To celebrate Leap Day and the fact that I didn't sleep all night, I made very buttery, salty scrambled eggs with a little milk, served on organic mill bread (the kind that J hates so I can only buy it when he's not here - for some reason known only to him, he favors sweet Hawaiian bread and butter top). I made my fifth cup of tea extra strong and now plan to walk with Dotsie for two hours in Franklin Canyon (where I got a moving violation for doing a California stop at the Stop Sign - please!) to clear mon tete. I am reeling in soldier onward bravely mode as my dear friend R, who was a reader for Dreamworks before he got serious and studied environmental law (and subsequently works in the legal department of a tv company) has given me brilliant, brilliant, careful, measured, kind notes on the thing that Miss J and I have been writing for what seems like months. Noony would call this "breaking news" as this is the first public declamation of the thing. It almost feels like coming out (I did admit to a girl-crush on the woman who plays Elphaba in Wicked). It feels terrific to get feedback but especially feedback that is constructive and professional. Props also to Miss L & Miss E who were extraordinarily supportive and sweet; I don't care if it's true or not, it just make you feel like pushing on up the hill. I mean, at the end of the day (I'm tired, forgive my cliches) isn't that what friends are for - just to keep you carrying on at what you love, with tireless support? I am a lucky girl on the friend front. I have thousands. Okay I lie. I have a few good friends and I love them all dearly. Miss J should be counted in there too, because when I called her this morning to say I'd been up all night and I couldn't face looking at the darn thing again today after inhaling it for the last three days said "of course, do you need company on your walk." Driving Minks to school, I said, that's a real friend Minky; someone who supports and loves you even when you've been up half the night after drinking almost a whole bottle of Chardonnay and sneaking three cigarettes outside at bed time, like a fourteen year old. Actually I didn't say this last bit. I just said the first bit and teared up appropriately. She's in that weird friend phase at school, where she's really finding out who her friends are. Her besty came running over when we arrived at school and I said, "Don't worry Emma - I packed two forks with the pasta today" and they both giggled. Minks rushed into my bedroom this morning stark naked and asked if I had a razor. I shouldn't be alarmed, I know. I keep forgetting she's 13.
But back to friends. One of my new Facebook friends is a brilliant, brilliant architect who designs buildings filled with beams and windows and light. I looked at some pictures of a Lutheran Church he'd done, and was filled with awe. It actually made me miss Norway. I thought about the Viking Ship Museum in Tonsberg and trolls porridge with cinnamon and those enormous whale skeletons that smell absolutely rank in the Summer.
Fred (the horse) is having a lovely time in his pasture near Fresno. He and a grand prix horse, Alfie, who is also laid up for a few months, are the only white horses there. Apparently when all the other horses graze sedately in the pasture, the two white horses frisk and frolic together in the muddy patch and so now both are completely brown.
So thank you to all my friends who've been kind, supportive, brilliant, and who've made me laugh and propped me up. It's been a long, lonely winter. But I've come through it! And my lovely sister and my Mamma, and of course Miss A who confided to me that she tries out a myriad of different accents when she is alone. And N who thought he could interest me in shooting his new airsoft gun and accepts cups of tea from me sweetly and even forces down breakfast sometimes, and M who calls me Mamma-Lumma and makes me get into bed with her in the morning. And J who is away but loves me from afar (if it's Friday it must be Mexico City). And C who things my paragraphs of dialog are too long but thinks I'm funny anyway. And L with whom I agree that inspiration is something channeled from above. And of course E, who sends me peppy emails every morning even though she's probably addled with ativan. And my bro who kicks my arse at Scrabble, and my other bro who sends me pomes wot 'e wrote. Thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you. Without you all I'd be a shell.
But now, I really must walk off the scrambled eggs.
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