'Nite

So, it's 4:12 a.m. on a quiet Wednesday night (well, Thursday morning actually, but my day doesn't start until I've gone to bed and then woken up a solid 8 or 9 hours later), and I am awake and alert in that state that sometimes occurs as a result of running around so feverishly all day long right up to this very minute that if you went to bed you would just lie there and busily think about your hefty to-do list until your nonstop mind moves on to inventing alarming scenarios involving your loved ones. No thanks. I've decided just to wind down here instead.

While winding down, I will share a few things that were flying around in my head tonight as I made four gallons of barley & bean soup. (Yeah, Wednesdays are Suzy Homemaker Days. . . Don't take that seriously.) As I cried my way through two cups of chopped onions, sauteed some garlic, and tore up baby spinach, I recognized anew that the BBC whips the pants off American radio all day long. Luckily NPR has wised up and just plays the BBC all night, apparently for the benefit of married grad students up late cooking. (and...who? who else listens to NPR at night? Truckers?) BBC is just better. It's succinct, it's rational, it's thorough, they have those neat accents, and, for a plus, it's actually international news. I know more than I could even tell you about German politics (did you know they had an "inconclusive" election for prime minister last week?! fabulous!), the state of democracy and women's rights in Bahrain, the fates of Mexican drug ministers, and an impeding natural disaster named Hurricane Rita (pronounce it "HURRikin") threatening the coast of our charming colony. If more people got their news from the BBC, we might be in better shape.

Which leads me not at all to another thought I was having during my midnight cooking session...is having jobs and all that really the way we are supposed to live? I mean, really? I'm not against the process of working on something meaningful, or even taking home a paycheck to do it. That all seems rather necessary. But is it NORMAL to spend most of your waking hours away from the people you actually like? Or the things you actually like to do? I don't have a 9-to-5 job right now, so my work hell happens at home. But James does work in an office, and he works not 9-to-5, but something more like 8-to-8. As we went to the gym together at 9:30 pm, then went to the grocery store at 10:45, and got home with our armfuls of provisions at 12:30 so he could fall into bed dazed and bleary-eyed at 1 am, I couldn't help but think: there is something wrong with this picture. I spent more actual time with fringe friends in college than I do with my husband. (You know, fringe friends: those people you have something in common with, maybe you play lacrosse together or you're from the same hometown, and you like them, but they're not your real friends. You won't ever see their face again after graduation.) I spent more time yakking in those people's dorm rooms about nothing than I do speaking to my husband in a meaningful way about anything. ! Is this okay? Right now, at 4 a.m., it strikes me as an odd way to live. Is this what everyone else is doing too? Tell me, readers.

And finally, I know it's too early to do it, but here goes anyway. I'm not exactly throwing in the towel, but I'm taking it off that little hook in preparation. The Sox are a half a game behind the Yankees as a result of their meeting earlier this evening with the indomitable Devil Rays (that was gross sarcasm, for anyone who doesn't know baseball or doesn't know what "indomitable" means), and they are no longer in first place in their division for the first time in nine weeks. Kind of bad timing, considering this season is going to be all wrapped up in less than a dozen games from now. But it's not about the half game, or even about how sad it is that Tampa Bay took two out of three from the World Series Champs. The Sox just don't have it this year. I've felt it for a long time now, and it's not about stats, or about injuries, or how Theo broke up the band from last year, or anything like that. It's just a gut feeling. Last year, my gut felt different. (hmmmm, let's rephrase). Last year, I knew we had a shot. There was a little bit of magic and that secret tingly feeling that you can't share with other people because you don't want to jinx it. This year, no tingly. We might make it to the playoffs, we might not, but whatever the case, if we do get there, there will be no magic for this group like there was last autumn. I've decided to voice this fear in the belief that it might be better just to accept it now and let the dream go. We've been defending champs for a year, and that's going to have to be good enough. So. Okay, there, I've said it, that's my prediction.

Now, here's hoping me saying that will turn things around.