Ohio

This is my Ohio trip round up.
I had a wonderful few days with Suzanne and Joe in Cleveland, and then the three of us took a little road trip down to Ohio University, complete with lots of junk food and a stop at Taco Bell. You know it's a road trip when...

It was just like old times!

We rolled into beautiful Athens and I was surprised to find myself choking back tears. It had been so long, at least 12 years, and my love for the school where I have so many strong memories took me over.

We basically spend 48 hours eating our way through the town. My sense of direction was awful, and many of the places I remembered where no longer there.

Highlights included
• talking about our time at OU together but mostly talking about life today
• remembering what a crunchy place Athens is. I love it!
• watching the end of the very long World Cup match between Chile and Argentina at The Pub over a ginger beer.
• nice breaks at various coffee shops after so much walking!
• Great meals - Bagel Street Deli, Goodfellas (pizza), Casa Nueva, some new hot dog stand that does killer fries, The Union Street Diner
• taking a closer look at The Ridges (spooooky)
• visiting all the places we lived (couldn't get into the dorms)
• most definitely visiting VisCom, where the darkroom is in the exact same condition I remember it. 

outside Alden Library

on the college green

film canister openers in the darkrooms!

wandering Union St

Farmers Market out on State Route

farmer's market

new coffee shop

on the east green where we met in Gamerstfelter Hall

on the college green

the fun walls of Bagel Street Deli

best bagel sandwiches anywhere!

on the porch at 27 N Congress

the great Athens Blocks

chalk drawings and a hot nut at Tony's bar.

On Sunday, Suzanne and Joe dropped me off with Kirsten in Columbus where I hung out for a few days. Lots of yummy food, ice cream, and catching up!  Off to the Columbus Zoo...

The Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Date

Abridged outline. Some of these chapters will have no text as the titles say it all.


1. His Breakfast Bloody Mary Isn't Spicy Enough!      
2. He Doesn't Feel It Neccesary To Put In Enough Money To Pay for His Own Meal.    
3. The Erotic Poet...or Not 
4. His Five Year Old Daughter Doesn't Have Personality and As Such Isn't Worth Talking About.  
5. The Ball Cap Wearing F-Bomb Dropper   
6. The Desparately Awkward One Who Wouldn't Stop Squirming In His Seat and Checking His Phone
7. Apparently We've Been Dating For Six Months Already The Way He's Treating Me on This Second Date.  
8. According to Him, I'm Warming To Him Because My Elbow Touched His Elbow.   
9. He Doesn't Want to Date Me, He Just Wants To Date SOMEONE! 
10. He Is So Very Nice and Smart and Interesting But I Simply Can't Get Past His Weak Chin No Matter How Much I'd Like To
11. He Was Much Shorter Than His Profile Claimed
12. Our Four Dates Were Weeks Apart. Get On With It Already.
13. The Worst Sense of Humor Ever. There's No Such Thing as "An Oreo Murderer" in The World of Humor of Elsewhere.
14. There Was No Interest In Either Direction, But We Still Sat and Ate Ice Cream. Calories I Will Never Get Back.
15. The Phone Date Who Said He Wanted To Meet In Person but Then Never Followed-Up. Thirty minutes I could have been watching an episode of Orange Is The New Black
16. He Was Definitely OCD and Creepily Insisted on Referring To His Friend's Eight Year Old Daughter as "A Woman" For "PC" Reasons.
 17. The Amalgam Date Series 1- He Has Nothing To Contribute To The Conversation Despite My Best Efforts to Provide Him Opportunity
18. He Said he Would Call To Set Up Another Date and Didn't. I didn't mind until I ran into him on the BU campus and he said he'd get in touch (again) which is really just silly. I don't want to be in touch, and by the way, find our own street to walk on.
19. The Harvard Grad Who Borrowed My DVDs And When It Was Clear I Wasn't Going To Hear From Him Again, I Was Mostly Just Pissed to Have to Figure Out How to Get My Movies Back
20. Nope. You're Just Too Young, Dude.
21. Um, Do NOT "baby" Me. We Just Met. (Check Please!)
22. Body Odor and Brown Teeth. Retirement Being Considered

So Sneaky!

Harlow has discovered the joy of chewing flipflops, now that the warm weather is here.

I foolishly left my closet door open and she got a hold of my teal ones and did those in pretty quickly (anything stinky and chewy is her favorite).  I would put the half-chewed flip (minus the flop at this point) in the trash. This is really dumb of me since she always pulls stuff back out of the bin as if to say "Hey! My toy! How did that get here!? I'll rescue it!"

My second pair sat with a pile of shoes I put near the back door for quite a while, and she only noticed them after I'd worn them once and left them in another location. She thuroughly enjoyed ruining those too. My fault really, for leaving them out!

One of the flips was in my bedroom trash bin the other morning following their mauling the night before. Standing in the bathroom, putting on make-up, I could hear the dog carefully removing the item from the bin as if she was playing a game of Operation, careful to not hit the sides of the bin and let off any sound that might alert me to her trash theft. Harlow definitely understands the concept of getting caught and how to avoid it - make sure it's done out of earshot.

But I hear the bin shift,  her slowly coming down the hall, and then as she nears the bathroom door, picks-up the pace. As she buzzes by the bathroom door, she is in a full-trot, and I can hear her giggling with delight in her attempt to pull her prank.

"Harlow! Leave it!" I shout as she starts down the stairs. I hear the disappointed thud of the flip flopping on the a step as Harlow continues to run away from the evidence as if to imply she'd simply run by it.

Oh that? How'd that get there?

Stuffing free!

I have decided to end by stuffing filled toy buying for miss Harlow as it always results in mess.

Here she is enjoying her stuffing free elephant...

Stuffing free elephant from C.M. Scott on Vimeo.

Bitches with Stitches

(Sorry for the crude title but it's clever and it works)

I took Tuesday off this week to bring Harlow to the vet to have a lump on her paw removed. It's stopped growing since she was a puppy, and I didn't do anything about it because she didn't acknowledge it. So, I know it wasn't hurting her. But last week I noticed it got irritated somehow (how that could possibly happen on my whirling dervish I have no idea!), started bleeding, and she started licking. So, I made the appointment.

When I picked her up in the afternoon following her procedure, she was a bit dopey. Thinking little of this fact, I opened the car door to let her in she jumped about one inch off the ground and squashed into the side of the car seat with her body and cone encompassed head. I imagined that in her head she had much more height that in reality. Of course I realised then that she'd need help getting into the car, because what felt like a hearty jump to her clearly wasn't in her present condition.

paw in the open

That evening she was snuggly and chill with an open row of stitches and I took a bit of time cutting about an inch off the ecollar after Dad pointed out that it was too big for her, only to replace it on Harlow and realize she could now reach the wound and took full advantage of this opportunity to start licking at it.

So I painstakingly re taped on the inch I'd just cut off. Smooth.

In the morning I put her in her crate with the ecollar on. She was not a fan of this and I can't say I blame her. She flailed and made a scene while i quickly got my things together to leave for work. This generally take sixty second but turned into much longer when I realized my keys were not where they should be.  They did not present themselves to me in a timely fashion, so I let Harlow out of the crate while I searched FOR ANOTHER 25 MINUTES before finding my damn keys.

I asked Dad to come check on her in the morning while I was at work. I arrived at the office after a physical therapy session just in time for a call from dad letting me know she'd thrashed around enough in the crate to bust open her stitches. I called the vet and planned on bringing her back ASAP.

I then walked down one east, crossed Commonwealth Ave, then west one block (because the T line fence prevents a simple crossing of the street in front of my office) to my mechanic who fortunately just finished working on my car (how could the tubing to my washer fluid sprayers simply disappear?). I would hop in and head home to puppy. Except I didn't have my wallet on me, so I trekked west one block, crossed Comm Ave and trekked east one block.

Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

When I got to Harlow she was fit to be tied at the site of me outside her crate. I took her back to the vet where they would sedate her again. I took the rest of the day off from work. That's how much of a project it turned into. But at the end of it all, she had a very pretty pink bandage and multiple appointments (and bills) to return to have the paw redressed over the next week and a half.

Heading back to the vet after the stitches opened up

she didn't know how to sit with the bandage on for a while

wasn't really slowed down much

Thursday we went back to have the bandage changed and when the vet came out of the back with Harlow she said breathlessly, "It's the worst bandage job I've ever done. We almost had to sedate her again!"
Schitzo on crack.

I worried that she would hurt herself again if left in the crate with the ecollar on, and I worried that she'd pull the bandage off without the ecollar. Mom and Dad volunteered to take her so the next morning I brought her to their place, only to find after about 3 and a half minutes that the wild child would be too much for them to deal with. It was like she was a schitzo on crack.

Fortunately, my dog walker is awesome and they took her. And also found her to be no trouble which was very lucky. They had her Thursday and Friday and Harlow was on her best behavior, except for the part about pooping in their house right after being let outside, "I think the cat scared her" Amanda, my dog walker said. I have no idea, but it's been a long while since she's done that and it was I think over the holidays at Mom and Dad's house.

someone's wearing the cone! This is the dog walker's son

playing at the dog walkers

rather cushy at the dog walkers!

Saturday when we went back to the vet for the next bandage change, I sat on the floor next to Harlow while they rebandaged it and she was as well behaved as can be, even as she panted in a panic with her tongue hanging out like a rolled out red carpet.  We played the fun game of "Gotchyer toungue!"  Well, okay, maybe I'm the only one who thinks it's fun.

Resting

Hiking with Harlow today and she suddenly decided to takes rest in the way to the car.

Quasi-Revalation

An interesting feeling is creeping into me as a result of my crappy lame-o useless eggs which I recently learned about (OK, yes, I'm being a bit dramatic with that statement). It's not relief, really. Something else.

For my whole adult life I have been seeking my person. They say that a way to make people gravitate to you is to appear to love life. To smile. Be magnetic, I guess. I'm not good at smiling genuinely when I don't feel up for it, and I have been aware for a very long time that I seem unapproachable. This fact gives me pause when someone actually does talk to me, like they've sort of braved a type of gauntlet somehow to "approach the stern one". I have been told I can be intimidating (both my men and women so I don't mean in a you're so beautiful people don't know how to talk to you but rather you look really unamused and maybe even scary much of the time and people find that intimidating).

Conscious of this, I try to be friendly to the best of my ability, aware however that my smile pops up to say hello! and my face promptly goes slack when the person is out of my line of sight. This is not because I am unhappy. It's because that person doesn't amuse me in the least. No no I'm just kidding. It's because I am who I am.

I love to laugh and have reason to smile. Don't we all?

Point being...I'm not sure what my point is, but I'm just going to keep going. You have nowhere to be, right?

A coworker of mine who while waiting for some technical stuff to be dealt with before we could get to work started chatting with me around the time of Commencement. He is quick to smile, and is friendly in a way that makes me jealous. I'm sure he has his bad days but he's one of those people who can make other people smile just by being around them. It's annoying, really.

I told him about the recent No Filter date and he said something interesting about the comment made about unapproachability. He said "You can be intimidating, but I know that while you have this expression that says 'I am unamused by life' I know there is a smile just under the surface and it's not hard to make it come out. You have a tough exterior but I know you're just a softy under all that".

It was the first time I'd heard someone describe my expression. "Unamused". It's a perfect description because all in all, I am unamused by life for the most part. Life, you need to earn my laughter. I don't just go givin' that shit out willy nilly.

His statement nearly made me emotional. I know that sounds weird, but I don't remember the last time someone who wasn't close to me looked at me. Like, really looked at me, and made an observation which was, in truth, a kind one, not to mention an accurate one.  I often feel misunderstood because of my mannerisms, facial expressions, and in general, whatever it is about me that results in me being misunderstood.  In reality, my tough exterior is actually thin skin, and all the sensitivity that that entails.

While I really appreciated his observation, it also reminded me that it's been a very long time since someone has wanted to know me, see me, understand me. And I realized how much I want that.

OK, I've digressed from my starting point which was about the feelings resulting from Sunday's test results. If I still can get pregnant on my own, it's still highly unlikely to happen in the next few years, which is when it would need to happen (sorry. this is probably more than you care to read about. but don't worry, I won't stick to this topic). Armed with this information I am disappointed, but also realizing that there is no longer a need to frantically look around for my person as if my life depended on it. Or rather, the life of my kids depended on it. I am entering the adoption/surrogate phase and there's no timeline for that.

At no time in my adult life have I been not actively look for my person. And now, the thought that I only have a limited window, if any at all (it's like a small bathroom window I think, really at this point), I almost feel free of the pressure. Because why panic for a tiny window which could be cracked and not doing it's job well anyway?

It's actually really weird.

If I have a daughter someday I'm going to encourage her to have her eggs frozen when she's 25. Oh...wait...

Ha. Ha. Ha. See what I did there?

Ribs and Hiding

This morning I was taking a leisurely walk around the block with Harlow, as we do every morning, when she got very preoccupied with a garbage can. It's garbage day, so everyones receptacles are on the curb. I asked her to move along as I passed her, leash in hand, tethered to her. Then I gave a little tug. She fought me. Then I gave a big tug, annoyed at being held up. She finally joined me and after a few moments, I heard the clicking sound that comes with something in my dog's mouth.

"What do you have?" I ask her, then remembering that a command is far more effective, "Drop it, Harlow."

What comes out of her mouth is the size of a large teacup saucer. It is intact, could not be seen inside her mouth, and is completely comical as it's flops out and hits the sidewalk because it seems far to large for her to have been able to hide it in her mouth. It's a rack of ribs. Three ribs to be exact. Still together, untouched. "I don't blame you" I tell her "I would have wanted to eat that too.

Later, we are home and I'm doing the morning routine - packing up my bag for work, filling her water bottle for her crate, turning the TV on and making sure it's not on FoxNews, getting treats for her and putting them in the crate.

Typically I have to come outside and coax her to some inside, but this morning, for some reason, she comes inside. She sits halfway up the stairs as I ready the house for my exit. I see her out of the corner of my eye slinking upstairs.

It's time for me to go and so I wander upstairs to find her and bring her back downstairs, put her in her crate, and head on my way.

When I find her, she is hiding under the curtains in my bedroom.

"Harlow's not here! You should look somewhere else of even just go to work without finding her and putting her int he crate!"

Time to go to work from C.M. Scott on Vimeo.

Now That's Love

I prefer stoicism. I prefer it to crying and drama. But this time I gave myself some slack and allowed myself to indulge.

This time, I deserved it. Letting go.

In the kitchen I thought to myself that I can take my diabetes. I won't complain, I'll just deal. I will try and suck it up that I can't seem to find someone to love. Or, someone I could see myself loving to love me. Even though I feel it is my life's purpose.

But this? Today my blood test results came back and my body is not capable of making a decent batch of healthy eggs to freeze. Could I still get pregnant? Yes. But it is highly improbable as it's not something I will likely get working on in the next year. I am not hopeful. This I am not OK with. Give me diabetes ten times over, whatever, but this I am not OK with. This what feels like the loss of my other life's purpose.

I am taken back to a strange daydream I had while still living in FL and was sitting on the beach at sundown one evening alone. I closed my eyes and suddenly, my husband was sitting next to me, holding our son. He was blonde and about eighteen months old.  It felt almost like a premonition. Now I see it for what it was. A daydream.

For the first time in nearly ten years, I let the rage come, kicking the kitchen door shut, crouching, fists clenched, letting out a guttural, primal scream into my black and white checked floor. It felt equal parts foreign, comfortable, and appropriate.

Harlow came running to me at the sound of it.  It wasn't my dog being curious or nosey hey, what's going on?.  She ran to me like she was in the dog park at full speed, saying, in her own way I'm coming! I'm here!.

I sat and sobbed with my back to the wall. She moved to be right next to me, sat, and put her paw in my lap. Just patiently letting me cry. Then, she lay down, putting her head in my lap instead, as if she was saying Take your time. Here, I'll get on the floor with you. 

After a little while, she sat up again leaning slightly into me, and this time, twisted her head so it sat in the crook of my neck. Like you would if you were holding someone.

My dog held me.

My spastic, hyper, high energy dog, sat with me, and held me while I cried. For all her fidgety ways, and quirky mannerisms, I have no doubt in my mind what she was doing for me in that moment. She was simply being there. Just sitting with me.

I can't think of a human who could have done it better.

I still feel terrible. My heart is heavy and this news has left me feeling broken and lacking in too many ways. I will adjust, of course. It's what one does. But for now, I have a puppy who deserved a big belly rub.