my heart is a glorious machine;

So, intense doses of caffeine make me really happy. Chemically, I mean. I suppose this is why people take drugs in, er, non-medical situations. I took Excedrin for a migraine and am currently on top of the world, which is good because today was one of those irritating days in which everything is wrong for no apparent reason.

But I am here to talk about Why Friday Was Made Of Awesome.



So, that was Friday. Today was bad for no particular reason, even though the things that were happening were mostly good, but now the caffeine is bringing me completely irrational chemical happiness, which I like rather more than completely irrational chemical gloom, and I had an extraordinarily excellent Goodwill day (red and white striped vintagey summer dress, long pinstriped double-breasted waistcoat, mostly red and brown paisley corduroy trousers, very flattering fitted blazer, blouse with bits of blue and white stripes and bits of red flowers and pearl buttons and general bohemian-ness), and made hot fudge sauce for to make sundaes for my brother's birthday (which is today), and now my fingers would rather like to not type anymore, wot wot.

(You know that I am tired and hungry and want the computer to just go away, please, when I post the same entry on Xanga and LiveJournal. Augh. I have been doing far too much of this lately.)

So, yeah, we went to Pittsburgh yesterday, and I--reckon I'm still a bit overwhelmed. I know that if I tried to type up the day, I'd end up going on about what happened, and leaving out what it was. I'm beginning to worry about my worth as a nonfiction writer, because this seems to be the extent of my ramblings: I will tell you what happens, but I will leave out what it felt like, what it meant, because I can't even get those to come out wordlike. I will also leave out anything that is terribly, frighteningly emotional, particularly if it is complicated, unless it is of such dire importance that I can't not write about it. Part of it might be the enforced impromptu nature of my blog entries--I have to compose them here and now, at a very specific point in time, and I have to have them done; I haven't got time to work on them. If I had my own computer, maybe I'd be able to write about things properly, or maybe I'm just using it as an excuse.

Sigh. Right. I don't even know what I'm saying. Yesterday was weird and sort of surreal, and I think you'd do better off reading Mum's post than mine.

( And yet I go on for quite a lot of paragraphs anyway. )

I am rather ragingly hungry and starting to lose track of general sanity in writing. Er. Going to scrounge for dinner now.

Well, then. Here I am, using midenianscholar's computer, and she's not even here. (Insert wicked laughter here.) Er. We're picking her up from the airport in a few hours, actually. Her house is so lovely and she's got the sort of bed I have always wanted, and the only thing missing right now is my personal CD player, which finally gave up the ghost when I dropped it in the sand. (I barely even dropped the plagueable thing; it sort of skidded about when the wind tried to blow my umbrella away, and apparently sand got in it and KILLED IT. So, I have had no music for two days and have been fervently doctoring myself with Alyssa's iTunes.)

Anyway, the drive Sunday was hellish. I really can't think of very many good things that happened during any time of that day, especially as it was Dad's last hurrah at the church, and it was muggy, so I was hot and angry, which is an unfortunate combination. The drive itself went well--we hit no traffic that I can recall, the car amazingly did not break down, and we got in on time, but it was deeply hot the entire way, and the siblings were bickering like mad and I developed a tremendous headache that had me in tears near the end of the trip (that, and then everything else, as I had gotten no time to process my emotions). To make a long, dull, and unpleasant story short, we were all extraordinarily relieved to get to our hotel, and the air conditioning.

The hotel suite is gorgeous. It's not especially fancy, but the air is cool and the (two) rooms are bright, and there are paintings on the walls. One has but to pull back the curtain in the living room bit to see the ocean, which would be much prettier were it not filled with people. It looks lovelier at night, but my camera can't get decent pictures in the dark. (I have snapped several pictures, which you lot will see eventually.) If one goes out onto the passageway from the hotel rooms to the elevator, one can see the city. I was so thrilled to be in it again, to look out and see the lights and the movement; to see, wherever I go, some sort of opportunity. It's weirdly familiar and so alien--I lived in the Virginia Beach area for six years of my early childhood, and things smell familiar.

I have so much to say already and not enough room to do so--rather, I could type as long as I wish, but I know you wouldn't read all of it at once. Even I would probably skim it. It's so difficult to describe things the way I want to--the Children's Museum, our old neighbourhood and the house that hasn't been painted in fifteen years, old friends, new friends, new old friends, the scent of the ocean, my very North-Eastern beach garb, watching Lonesome Dove with Dad until one in the morning, the ridiculous glory that is my first ever pair of sunglasses, swimming at night, the feel of warm wind drying one on a rooftop looking over the night-city in all its lit-up glory--I feel almost as if the only way I can properly represent any of this is through a collage: splashes of colour and sound and brilliance and bits of drabness here and there; or a collage-poem, like 'The Poet In Exile'. Perhaps time will help me to sort things through again; I wish I'd had the computer during this time so that I could document things as they happened. Which I can do now; huzzah. Er. Especially after I bother Mum into taking me to Lynnhaven Mall, which has got a Barnes & Noble in it. And a Starbucks. Among other things. Oh, and a carousel, which is one of my fondest and most vague childhood memories, and yes, I am riding it, and yes there will be pictures. I am still madly in love with carousels; more, probably, than I was when I was young enough to be without ridicule.

(Well, I'm back. Not home, but here, which is sort of like being home anyway; leaving you lot is rather like leaving my family, because I 'see' you every day, so the not-seeing is a great jolt out of my sense of normalcy.)