Here’s an essay on the new/last Star Wars movie that I like, and which describes (one of) the reason(s) the film is so utterly crap. And by the way, I don’t think I say that enough things are crap. It’s just such a satisfying word — so small, neat, and evocative. And yet, somewhere along the line, it vanished entirely from my vocabulary as an adjective. Likewise the word “brilliant” used in a sarcastic manner, which my onetime best friend Beth used to affect, way back when we were blue fingernailed and she used to make pencil cases out of socks. And come to think of it, how on earth did she get away with doing something as comprehensively dorky as making a pencil case out of a sock, while still maintaining her reputation for supreme cool and sexiness? I will never understand, but I bow to her superior powers.

A little while ago I posted a glowy nostalgic picture from college, and a certain someone said that he was a teeny tiny bit sad that he wasn’t in said glowy pic, not because he necessarily wants to be plastered all over my blog, but because he wished he’d already been friends with me when that photograph was taken. Which, aw.

And so, since I have to pee and we have the first mango of the year waiting to be sliced and this waiting in the DVD player, I give you some pictures from a couple of years after that, in my backyard:

Ok, I’m not actually in this picture. And don’t even start, you-who-know-who-you-are, with your comments. But aren’t these pictures happy? They make me happy, anyway. Mostly because damn, do they look summery. And damn! Am I ready for summer!

DeCordova pictures are up. It’s very weird deciding after the fact which photographs ought to be in black and white — it feels a bit like cheating, but then again I’m hardly a purist. Anyway, this is one of my most favourite places to be in all the world — under the canopy of a large tree. Had to almost lie on the ground for the picture, while Ross was exclaiming over some teeny tiny baby-blue bugs on the branches (my lens wouldn’t focus that close; they were the size of the letters on this page).

P.S. We went to the Super88 today for groceries and I picked up a box of Strawberry Pocky. They were gone in about five minutes.

Since it’s been so miserably rainy here for the past few weeks, I hadn’t taken my new camera-beastie out for a proper spin yet. So when Saturday morning dawned sunny and warm, Ross suggested we take a walk to Haymarket so I could shoot a bit. The results of this walk, which ran from 11am to 3:30pm (with, ok, a stop for pizza and pasta in the North End), included the wonderful discovery you see above. Sarah pointed out how Scrabble-like the letters spelling out “Saints” are, which I hadn’t registered before.

The other results of the walk are one pair of extremely sore calves, attached to yours truly. Evidently when you fail to regularly use your calf muscles, they waste no time making their displeasure known when you suddenly expect them to carry you around all day long. Fortunately today didn’t involve much walking, except around the sculpture garden of the DeCordova museum, which has started charging for entry to their grounds during museum hours (boo), but has added several exciting new pieces to their collection of sculptures (yay). I’ll upload the pictures from that escapade later on.

Anyway, I’m having a perfectly lovely Memorial Day weekend so far, but unless I post reviews of the three (yes, three!) films I’ve seen in the last three days, it probably won’t interest you too much. And I’m not really feeling like Ebert this evening.

So, instead I’ll leave you with a tantalizing piece of news: One of our neighbors (we don’t know which one, but we’ve got bets) is a folder. Ross was kind of squigged out, so I don’t think we’ll ever leave our laundry in the dryer all afternoon again. But hey, although having your clothes neatly folded by a total stranger is

1) Kind of creepy,

we also

2) Hate folding. Score!

He’s been missing for three days now, and I’m starting to worry a little. Some mornings before, he’d seemed not to be there and then he’d turn up suddenly, in a flurry of smiles and sorrys, just as I was about to disappear down the stairs. But he’s just been gone this week. I think he was at his usual post on Monday, but I just don’t remember. It might have been Friday when I saw him last, and wished him a good weekend as I took the paper from his hand.

My Metro guy is missing.

Ok, he’s not technically my Metro guy. He always has a ready beam for everyone who trundles past him, and he’s always chatting to the guy who sells the tickets for the trolley tour, or the person handing out flyers protesting MASCO when I walk up to the entrance of the T and accept my morning news. And the morning that the two giggly girls were handing out granola bars for Christ, he was flirting with them, too. We’ve exchanged a little small talk now and again, and his face always splits in a grin when he sees me, but I know he doesn’t really have a soft spot in his heart for me — or maybe he does, but it’s right next to the soft spot he has for all the other people whose morning he brightens. It’s really cool how he’s created a kind of little kingdom around his post, a little community of folks who have nothing in common except his smile. Once he had a little boom box next to him as he worked. Two weeks ago I didn’t see him up at the top of the stairs, but as I was bounding down them he appeared out of the train tunnel, breathless and apologetic. He gave me my paper and I thanked him, putting it in my bag and smiling to myself. Two minutes later, I was standing on the platform when he came blowing back down, “I forgot! For you!” and thrust into my hands a pink promotional pen for some new rah-rah-women magazine. Then he rushed down the platform seeking out his regulars, planting a row of fuschia posies in fists as he went; then blew back up again.

I love my Metro guy. And now he’s gone. I contemplated calling the Boston office to ask if he was sick, or been relocated or something, but I figured they’d think I was crazy. It’s nice to think though that there are others, like me, wondering at his absence and fighting the urge to make a nutty phonecall.

Hopefully he’s just on vacation, or nursing a cold because of this weather.

*******

I don’t especially want to talk about choir, but I want to tell you about B again. Oh, hell, his name’s Ben. So there. ;-) Anyway, last week after choir we had a little social, and someone tried to introduce us to each other — so I said “Oh — I know Ben!” and grabbed him by the shoulders to give him a kiss on the cheek. Later we were chatting and among other things he asked about my name, so after making sure he knew it would be a long story I gave him the whole lowdown on Mirabai, and he listened very sweetly.

Yesterday, when Ben came in to choir he sat down next to me and faced me quite seriously, to thank me for going into so much detail about my name. I told him it was my great pleasure, and then he said, “Also — I don’t know if it’s a custom? Or was it just your” — he gestures with his hands, blushing a tiny bit — “your spontanaeity, or effervescence, that made you kiss me?”

I am floored by how adorable he is, and also stunned at being called spontaneous and effervescent. I’m more used to aloof and calm. I don’t really know what to say.

So I laugh, and I hope he sees how pleased I am.

“Let’s just call it effervescence.”

*******

Everybody pray my Metro guy is there tomorrow!

When I was in school we were always allowed to take two class pictures: one serious, where everyone sat all straight-backed and put their knees together like ladies and stared coyly at the camera, and one completely goofy. In the goofy one people were usually falling all over each other and rabbit ears multiplied like — well. We would loosen our ties (yes, we wore ties. Shut up.), puff up our pinafores even more than they already were puffed, and dangle lanky adolescent limbs in awkward positions. If we liked the class teacher we had that year, we would dangle over her, too. And she’d try to maintain her decorum, but grin.

I have a class picture from this year’s teaching. It was taken in December, when I knew I was leaving and all the boys already hated me deeply — not because I was awful to them, although sometimes I was, but because I didn’t know how to show them I cared about them even though they were eating me alive. It’s an odd picture — half of them are missing, because they were suspended that day or something, and the other half look heartbreakingly neat and pressed. There are a couple of megawatt smiles, and a couple of furious scowls. My head is tilted at a weird angle because I am trying not to let tears run out of my eyes.

I really wish I’d known how to let them have their serious picture and their goofy picture, too.

Anyhoo — this isn’t supposed to be a melancholy post. Go check out those wondrous dudes in the picture… and dream of the lives they ended up living. Goodnight.

Although I am sick (dribbly nose, scratchy throat), I am excited about several things today. One of them is that my new camera arrived today. It was an extremely extravagant purchase (although I did get it used, for a very reasonable price) — but it really wasn’t my fault. It was this diabolical woman’s fault. Uh huh. See, I nearly bought a 2002 Canon D60 from her last week, but she sold it before I had a chance to look at it — and by then I had lived with the idea of owning a digital SLR for just long enough that I found it hard to let go of the notion, so I did a little more research and found an ad by this other temptress for a 2003 Canon 10D (the next model after)… and three days later, it’s mine. I am still sort of in shock about the whole thing, but it’s a good kind of shock. The camera is sturdy and satisfying to hold — not as heavy as my old faithful Minolta, but still a good solid beastie. It is much more badass-looking than my 35mm Canon Rebel.

Anyway, now I really have no excuse for not working on taking better photographs. This little baby goes so far as to show me tiny histograms of the pixel density in various parts of the picture I’ve just taken, so that I can correct the exposure immediately. If I take the time to learn how to use it well, I’ll understand much more about the technical aspects of photography that I like to ignore. My current M.O. is to compose, shoot, and hope for the best, with no real idea of how any given photo will turn out — rather than making sure I control everything I can control before I take the picture. It’s one of those things I’ve chosen to be helpless about, like driving before I decided I wanted to learn.

The other neat creative thing that happened today was rather serendipitous. Ross and I wanted to go see the Hitchhiker’s Guide at the Loewes theater on the Common, but when we got there we discovered that they had cancelled tonight’s showing, so we decided to walk home from Park Street. Along the way we got to talking about a particular Spare Change salesman that we recently started seeing outside Christina’s in Inman Square. He has a very distinctive look — he’s tall and thin, and he always wears a grey suit and hat, and carries a briefcase. And he’s extremely soft-spoken, diffident, and polite. We both think he’s lovely, and rather intruiging. According to his nametag, he also has a wonderful name — which I won’t put online, but which sounds very like a superhero’s name. Trust me on this. So on our walk home tonight Ross and I started talking about how cool it would be if we collaborated on a graphic novel starring J____ P_____ the Spare Change salesman as an urban superhero. And we walked, and talked, sniffing the delicious spring night air, and developed a backstory that we think is complex and has lots of potential.

We’ve had many ideas for books we’ve wanted to write together, but this one really seems like it could work. Stay tuned for updates.

1) I walked home a different way today because:

a) I was following a cat (which ran away from me in abject terror)
b) I was following the scent of summer barbecue
c) Somebody said, “Hi, beautiful,” and I wanted not to walk next to them

2) When I got home last night, I planted my little Lily of the Valley (a courtly gift from B. at choir):

a) in a nice vase full of clean water
b) behind my ear
c) in a demitasse of stale coffee

3) In about five minutes, I’m going to:

a) Do the truckload of laundry that is hidden behind the closet door
b) Watch episode 5 of Season 4 of Buffy
c) Watch episodes 5, 6, 7, and possibly 8 of Season 4 of Buffy

Who’s gonna get a gold star paper?