Day two. What does a Mom (over 35 but under40) do with a St. Patrick's day afternoon to herself? Funny you should ask. Today I left my kids with the husband and went off with no particular plan. I spent almost an hour hanging out at the local record store. Yes, I DID say record store. I have fond memories of record stores when I was a teenager, and Music Matters is as close as we get up here in rural New England. I looked at the new Yo La Tengo CD, I thought about buying some music that I'd never heard (and then realized that money is a huge stress factor in my life) and ended up leaving with exactly what I went in for; Abbey Road on disc. Boring? Yes. However, you can't get the Beatles on I-tunes, so it's a good excuse to actually go in a store and talk to the local owner about music and life, and Rat Dog, and snow storms, and of course, kids and "the transition".
Then it actually got interesting, for me at least, I went to an Irish Pub, sat at the bar, had three pints, ate lunch, and wrote in my handy dandy spiral notebook. I desperately hope that the college students thought I was an interesting troubled poet or something. The truth is, I'm sure that no body even knew that I was there. I had a lovely afternoon. It's been a while since I've had the luxury of hanging out at a bar in the afternoon.
Perhaps I will return to the bar on my way back to the car. If anyone has read this far, they may be wondering where I am. Well I'm in the library of the local university, using a free computer to write my blog while still enjoying the afterglow of the three pints.
I would like to take a moment to say how much I enjoy sitting in the pub during a snow storm. There is nothing like it. Back to the point...that is, the Fall. Last night I stayed home and watched Little Miss Sunshine. That was good. Celebrate life and all that. Made me smile. Now, I suppose it's time to divide up the cookbooks tonight. I am desperately hoping that the husband has cleared all his things out of the closet today. I must confess, and it's probably politically incorrect to say this..but, I've been looking forward to having the whole closet to myself. It will be one of life's small joys to let my clothing spread out and fill the space.
Can we talk about music? I mean, it is the soundtrack of everything, including the fall of civilization. That's the whole quote by the way "After the fall of civilization some people simply slept." I have no idea where it came from, but it's been stuck in my head for years. I do believe that in my childhood I would go to computer stores, please understand, it was an "all DOS all the time" world back then. We precocious kids had to "program" everything line by line. So I would program this phrase "After the fall.." etc, onto the store computer and make it scroll endlessly. I thought I was so cool.
That's not music though. My Father was giving me advice about my divorce (and I would have to write a very long pithy novel to explain the irony of this statement) and he said that the hardest thing about divorce is dividing up the music collection. I decided that it would be prudent to mention this to my husband this morning. Hmmmmm, maybe not. He was offended. something to the effect of, "I've got much bigger things to think about than music." OK, so forgive me for trying to bring the mundane into our reality. A few facts, he is planning for 50% custody of our beautiful children, I applaud this, I have no reservations about it, I think it will be interesting. However, I'm not sure he has any idea what we have to look forward to. I mean frankly, one of them has entered puberty and has the emotional thermometer of a gnat (that is to imply that all things are emotional and mercurial, and instant).
Let's try again on the music. I like what I like, and I know what I like. I like the Alman Brothers, I like the Who, I like Alannis Morisette (even if I can't spell it). I also like Antler, My Chemical Romance, and AC/DC. Listening to music and NOT worrying about what the people around me think about what I like; that's a challenge.
After the Fall of Civilization, some people simply slept. Yup.