or red
  1 stick of butter or margarine
  4 to 8 oz cream cheese (to taste)
  8 oz container of sour cream
  Fresh garlic to taste – minced as small as you can make it
  White onion to taste – minced as small as you can make it
  Garlic salt, onion powder, salt and pepper – to taste

Directions!
1. Scrub and cut up potatoes (do not peel) and place in a large pot. Cover with water.
2. Bring to boil and cook 20-25 minutes (smaller pieces cook faster). Drain.
3. Mash potatoes and add all ingredients. If you have a mixer, it works great for mashing and mixing the potatoes thoroughly!
4. Serve immediately OR refrigerate (up to 3 days) or freeze and serve up to 10 days later (maybe longer?).  For re-heating, put potatoes (still frozen) in a 350 degree oven for 1-2 hours – the deeper the dish, the more time they will need. I actually think they are better reheated because the flavors have all melded together!


Oliver is a fan

Variations and adaptations!
  Use garlic salt and onion powder instead of fresh – almost as good, and way less work!
  Peel your potatoes and have more “presentable” potatoes (as my grandma would say…)
  Play with the amounts of butter, sour cream and cream cheese – you may find you like more or less of any and all of these; altering them changes texture and taste.
  For a unique taste, sauté the onions and garlic first with butter!

Thanks (Photo)-Essay 2: Iced Coffee

Once upon a time,
there was a girl just out of college
who worked hard at her job
and stayed up all night, many nights,
thusly leaning heavily on her daily caffeine supply.

The girl drank easily 4
(or 5, sometimes mixed with orange juice)
cans a day (and night). 

She is (and was!) not totally clueless,
but the girl somehow forgot about the
46.5 grams of sugar that accompanied each
54 life-saving milligrams of caffeine.

She also spent a lot of time stressing about
writing school board stories
and not sleeping very well. 

By the time she left her job to go to grad school,
she looked kinda like this.

That year,
the girl started waitressing in a cafe with
 3 flights of stairs,
then walking home every day
from the Theater District to the Fenway. 

She had nothing against Mountain Dew,
but at the same time discovered that
Boston runs on Dunkin',
and that coffee on ice with cream and sugar
tastes kinda like a soda and is
cold and refreshing like a Dew
with 4 times the caffeine content.

She eventually went to a quarter-portion of the cream and
subbed artificial sweetener for the sugar
and often added espresso on top.

She started drinking it for the coffee taste.

She even started making it for cheap at home.



Real-time photo



The girl has probably drank 5 cans of Mountain Dew
in the last 12 years. 
She's drank approximately 4,000 glasses of iced coffee
in the same timeframe.

And today she looks kinda like this.

With her lovely sisters

Coincidence? 

I think not.

Thanks-Essay 1: Friends Who Run

Saturday was being one of those days.

Yes, even a Saturday can start out being one of those days, when it involves a mid-morning landlord visit requiring finding and eliminating every kernel of stray cat litter (and hair) from premises, followed by an impromptu 3-hour nap (3-hours! as if a sick toddler!) complete with sweaty nightmares that not only left me more tired than before I started but sucked up 3 of the 4.5 hours of available afternoon sunlight. (And 4:30 p.m. sunsets suck, people. Even if they're pretty.) Followed by a trip to Family Dollar Store confirming that because there are now 15 aisles of stupid, cheap Christmas decorations, there is no longer room for 30-cent cans of cat food.

It was in this moment, while rounding the corner of Dorchester Street and Broadway and muttering about stupid, cheap Christmas decorations and overgeneralized holiday commericalization, I was blindsided by the blaze-orange sprinting shoes and the figure of my dear friend Chris. Indeed sprinting by. A friend who runs like the wind, but lives in Roxbury and wouldn't generally be in this hood this hour. 

As he quickly explained:

"I just stopped by your place. I was headed out and realized today I wanted to run to Southie, but didn't think to call you until I was on my way.  Wanted to see if you wanted to go for a run."

It was 3:30 p.m. and I was still in my pajamas, drowsy and bed-headed. But had I been in Family Dollar Store for 30 seconds longer or shorter than I had, Chris and I would have missed each other. The day was crying out for a divine kick-in-the-pants ... and it appeared.

By 3:45 I was in shorts, tech top and Asics and he and I were jogging west towards the other side of town. Chris is a much (taller and long-legged and) faster runner than me .... even with him cutting 2-minutes-a-mile off his pace, I chugged hard to keep up and not feel the guilt of boring him.  But I kept up. We conversed in that necessary way friends who get too busy need to converse, passing the 4 miles to Roxbury in no time.

By the time we reached his home and I set out for the return trip (in the end, 8.75 total), the sun setting behind me in the cool afternoon, I was glad and grateful.  To have shifted my day's attitude so thoroughly.  To have run faster and longer than I would have ever done by myself.  To have the privilege of such an awesome, selfless friend in my life ...

....especially one who runs.

Thanks IV (insomnia)

Yes.  That would be for real.

At 2:48 a.m. even the cats are asleep, which means no one is around to witness the selection of the biggest chunks from the crisp layer of the leftover apple crisp, or to remind me that cinnamon sugar has no documented soporific qualities.

Good thing the green bean casserole has already been refrigerated.

(Unless, of course, that would help?)

Thanks III (for the little things)

Like a job that

(even on the day before a major holiday,

as all who call in say "I'm so sorry you have to work!"

before they say hello,

even though they're working, also, it seems)

Provides unlimited Post-Its and

Lets me freely drink the world's best iced coffee

(with the world's cheesiest misspellings) and

Listen to the best Ben Folds covers on Pandora

(thanks for PC and auxiliary speakers) and

Put out pictures of my friends (like Balint)

and my nephew(s) (like Henry)

(both who I'm more than just thankful for, I'm humbled to know) and

(occasionally)

Write a blog entry on my noon hour.

Thanks II (for Karaoke and PBR)

It has been something like 3 years since 

Joshua and I went to the Courtside for karaoke.

Fortuitous camera shutter malfunction.

There was a time, for a long time, 

when we used to go every week. 

That was before Joshua moved to New York 

and I started doing other things with my 

Thursday nights.

But Joshua is back in Boston.

My Thursday night was otherwise unoccupied.

Wilson Phillips' "Hold On",
specifically "you got yourself into your own mess..."

So we went, and 

Mark the Shark remembered my name.  

Mary Ellen still brought the beer. 

(I helped pour.)

Vintage cheap draft.

Joshua and I once again lustily belted back-up harmony 

to "Brandy (You're a Fine Girl)."

We might be 3 years older,

but we can still put down 

2 pitchers of Pabst Blue Ribbon in 2 hours,

no sweat.

Savoring vintage cheap draft.

And even though Joshua doesn't look like Aaron Neville 

and I don't sound like Linda Ronstadt, 

the DJ let us end the night 

one more time with

"Don't Know Much."

Serious singers.

(Round here)

we stayed up very, very late.

Vintage, my friends.

Thanks I (for YouTube)

I can complain with the best of them (and will refrain from dredging up all the past examples of doing so in this space, as not to bore you and/or implicate myself).

Been thinking, though, for this week leading up to the official "Thanks" holiday, I'll refrain from griping and make some "Thanks" lists.

Today, I'm thankful for the all the cool music on YouTube that I can play on repeat at work without bothering my neighbor, as well as crank up for post-midnight dancing in the kitchen.

Especially my most recent top-5ers:

5) Ben Folds covering "Such Great Heights"

by The Postal Service

Must refrain self from wiggling in chair at :21

when the octave-pounding bass line begins...

4) The late, great Polish composer Henryk Górecki's

"Symphony of Sorrowful Songs"

When the soprano begins her volume swelll at 3:51,

make sure to have your volume cranked by 4:11 to the end

for the orchestral coda.

3) Original theme to the Mary Tyler Moore Show

Maybe it's just the hormones,

but I can't be the only person in the world who chokes up

when the groovy  brass fanfares kick in at :30.

("Love is all around, no need to waste it.

You can have a town, why don't you take it.

 You're gonna make it after all.")

2) Opera Company of Philadelphia

"Hallelujah!" Random Act of Culture -
Macy's, Philadelphia

OK. I want to do this in Boston.

Who's with me?

1) Beyoncé' "Single Ladies" spoof,
featuring Barack Obama

Because politics is so damn serious these days. 

Why?

And I have no idea who this dude is.

And how about that butt-slapping at 2:36?
Pretty presidential.