Pottery

So, I'm taking pottery.

Every Wednesday night, from 7 - 9, I put on some sloppy clothes and go to down the road of our very artsy neighborhood to Plum Pottery to learn whatever my teacher Annie has in store.

I always think it is going to be this enormously relaxing, cathartic, freeform experience. Instead, pottery is really shockingly involved. Sometimes I just want to squish the clay between my fingers and squeeze the pot up and then mash it down, never intending to make anything. But then I look around and cave into peer pressure.

Tonight, I didn't get to squish any clay, because tonight Annie taught me how to trim a pot. I took lots of art classes as a child, including pottery, but somehow I never heard that pots had to be trimmed at all. Apparently they do.

Dave, the other beginner, learned how to trim at the last class. I missed the last class because I was sick, but my pots were waiting for me all the same - the near-collapsed pot that I turned into something of an anemone, the two lop-sided cylinders that were feats of verticality, the semi-attractive V-shaped dish that made me proud, and the weird spherical squatty pot with the strange bottom ledge that I made as a semiconscious expression of individuality.

Whenever Annie does anything, it looks about as hard as breathing. When I try to do it, I'm amazed that any single pot was ever created to begin the art of pottery at all. She is a very good teacher:

first you brace your arm, then you hold the trimming tool like a pencil, then
you anchor your left hand in the center, your index finger on the side of
the tool, and down, and down and .......

Then I do it, and the 10 steps become blurred into one general pseudo-step, taking me from a very orderly set of movements directly to chaos, where I give in to the just-let-me-squish-the-clay desire (which, in trimming terms, turns into a general pot-shaving).

I shaved a bunch of pots tonight, and though it took a lot more mental commitment than I was bargaining for, it was fun. I felt better. When I got to the class, I was all sad and disappointed because one of my mice had fallen seriously ill, and I had missed an opportunity to see one of my friends because I had wanted to stay and care for the mouse. By the end of the class, though, I had dedicated so much mental energy toward pottery and away from those cares that I was smiling again. Somehow, pottery was therapeutic, rules and all. Maybe there is more to it than just squishing clay.

Pink Martini, Part II

Sheesh, with the time it has taken me to finish this story, you would have thought I were part of the writer's strike!!! This is a continuation of the 10/2/07 story about how Jess and I opted for a more economical and adventurous way to see Pink Martini in concert....

So, I left you last at the moment when Jess and I, despite having hand-inflated a far-from-seaworthy vessel, decided to embark on that dinghy and paddle it to the Pink Martini concert across the bay.

The moment I stepped into the dinghy, I could hear the loud hissing of escaping air and the gurgling of incoming water. Still, we were unfazed. An electrifying sense of adventure had filled us both.

I settled myself opposite Jess, securing our bag of Mexican food to the side of the dinghy. Night had set in, and the water was placid, black ink surrounding us. We floated calmly for a few moments as we got settled and poised the paddles for paddling.

Suddenly, a bright light shone into our eyes from someone on shore, who shouted "Get out of here, NOW!"

We were bewildered. The flash light was in the hands of a tall 30-something guy wearing jeans and a ski jacket, who demanded loudly, "WHO ARE YOU? WHAT are you doing here?"

I was speechless, but Jess answered "We just stopped by to pick up some food!" (Which is hilarious, since all there was were a bunch of rocks and mud...were we suggesting that food had been left for us by an elf on a boulder?!)

"Get AWAY from here, NOW!!!" he insisted wildly.

"We are trying to get out of here," Jess replied calmly. (I kept my mouth shut, wondering if the guy was packing heat). Meanwhile, I tried madly to paddle away, but, instead, found myself subject to that ridiculous paddle reorientation period that afflicts those who only rarely row a boat...despite my best efforts, the boat just turned in circles.... Jess found inexplicable courage and countered boldly, "And who are YOU?!"

The man faltered for a second but soon replied, emphatically "I am...an OFFICIAL!!"

We paused and looked at each other in surprise, trying not to laugh. "An official of WHAT?" we both wondered aloud (though Jess was probably the only one he heard). I was immediately thrust into one of Gilbert and Sullivan's satirical numbers under my breath:

I am the very model of a modern Major-General,
I've information vegetable, animal, and mineral...

The crazed guy must have felt invigorated by his comment, because he delivered this next verbal blow with obvious self-satisfaction: "You people need to go back to your limos and get the heck out of here!"

Uh - was he being ironic? Maybe he was able to peer into the future and see great successes in our horizons? Or maybe the comment wasn't so strange. After all, who wouldn't come to the conclusion that we had arrived via limousine - here we were, two girls in old clothes, barely floating in an audibly dying dinghy that had just launched off the rocks near - but NOT on - the pier of the Yacht Club. Every intuitive fiber in that guy's being told him to be suspicious of the two dangerous, spoiled rich girls, armed with an inflatable seacraft!!!

Miraculously, just then, I got the hang of paddling and put some distance between us and the madman. Still, he kept the flashlight trained ardently on us as we paddled off across the bay. We nearly wet ourselves laughing.

It was time to crack open the beer and the food. By that point, there was about a foot of water in the bottom of the dinghy, and we were bailing several times a minute, so everything was either moist or on the verge of getting soaked. It didn't matter. We ate our misty nachos and drank our salty beers and took turns paddling towards the lights. We had no lights of our own, no life jackets, no cell phones, nothing. We also had no worries.

I knew that Jess would know where to go. Jess is one of those people who just knows. Somehow, without ever having done this before, she navigated the moored boats and the small canals, and we floated up a narrow corridor to the spot where people with the same idea had gathered in boats to listen to the concert.

We rowed up as silently as two girls paddling and bailing water can row. We attracted the attention of the pirate-esque man in his kayak and the blissful couple lounging in each other's dry arms. An elegant party lowered their wine glasses to peer down from a sailboat at the spectacle we were creating, despite our best efforts to be discrete. They smiled kindly.

"Are you ladies really bailing?!" someone asked.

"Yep!" Jess responded in a loud whisper. It was then that they noticed that we were also inflating our craft. It wasn't immediately obvious, because I had adopted the stealthy position of squeezing the accordion pump between my legs, a la Thighmaster. This was a point of great amusement. A nice man asked if we needed any help - one lady offered her husband. We politely declined their generous offers and continued along our way.

Instead of hanging back in the rear like people with any shred of embarrassment would have done, we paddled our way up front and explored a bit, making friends as we went. The concert was simply beautiful. The music filled the night sky and resonated through every person, interconnecting us with the same vibrations. A smattering of stars spread out overhead. We felt peaceful and awake and alive. Everyone forgot what it was like to be lonely.

By the time the concert was over, Jess had chatted up nearly everyone we passed. We paddled back to shore as a friendly fleet. They showed us a much more reasonable place to disembark - an actual pier! We deflated the dinghy, loaded up Jess' car, and said our farewells.

When I slipped in the door of my house, I was muddy and waterlogged and breathless with laughter. I couldn't tell a bit of it to Geoff in any way that he would understand, which, sadly, broke the spell. He looked at me confused, then kissed me goodnight. I was home.

Freeform

I could blame it on moving, on the boxes still waiting to be unpacked or the unresolved organization issues in every room. I could blame myself, my own failure of discipline, my total lack of consistency and weakness for the way the wind blows. No, instead, I'll just blame it on medicine.

My life has no structure. And it can be traced back largely to the fact that, over the course of my 31 years, I can't remember ever having a steady, predictable schedule for more than one year at a time. After all, I've been in school for 25 years of it, followed immediately by residency. Medicine only exacerbated the problem by presenting the monthly challenge of ever-changing rotations. Research lacks even that much structure - an amorphous blob of time with evolving goals and adaptive pursuits. You can plan all you want, but biology will have its own way.

Each morning, I reinvent the course I am going to take that particular day. The alarm goes off - I roll over and decide whether the dream is worth playing out. If not, I get up. Shall I walk Mishka? Maybe yes! Well, no. Will I go to work now? Later would be nice! This week I'll go early. Tomorrow I'll keep dreaming longer and stay very late. What will I do when I get there? Why? And for how long? When will I exercise? Does house cleaning count? Tomorrow will be different. Next month - well, that's a whole new chapter. And next year will be an entirely new invention.

I am living in a blank canvas.

Force me to conform to the shape of a limerick. Make me bend into a sonnet...but don't torture me with this wide expanse of formless white. I can't make heads or tails of it, and every day's choice becomes both a wicked indulgence and a pure torture. I want to have no choice sometimes.

So, in retaliation toward my horrible, inefficient freedom, every now and then I try to regain control of my life the only way I know how: by making lists.

1. Clean the bathrooms
2. Exercise at 5:30 PM every day
3. Go through the mail
4. Take Mishka to the dog park every morning
5. Image 30 mice
6. Go hiking
7. Use spare time to do other items on list
8. Take time to enjoy a quiet moment
9. Write a letter to Liz
10. Iron shirts

I make big plans to plan out every hour, every day, every month. It never lasts. Mostly they never make it to Phase I of implementation.

When the planets align, sometimes these plans do stick. I have the greatest chance of success when life holds steady for several months on end...I can relax a bit into the sameness. But if that goes on too long, I get itchy for change. I ache to stir it up a bit. Because, deep down, I know that the way things are right now, well, that's not the only way they can be....

Snowboarding Cally Style

Before moving out here to Southern California, we had some pretty clear notions about what it might be like. After all, we do watch TV.

Hollywood is constantly portraying California culture, showing us the beautiful people riding their skateboards and rollerblades down the boardwalk - every body cosmetically perfected - and the slews of golden, towheaded surfers relentlessly pursuing the perfect wave. We expected to find cool shops on every corner selling breakfast burritos stuffed with sprouts and avocado, an intense obsession with Versace and organic food, and a much greater tolerance for diversity than we had experienced back at home. Some of these stereotypes were off... but not that many, really. Some even underrepresent the Southern Californians.

For instance, it is true that nearly every Californian we have met participates in at least one physical activity or sport, most of which involve the outdoors. In between jobs, our carpenter Todd is constantly training for the next Iron Man Competition. Each week, my friend Sarah straps six bikes to the back of her Suburban, and she and five of her closest guy friends go riding on rough trails in the mountains and desert. Our new BFF Shane likes to get up before dawn to go surfing before heading to the hospital where he is an ER resident - if the sun hasn't set yet by the time he leaves, he surfs again before nightfall. Jess races sailboats, Anni hikes the desert with Gustav, and, now that it is the winter season, Brook and Sharon fly to Utah every weekend to go skiing.

Geoff grew up skiing and can't believe I've never gone. While we lived in NC, he alternated between chastising and begging me to join him. I refused. I'm mortified to ski because my knees are so unstable that I'd surely fall victim to a torn ACL like Ryan got while she skied (she's planning surgery soon). Times have changed, though - we're in Cally now, the land of the surfboard and the skateboard...maybe I should try a snowboard. At least with snowboarding, your feet are strapped on, so your legs have next to no chance of splaying akimbo. There would be bruises...lots of them...but I wouldn't be at as much of a risk of surgical injury (at least not theoretically).

So, to fulfill Geoff's constant wish and to inaugurate ourselves as Californians, we accepted Brook and Sharon's invitation to join them on a skiing/snowboarding trip to Salt Lake City with a bunch of friends in February. Almost no one going will be a beginner, except perhaps for Joyce (our other new BFF and Shane's girlfriend), who has only gone a few times. Before the big trip, though, I decided I'd better get in some experience.

This weekend we took some of my lab friends with us up to Big Bear, where they had gotten 2 feet of the white stuff this past week. To prepare for the trip, we had to make several trips to Sports Chalet and other shops to pick up the necessary clothing and equipment. I discovered that there's a whole subculture surrounding the snow sports. Basically, if you're going to face plant in the snow, you'd better be darn cute while you're at it.

Anyway, after leaving San Diego at 5 AM on Sunday, we arrived at Bear Mountain by about 7:30. My first - and most terrifying - challenge was the ski lift. Getting on with one foot strapped to the board and the other foot awkwardly hobbling along was stressful enough. Then, however, after a deceivingly relaxing little ride over the treetops, suddenly came the dismount. While we were still too high up to be safe, we had to lift up the bar and prepare to glide off the lift in some impossible fashion. There was no time to second guess yourself. For most of the day, I couldn't get off of the ski lift without falling and crashing into Geoff. (Good thing I was wearing a cute outfit.)

Daniel, the MD-PhD student in my lab and a veteran snowboarder, turned out to be a superb teacher. His first lesson: how to stop. It turns out that going isn't the problem. It is the easiest thing in the world to point your board down the mountain and glide down gaining more and more speed as you go. Controlling one's direction and determining how that mad dash ends, well, there's the rub. After lots of practice, many mistakes (including taking a poor guy out because I actually didn't have the control I thought I did), and a whole variety of falls (the worst being the jarring sacral slam into the ice and the funniest being the pathetic backward drag down the mountain), I managed to get the basics under my belt before the day was through.

What they say is true, though: no pain, no gain. I bit it pretty hard many times (my poor tailbone) and was basically a motrin-seeking heap of soreness when all was said and done. By the end of the day, I had run out of fresh places to fall on, so, petrified of making anything worse, I finished up gently down the bunny slope.

Despite this untriumphant ending, I was proud to be able to claim that I had snowboarded the whole time and didn't walk down the mountain even once. It is true that ever since Sunday, I've been groaning every time I change positions or bend down, but, really - it was worth it...not only for the thrill of snowboarding, or even the beauty of the mountain, but for the experience of the initiation. Now we can say it...

We are Californians.

Anni in Wonderland with her two creatures, Mishka and Gustav

Here's a photo from our recent hike to Secret Canyon and Horsethief Canyon. Something about the lighting and the colors makes me think of Wonderland. It was an unusually warm day in the mountains.

The dogs had a blast!

Happy New Year Everybody!!!

Its a new year...

Just to feed the stereotype, we are starting 2008 with another perfect, lovely day here in San Diego. The sun is shining, it is 67 degrees outside, and Mishka is navigating the canyon behind our house like a little mountain goat. Through the window behind our dessicated Christmas tree, we can watch the happy lizards doing their morning push-ups and little hummingbirds fussing over the bright red bougainvillea. Geoff manages to keep one eyeball trained on the window for any signs of wildlife and the other fixed on the football game on our new giant flat screen TV. The recent winter rains have revived our drooping plants and provoked all the thirsty seeds to germinate, making for an oddly verdant January landscape. It is beautiful and surprisingly not at all confusing. It may look like spring, but it still has all the coziness of winter.

We are overwintering.