every day life « house of waffles

every day life

15 Albums

Via Adrea. Posted here because my posting here has been lame this week. Write in the comments your list, if you want (or dare!). Or, if fifteen is too daunting, make it five. Or whatever. I find it amusing to consider what other people listen to–such different tastes represented all over the world.

Rules: Don’t take too long to think about it. Fifteen albums you’ve heard that will always stick with you. List the first fifteen you can recall in no more than fifteen minutes.

1. Weezer (the blue album). The Sweater Song will always, always stick with me. Hearing Weezer was like a revelation: THIS! This is the band I’ve been waiting for all my life. Also, will always remind me of my first year at college.

2. Green Day (Dookie). This one was blared continuously in my little silver Honda Accord hatchback my senior year of high school. I STILL love me some Green Day, every single album they’ve ever come out with. American Idiot is brilliant.

3. Enya (Memory of Trees). Okay, this one is a little embarrassing but I’ll put it up because it immediately came to mind. Again, freshman year of college. Many, many repeats. Little Jen and I listened to this all school year as we studied and I’m afraid we got a little crazy listening to it, making up our own lyrics, etc. I recently re-listened and believe that this is one of the best mellow albums ever, if you can stand it. It might make you crazy.

4. Simon & Garfunkel (Bridge over Troubled Waters). Childhood album that retains deep nostalgia for me. Something about The Boxer gives me chills every single time: a song of perseverance in the face of relentless struggle.

5. Raffi (Baby Beluga). Hey, the rules didn’t say 15 albums you LIKE, just 15 albums that will stick with you. I had the song Baby Beluga on continual repeat for Anna’s entire second year of life because it was better than listening to her scream “Baby LUGA!!!!!!!” all damn day long. God, I hate that song.

6. Madonna (Material Girl). Because I bought this album TWO TIMES (sister Liz ratted me out on owning it the first time and my parents THREW IT AWAY…MADONNA BAD BAD BAD ETC, so I bought it again, it was THAT good). And maybe I really shouldn’t have been listening to Like A Virgin whilst still in elementary school but, hey, can I help it that this album rocks and needs to be listened to?

7. Belle and Sebastian (The Boy with the Arab Strap). And thus began my longtime love affair with this group (always dubbed “quirky” by the music industry). They’re just so…..different. In a good way. This led up to one of my very favorite memories ever, attending a Belle and Sebastian concert at the Hollywood Bowl (box seats–woo woo!) on my birthday, in 2006, where they played with the LA Philharmonic. Just a totally rad concert.

8. Bob Marley (Legend). I don’t think you can live in SB and not have this one in your musical collection. Beach town and Marley playing in the car = match made in heaven. Even if I am an upper-middle class white girl from the ‘burbs.

9. Carole King (Tapestry). Cheesy but the song I live for (“Beautiful”) is on this album. “You’ve got to get up every morning/With a smile on your face/And show the world all the love in your heart/Then people gonna treat you better/You’re gonna find (yes you will)/That you’re beautiful as you feel”

10. Hole (Live Through This). The album that showed me that grrls can rock it, scream it, thrash it, too. My favorite angry music. Even if Courtney Love is clinically insane.

11. Jack Johnson (Brushfire Fairytales). I have a love-hate relationship with this album. I loved it and then…..oh god, if I had to hear another J.J. song again I might go crazy….but, there is still something about it. The songs get stuck in my head. Another beach town vibe album again.

12. Nirvana (Nevermind). Of course. I grew up in the grunge rock era, what can I say? I cried when Curt Cobain died.

13. REM (Out of Time). My very first ever purchased CD. I wore that baby out on my newly purchased (with my allowance) boombox. Oh, yeaaaaaaah.

14. Peter, Paul, and Mary (Peter, Paul and Mary: 10 Years Together). This feels like the soundtrack of my childhood. This was the music I remember listening to in the car, while we cleaned house, etc etc etc. I still love it: Stewball, Puff the Magic Dragon and who can forget the rockin’ (snort) “I Dig Rock N Roll Music”????

15.Renee and Jeremy (It’s a Big World). The soundtrack of Anna’s first year of life (this is an album of lullabies). It makes me tear up to listen to now, because I remember, in the cheesiest, best nostalgic way rocking Anna to sleep. Even the endless pacing through the living room takes on a cheerful glow (in retrospect), when I hear these songs now.

Runners up: Liz Phair (Whitechocolatespaceegg), RadioHead (Pablo Honey), Smashing Pumpkins (Siamese Dream), Sublime (self titled), Toad the Wet Sprocket (Fear)

Doing it all by herself

It scares me, sometimes. “I do it myself, Mama!” she exclaims. So many things she does herself. Always growing, growing, growing. Becoming her own person: her own breathtakingly beautiful, pinkalicious self.

I didn’t think I would let my three year old play with these “beauty products” at such a young age. It seemed too early. It seemed inappropriate. I see now that it is all part of the endless role play, just like pretending to be a queen or a monster or a mommy or anything else. Trying it all on for size.

Doing it herself. Doing it her way. Even if it means ending up with uneven, gloopy-polished nails. It’s all still beautiful to me.

every day life — 1 Comment
18
Aug 10

Faces

Parenting / every day life — 2 Comments
16
Aug 10

Expectations

I know that I do best the days that I scale back my expectations, the days where I have only modest goals in mind. That way, I am so exceedingly surprised, happily so, about my accomplishments, if I indeed go above and beyond those small measures of success established earlier. If I just manage to cross off a meager thing or two, I try and remember that it is so much more important, in the long run–the big picture view–to focus on my kid and enjoy life. Life is what we are doing now!

Plus, I get the bonus of enjoying things that usually wouldn’t make it on the list, things that don’t seem important enough to write down on the to do list but that are, by golly, more hugely important and satisfying and beautiful than any trip to the grocery store would ever be.

Today we did get to the carwash and the dry cleaners, buy then we also (unplanned): ate Popsicles (one of the joys of summer!), played princess wedding, painted fingernails and toes sparkly pink, danced in circles until we got dizzy, ate frozen blueberries for dessert, and took a good long soak in the tub. We may be low on toilet paper but, aw heck, we sure did have fun and I think, when it is all said and done, that’s what I’d rather remember doing with my girl anyway: eating pink Popsicles and sitting on the front porch with freshly painted nails, just being there together with each other. That’s Life with a capital L.

every day life — 2 Comments
10
Aug 10

The Bright Side

I just typed out a whole long ugly whiney thing that I just cannot bear to publish. Instead you get this. The bright side of life:

My hair is so long and thick and luxurious now that I actually have a for-real hairdo, not just post-chemo shortie wanna-be hair.

No. Evidence of. Disease. (NED is what us cancer folks call it when we have a clean scan) = remission. This is good stuff. The best of the best.

Did NOT lose my cool today when Anna yelled at me (on two separate occasions) that I was NOT her Mommy anymore. Also, did not break her things. Progress.

Adam and I are going away this week. Overnight and everything! To celebrate being married and our love and blah blah blah. Upshot is this: wine and wine and wine and oh, also maybe that thing that two people who love each other very much get to do with each other. None of these things involve children screaming SHUT UP at us. Very Very Excited.

My iPhone. I love that darned thing. E-mail anywhere! Directions! Internet! Pandora! It’s a veritable carnival in my purse all day, every day. All this for less than $100/month. Totally worth it.

Today Anna and I ran errands and she was totally dressed in her princess costume, tiara and all (well with flip flops, but I nixed the Cinderella “glass slippers” as that just seemed like a bad idea) and it just made my day to see the smiles that she left in her wake as she pranced through Trader Joe’s and Michael’s Craft Store. A ray of sunshine, she is (when not provoked).

A cool summer = not having to sleep with a fan blowing directly on my body. It is so pleasantly wonderful, somehow, to go to bed with all the windows open but to still need a down comforter. In August. I know, I know, some of you here in Santa Barbara are mourning the lack of sunshine but I’m kind of liking the Summer of Fog. I have yet to get that icky sticky feeling that happens when it’s so hot and you’re wearing shorts and everything is sticking to you and…yuck. Fog is better.

Homemade tomato soup, with tomatoes picked this morning and roasted this afternoon. Duh-LISHous! (as Anna says).

I am hoping that you will find your own personal bright side, too, even if you start out, the way I did, feeling hopelessly exhausted and depressed and useless. It’s there. I promise.

every day life — 1 Comment
9
Aug 10

Ballerina…or Firefighter?

Family / every day life — 2 Comments
4
Aug 10

Viva La Fiesta 2010 Edition

I love Fiesta (okay, more properly called “Old Spanish Days” but known by locals simply as “La Fiesta” or just “Fiesta”). Not just because it is a week-long excuse for the entire city of Santa Barbara to shut down and party, but because it is a tradition. Oh, how I love and live for traditions!

Tonight, as we walked back to our car from the Mission, confetti in our hair, sounds of Mariachi drifting alongside us, the crush of humanity all around, smells of tacos and churros in the air, I thought this thought, “This will be years and years of happy memories for Anna! THIS!” I love that: to know that we are creating something that she can turn over in her mind’s eye. The sights, smells, foods that she will remember with nostalgia. The activities and events and places that she will carry on forever in her heart.

Good friends, as there always are.

The sun shining down on us as we chow on Mexican food, as always.

And the fog drifted in, as it always does and we turned for home, tired and content, knowing that this is just the beginning.

Viva La Fiesta!

Family / every day life — 2 Comments
3
Aug 10

Lucky

Once upon a time, Adam and I decided to get a dog. Adam ran into a poster of someone who had some Akita puppies. We looked them up (in my admittedly shaky memory of this, it was at a bookstore, thumbing through books about various dog breeds) and were hooked. Gloriously beautiful dog with showy looks? Check. Big, huggable “real” dog (sorry to all those purse sized dog owners out there, but I prefer a dog I can really get my arms around and squeeze. Also, less yippiness). Check. Loyal? Check. Excellent intruder prevention? Double check.

She came home with us when she was just eight weeks old. She has been a constant in our lives ever since.

Not only does she have all those qualities that we were hoping for, she also does this crazy Akita dance when she is really happy or excited (runs in circles and chases her tail like a puppy). She gets crazy eyes when she is feeling mischevious. She has certain people that she adores beyond reason and won’t leave alone (luckily, most of them adore her, too). She is just as big and cuddly and beautiful as ever, even at 11 years old.

As much as I complain about the bad stuff (and she certainly had had her fair share of annoying, messy, loud, obnoxious, and otherwise terrible dog behavior), we sure do love this big ol’ Teddy bear. It wouldn’t be the same without her around, underfoot in the kitchen or snoring in the hallway.

That’s our Lucky Girl!

every day life — 2 Comments
2
Aug 10

We are so small

We took a hike up to Las Positas Park last week. Anna looked down at the city spread all around and below us and remarked, “We are just very small people, right, Mama?”

Wow. We really are, aren’t we? All of nature spread around us, and all those buildings and cars and houses and people walking around and doing all the things that people do. We are so small.

I like that feeling, sometimes. That feeling that we are just these tiny, tiny things, these miniscule ants parading around and talking in these voices that feel like shouts but are the mere whisperings of the wind. It feels good to me, to remember this. To remember that the birds and the canyons and the ocean and the wind remains wild and free and that we are no more and no less than small people. That doesn’t feel like an insult to me, a worry, a feeling of insecurity. It feels like an enormous relief. It feels like there isn’t something out to get me, like this is all just–all of this, all of life–happening because of nature and biology and the inevitabilities of life. It does ‘t make it any less amazing. If anything, it makes it even more astounding that we are here. Us! Tiny little us! Here living and moving and loving and breathing and doing the best that we can.