On the train tonight, coming home from work, a man was sitting across from me wearing infuriating pants. They had a design running down each leg, and I honestly did a double take when I realized what it was. You know that awful cut-out of a woman that haunts mud flaps on Mac trucks? Well, it was her, but in a double mirror image, so you got not just one unrealistic skinny-but-huge-hooter body but two, connected, for your watching pleasure. And this on an enourmous, chubby guy who sighed audibly when a sweet young black woman asked for one of the two seats filled with his shopping bags. Whe he finally moved the bags, he started pulling out the contents. What was in the bags? Chocolate bars. Several of them.

I wrote a blog a few days ago that was eaten by my web browser when it froze. I kick myself every time I don’t save them before I post, but I can’t seem to save them consistently. I’m not sad it’s gone, though; the whole blog was about the different kinds of wine I had drunk the night before and that stuff is only interesting if you are a wine geek. However, I had my first bar shift Sunday morning and it went really well. Too well. So well that the GM who was managing the shift sent an email to all of the other managers telling them how well I did. My mom asked me last night how it went and it was depressing to tell her. I want to be a great many things, but being a great server is not in my top five. But- it was fun, and a change, and the money was terrific. My sister-in-law-to-be Tessa stopped in for some oysters and garlic chips and I realized how easily my friends can now visit me at work. I’m hoping that more of my family shows in the coming weeks.

My brother Ian is on the front page of Salon.com. Pretty freaking amazing, and such a terrific piece. But more on my mind is the threat of war, and the threat of retalliation. I can’t stop thinking that somewhere in Iraq, a woman my age with several small children is learning that Americans will most likely start dropping bombs on her in less than two days. And whoever that woman is, she is thinking that I am aligned with my administration, that I support it, that I am the true evil. I am not proud to be an American right now. I feel lucky and blessed to live where I do, and baffled and terrified by Bush and all who cater to him. For the first time in my life, I am seriously thinking about choosing a different country as my home. I feel like there is little hope as long as Bush is in office, and the work it will take to undo his damage is almost insurmountable. He was not elected by the American people, and he is not listening to them (or anyone else) and I am sickened as the shock waves of his awful choices resonate around the world. In short, I do not know what to do.

I know a few things. It seems like a good couple of weeks to avoid the trains. I’ll be biking to work as much as I can. It’s also a good time to avoid that glass of wine after my shift- I want to be completely sober if something happens and I need to help somebody. And perhaps the perfect time to get a really good first aid kit and some maps to keep in my backpack. This is all precautionary, but these steps can be a hell of a lot more helpful than duct tape on windows, three days of rations, and an orange-hued brand of fear. I said to a friend tonight that I was not so much scared as ready. I feel like we are takings steps, making choices that invite and encourage another attack on my city.

I am awake, aware, and prepared. And perhaps the answer for me will be a summer in Iraq, to prove that some proud Americans aren’t interested only in oil- that maybe some of us care more about cleaning up the mess we’ve made. Right now all I really want to do is stick my head back in the sand. But I think that twenty-eight years of living with my eyes sealed shut is long enough.

I don’t know if it’s the day of the week, or the phase of the moon, or the cycle of my menses, or the fact that it’s my first day off since… last Friday, but I am having a terrific day. Even the fact that the temperature is hovering around freezing isn’t getting me down. It might also have to do with the fact that I slept twelve hours last night, and also that my apartment is clean. I just took a little walk around my hood, and the sun is bright and promising. The one thing that assures me that I will leave this apartment at the end of my lease is that I get absolutely no direct sunlight. I don’t know exactly which way I face but the sun never touches even the bars that protrude from my windows. So even with my high ceilings, it is always a little dim. It also means that my window boxes can only be shade-loving plants. Hmmm. No basil.

I had my first and only training shift on the bar yesterday. It was fun, because it was a change, and because my beloved friend B (as we call her, that or Ms. B) was the one training me. She is about to start school to be a yoga teacher, and is in the throes of a new love, so we haven’t had much time to hang out. And even though we were working the whole time, just being near her was lovely.

Right after work I grabbed a bite to eat at the bar (porcini gnocchi, creamy polenta, broccoli rabe, oh my god) and then sped off to my first real appointment with my analyst. And I have to say, I didn’t like it much. I didn’t really want to be there, I didn’t feel like talking to her, I didn’t feel, really, one way or another about the whole session. Halfway through, I realized that I didn’t want to come back. I don’t feel compelled to speak to her. It was really different than the first time we chatted. I am trying to talk myself into giving it one more chance, but I think I am going to look around for someone else. My friend who recommended her thought she was brilliant, and perhaps she is. But if I don’t want to talk to her, it’s just not going to work.

I’m going to continue cleaning my apartment, give my bike a loving wipe-down, and perhaps clean out the inbox of my mind as well. I had sort of a revolutionary conversation with my lover, but it’s one I need to sort out on my own before I write about it. Suffice to say, today, I’m at peace.

Tomorrow, my beautiful bike and I are going to have our first long ride. I’m so very, very excited. Yahoo!

It’s sort of amazing how much my life slips by during my work week. This was a particularly silly week- basically a “quad”- two shifts on Sunday followed by two shifts on Monday- then sleeping ’till noon today and having enough time to do a load of laundry before heading out to work yet again. But one or two lovely things have happened over the last few days. I was in the middle of the Sunday morning lunch rush when a woman ran in the door, calling my name. She grabbed my arm as if she knew me like a sister and started yabbering about how I had served her. I just nodded and smiled and scanned my brain until I found a match: she was the secretary of a cop at the 13th precinct. Her boss and his wife had brought her to dinner two weeks ago to celebrate her retirement. I remember that she was quiet and sweet, and that the cop almost had to force her to order more than just an entree. If memory serves, I sent them a free dessert with “congratulations” or something written in chocolate. Anyway, I’m remembering the whole dinner as this woman clings to my arm, rattling off a story about how she got too drunk to remember what I looked like, and that she had called the restaurant and stopped by trying to find me, and that she had a present for me. She shoved a small package in my hand, and suddenly embarassed, sped out the door before I could entirely catch up to the situation.

I stopped for a minute in the middle of the rush, in throngs of people trying to get in and out of the restaurant, and gazed at this little package in my hand. And only then did I realize that it was made out of the postcards that we put in our check presenters. She had taken several of them and cut and pasted them into a cylinder. She filled the cylinder with Easter chocolates and then wrapped it in plastic, like a giant Tootsie Roll. And then- this was the kicker- the ends were wrapped in ribbon that matched the colors of the postcards- black, green, red, and yellow. The effort put into this small gift was staggering.

And then I noticed the small card (also cut from our postcards) that hung from one end. In it was a sticker that read simply, “One person can make a difference”. Say what you will. These moments justify my life.

The next night, some of my new regulars (who I’d only met once) came in for dinner. I was only doing the wine that night, so I couldn’t wait on them, but I spent a great deal of time at their table, making recommendations and chatting. At the end of their meal, the husband put his arms around me and told me that I was a star, that I was wonderful, that I was the kind of person who would do brilliantly whatever I chose to do. And then the woman searched me out and put $40 in my hand, on top of what they left their server.

It’s strange. I guess when you are not dating somebody, and you don’t have anyone around to tell you that you are doing okay, the universe sends you drunk 50-year-olds to remind you that you are loved, that you might even be extraordinary. If the universe forgets, then you have to tell yourself that you are okay, that you are doing the right thing, that you are cool or attractive or worthwhile. But when you forget to tell yourself, well. That’s when you are in a world of hurt.

I also got the good news today that I’ve been promoted- I’m now also a bartender as well as server at the most popular restaurant in New York. As I’ve said a million times, if all I wanted in life was to be a waittress, I’d be the most successful person I know. As it is…

I keep wondering who is going to take the initative to shovel our steps and sidewalk. Since this is about the three hudredth snow storm this winter, and our stretch is the only one on the block that stays white until it melts, I guess the answer is no one. I guess maybe it should be our landlord, or maybe there should be someone designated. I wouldn’t mind if it was me, but I don’t yet have a shovel. And it reminds me that I am living in a very young building, lots of early twenty-somethings who still enjoy singing along to Bon Jovi (and meaning it, or so it sounded like at the most recent house party above my head. I quite literally put in ear plugs and chanted in Sanskrit and could not fall asleep for the literal shaking of my walls.) Reminds me also that, as much as I dread it, I will move again come next fall. I just don’t belong in a building like this. Unless… of course… I can afford the lovely garden apartment in the basement… mmm…

Here’s the thing. We have ANOTHER snow storm coming. Yep, this Tuesday we will yet again be lathered in cold whiteness. All I want in life, right now, is to be able to ride my bike in warm sunshine. That’s all I want. Umm. Okay, I want a few more things, but that would sure as heck be a start.

After yoga class tonight I had a slice of pizza. Classic New York slice, big, long, drippy with oil and cheese. One balances the other, right?

I woke to another snowstorm this morning, the streets AGAIN covered in white. Not just a flurry, but a big, fat storm. I sloshed through it to my first eye exam in about a year and a half, and was greeted with terrible news: all of us who wear disposable contacts, but don’t toss them nearly as often as we should, or sleep in them for weeks at time, and who say we’ve never had a problem? Well guess what. There is bad news, and it will reach you eventually. I have GPC, or GIANT PULMONARY CONJUNCTIVITS. It’s on the inside lids of my eyes. I also have a swollen cornea. What does this all mean? Well, first of all, I can only wear my contacts for a few hours each day until I heal. If I don’t do this, soon I will never be able to wear contacts again. Secondly, a newer, more expensive kind of contact. Third, a new cleansing system that wipes out the idea of 3-in-1 solution, which is laden with heavy chemicals, which irritate the eye. I had to buy an expensive three step cleaning system which involves storing them in this little capsule that, in miniature, reminds me of the contraption that Jodi Foster met the aliens in at the end of the movie “Contact”. Anyway, I have to put them in there EVERY NIGHT, and clean them every morning, and throw them away after just a week for three months until my eyes heal. Major yawn. So I had to get an eye exam, order contacts, and buy this new solution. That put me back about $150, and I only ordered 2 boxes of contacts. But it wasn’t over. I then had to buy glasses- my first pair in years- and after searching Park Slope for some frames I could afford, I was still out another $250. This was a $400 afternoon. And THEN, off to my first analysis appointment.

It was actually rather nice. She practices in a beautiful old building that faces Prospect Park, indeed a fifteen minute walk from my door. There was actually a couch on which I was apparently supposed to drape myself but instead I settled in a chair opposite of my analyst. She asked me why I was there, and after telling her that my life was a little complicated, and that I wanted to learn more about myself and through this knowledge make better choices, I just started talking. Forty minutes later I had told her about my brothers, about my parent’s divore, about my alchoholic ex and our brakeup, about my jobs, about my passions, my wants, my confusions, and even about my current lover, who she (ahem) knows. (He is in training to be a psychoanalysist.) She asked a few questions, and mostly said, “Uhn. Hm. Uhn. Ugh!” (This was in response to my ex and I’s brakeup.) At the end of it, she asked me what I thought about our “talk”, and I said I thought it was just fine, and then we talked money for a few minutes, which made me terribly uncomfortable. But then she said that she’d charge me $60 a session, as long as I came every week. Not bad. I have no idea in the world how I am going to afford it but I really want to commit to this.

To be honest, I’m almost regretting my most recent large purchase. As much joy as my bike is bringing me, I would not be in any financial dire straights if I had not bought it. In fact, I’d be just fine. But then it would have been sold by the time I was able to pay for it, and really, it’s as if it was waiting for me all this time. It is what is making me most happy right now. I will find a way to make all of this possible… slowly, maybe, but also surely.

I think my only issue with my new analysist was that she seemed awfully impressed with me, with my life the last two years, and with what I want to do. Conversely, I feel that my lover is not nearly impressed enough. Doesn’t it seem like your therapist should be objective and your lover should be taken?

My windows are wide open to the 43 degree breeze here in Brooklyn. It is supposed to hit 49 today, the warmest we’ve seen since around October. Tomorrow? Huge snowstorm again.

I just shopped at the Park Slope Food Co-op, where I had a very emotional moment in the bread aisle. I was picking up vegetables, extremely aware that I was shopping for one (one arichoke, three bananas, one apple, one small bag of spinach) and I was lamenting the fact that bread comes in such large loaves. It’s very hard for a single person, who doesn’t eat much bread, to go through a whole loaf before it goes bad. So I wandered to the bread aisle, and found several half-loaves, whole-grain wheat, waiting for me on the shelves. Packaged not by us, but by some granola farm in upstate New York. Which led me to think about the market of single granola folks like me, needing bread, but only need a half loaf. Jeeze. I should put up a sign on the bread aisle that says, “Are you buying this bread? Why don’t all of us buying this bread start a book or hiking club. We can eat organic granola. We can wear organic unbleached wool fuzzy sweaters and drink organic coffee made with unbleached filters. And then hit a yoga class. C’mon!”

I’m “trailing” (which basically means auditioning) on the bar tonight at my restaurant. I’m not entirely sure that I want to be a bartender, but I do want more money. And I want change. The whole restaurant had to take a five-page short answer and essay test on wine… the trailers and bartenders and servers alike… and guess who got the high score? Yep. Me. Which is cool and really pathetic at the same time.

I live my life in little pockets of hope. It may be an audition, an idea of a new job, a bit of writing, but whatever it is, it colors every minute of my day. Until, that is, the audition goes badly, the job doesn’t work out, the pitch is never answered. And yet I somehow do not lose hope. I guess that’s the amazing, or ridiculous thing. I’m sad for a few days afterwards but then I stumble upon something that re-awakens the hope. For all of two days I was thinking that I might be able to leave the floor of my restaurant, to work in the newly-forming HR department, but my meeting with the GM today left me with little hope. It’s possible, but it’s way in the future. Same thing happens with each big audition. I keep thinking “ah-HA! This is IT! THIS is what is going to change my LIFE!” And yet my life rolls on, not too much different than the day before.

I’m trying to believe my yoga teacher. Trying to believe that I need to work towards acceptance and contentment. But I just don’t think it’s in my blood.

After three lovely days off, I was returned to work today, and I have to say, I didn’t miss it much. Mostly because I got some good writing done, one pitch to Family Circle magazine (hey, they pay well!) and also my fundraising letter for the AIDSRide. It’s a much better letter than last year, as I have a better idea of what this ride will be like, but I’m also more committed to the cause, and far more informed in general. I had dinner at the Veg City Diner on 14th, where I enjoyed a cobb salad topped with “chickn” nuggets, soy bacon, avocado, and real blue cheese. My kind of meal. I ate with my friends Allen, Carol and Heather, three fellow Saturday and Sunday lunch workers. Heather is a singer/songwriter, Carol an actor, and Allen is a writer/directorer/producer type. I read them my letter, and we decided to put together a benefit show for the AIDSRide.

Tomorrow I work a double. I’ve decided that I rather like this, six shifts in four days, which allows for the three days off and a healthy paycheck to boot. I don’t know how happy I will be Monday morning when I drag myself to work after the double, but right now, after the time away, it feels good.

I wish I didn’t have to work, like this, at all. I wish right now I could be up at the farmhouse in Hillsdale with my brother and sister-in-law. It is a terrific writing environment, lots of good chairs and good cheese and coffee and Chopin the dog to scritch when it all gets to be too much. And it is beautiful. When I wrote for Slate.com last year, I started my week of writing work at the farm. I remember it was warm enough to write outside, which I did, in a tank top, with Chopin for company. And this was some time in March… and we are so very, very far away from tank top weather.

How does one pursue a career as a writer? Sometimes I feel like these blind submissions are going to be as useless as attending an Equity call for a show. No one is really paying attention. But the writing itself is satisfying, and I suppose I am developing a body of work that eventually could be useful. I very much need a foot in a door, but which door, and which foot?