because i read a quote on a friend's page today from the film bounce that stirred another bit of nice. well, two, actually.

she'd written a post about how much she liked gwyneth paltrow. me? not so much. except for the film sliding doors. that is a cool flick. yall should see that one. i didn't mind her so much in that.

your company. the pleasure of your company. i want your input on video rentals. i stand there for hours. i can't pick anything out. i want someone to say goodnight to -- a last call of the day. 

back to san antonio. back to borders. generally, as a rule, i was on closing detail, mostly because the inventory and office supervisors had to be there during the day. the music and cafe supers usually worked mid-shifts, and i got the closes. except for tuesdays, but that wasn't so much because i sometimes wanted to go home and more because tuesday is usually a huge new release day, which meant the front tables needed to be reworked, which meant i would either be reworking them or overseeing the reworking. usually it was the former, which was fine, because that was my favorite part of my job.

but because i worked a lot of closing shifts and never really had a weekend off and because he worked nothing but first shifts and always had the weekend off, we only really got to see each other twice a week or so.

he'd asked me to call him when i'd gotten in from work. i'd thought that was kind of silly when he'd mentioned it. he'd be sleeping. i'd be exhausted and possibly cranky, depending on how work had gone.

but it ended up being kind of sweet, actually. i'd wake him up when i got home from work. he'd wake me up when he left for work. we wouldn't talk for long. maybe a minute or so. mostly because one of us would be more asleep than awake. but it did put a nice little cap on my day, that last call. i did quite like the sound of his voice.

the other?

one sunday after i'd gotten off work, we went to blockbuster and rented jay and silent bob strike back. i had never seen it. he was surprised by this.

you ever try making out while that movie was playing? it's pretty fun. i highly recommend it.

why i love bubble wrap

i'm not sure i've told you this story before. i don't think i have. one of my readers commented on a post i'd written months ago that she wanted to hear more about the boy mentioned in that post. i'd kind of tagged one of my blog challenge entries to another post -- mostly because i hadn't felt like writing about it at the time.

and then yesterday, when i wrote that bit about knowing about a guy, it kind of caused a memory of which i'm pretty fond to stir to the surface.

it comes up every now and then, usually when i need to remember the good things about love and all that crap.

so ... here is a flashback for you from many, many years ago. and no, i don't recount it because of the boy, but because of how i felt that day.

it was, all in all, a pretty good day.

it was march twenty-sixth. a tuesday. according to astrology, tuesday is my day. whatever. three days before my birthday. i was working at borders at the time, residing in san antonio. my schedule was set up so that i opened on tuesdays, which meant i got off work at five or six, had off wednesdays and thursdays and closed on fridays, which meant i went to work at three. but i'd requested off for my birthday (or borders was nice and gave us our birthdays off ... i can't remember). so i was looking forward to a three day "weekend". and i'd just started dating this guy i'd thought was pretty cool. so i was in all kinds of good spirits. anyway, it was set up this way because if i felt like going home to visit the family, i could leave on tuesday after work and come home to my apartment on friday afternoon.

but the boy talked me into staying on tuesday night and going to my parents' house on wednesday morning.

i met him at his apartment at seven or so. we hung out for half an hour, then went to jason's deli for dinner, where we drew pictures for each other on napkins in brown (mine) and black (his) crayons. and then we went to the amc theater at huebner oaks and saw ice age.

we stood in line to buy the tickets. we went inside, and i made him wait while i hid out in the women's room to recollect myself. because i was pretty overwhelmed by him. i'd never been that way about a boy before. it kind of freaked me out. so i stood there with my hands pressed to the countertop, just inside the doorway, sucking in air and glaring at my face, telling myself to calm down. a woman walked by and asked if i was alright. sure, i said. no, i thought. not so much. but i got it together and got back to the lobby.

where he was sitting on a bench, popping bubbles on a sheet of wrap. i stood there, watching him, one brow raised and my lips curved in amusement. and all the anxiety i'd felt magically disappeared. i don't know how long i stood there. it wasn't more than a minute or so. but eventually, he looked up and grinned and slowly set the wrap aside and stood.

we shared a coke. i never share coke. with anyone. and i got those little shivers you get when your hands touch. those things i'd always thought were some crazy, hokey story-telling tool to make a girl appreciate romance a bit more. those things i'd always thought were impossible.

and every time i see a roll of bubble wrap, i think of that day. of how good i'd felt in that moment.

random quarter

one. i've never been skydiving. i'm alright with this.

two. i can't dance very well. i'm alright with that, too.

three. i can't whistle. i'm not so alright with that. i try. but nothing happens. oh, and that thing where you put your fingers up and blow, like to hail a cab? i definitely can't do that.

four. i think you know about a guy after three dates. hell, i think you'd know about him, really, after the first. but the next two clinch it. i've only ever known twice. and of course, neither of those times mattered all that much. i don't see the point in wasting time with a guy. mostly cause i did it once. that won't happen again.

five. white sports coats are gay. white sports coats with blue gingham button-downs? really gay. white sports coats with peach button-downs? supremely gay. why would any wardrobe designer make any man wear stuff like that?

six. i had travis tritt in my head this morning while at work. i was not alright with that, either.

seven. my friend swissy and i made a pact that i would write five pages a week and email them to her on saturday. i've not written one yet. go me.

eight. my mouth hurts. i imagine it's gonna hurt a lot more at the end of the day.

nine. nothing tastes good right now. this is a huge suck. oh, and i'm starving. also a huge suck.

ten. and the ice that's pressed to my cheek? i'm not sure it's doing much good.

eleven. i don't like my handwriting. maybe i've mentioned that before.

twelve. if i had to rebuild my cd collection, the ten cds i would purchase first are: the best of van halen: volume one, u2's the joshua tree, stevie ray vaughan and double trouble's greatest hits, counting crows august and everything after, a fine frenzy's one cell in the sea, zz top's greatest hits, pearl jam's rearview mirror, sarah mclachlan's fumbling towards ecstasy, the airborne toxic event and what made milwaukee famous' trying to never catch up.

thirteen. the ten dvds: star wars: episodes iv-vi, the lord of the rings trilogy -- the director's cut, eternal sunshine of the spotless mind, star trek, pirates of the caribbean: the curse of the black pearl, steel magnolias, playing by heart, for love of the game, the family stone and dedication.

fourteen. the ten books: nora robert's lovers and dreamers, cecelia ahern's love rosie, charles dickens' our mutual friend, ellen shanman's right before your eyes, john knowles' a separate peace, seneca's thyestes, audrey niffenegger's the time traveler's wife, jhumpa lahiri's the interpreter of maladies, j.k. rowling's harry potter series and the complete pelican shakespeare.

fifteen. for some reason, in the days before any time i go under anesthesia, i feel compelled to purchase a large box of crayolas and coloring books. it doesn't matter if i've got a perfectly good box of colors and books already. i will go out and buy more.

sixteen. the worst pain i've ever felt physically? knee reconstruction was a bitch. mentally? despair and madness beat a broken heart every time.

seventeen. in school, i'd never been suspended. i'd never been expelled. but i did go to detention quite a bit. can't remember why.

eighteen. i've never passed out from being drunk. i have gotten so drunk, though, that i couldn't read the text on a television screen that was a mere five feet or so from my face.

nineteen. favorite pizza is california pizza kitchen's blt. when i lived in san antonio, there was a cpk five minutes from my apartment. i must've eaten there once a week. oh, i miss that place.

twenty. my day was reclusive because i got a tooth yanked out, and so now i am sitting on the sofa with a bag of lima beans pressed to my face, listening to the fountain churning the water in the backyard's pool, the shrill ring of the telephone, the hum of the refrigerator and my fingers hitting the keys. it's kind of nice, actually. it'd be nicer still if the vicodin i just took to make my mouth stop hurting wasn't making my stomach twinge because i'm HUNGRY! grrrr.

twenty-one. chicken spaghetti would be really good right about now. but i've to settle for soup. at least it's wonton.

twenty-two. i like red better than pink. except when i'm buying lingerie. i don't know why this is.

twenty-three. i've off the next two days! WHEE!

twenty-four. which means i should get some writing done. (yeah, like that's gonna happen.)

twenty-five. i've never blocked anyone on facebook. i have, however, blocked guys on dating websites. and i have defriended people on facebook. sometimes i feel guilty about this. it doesn't happen often.

blame it on the janes

i managed to go through high school and college, studying english, without ever having to read any of jane austen's or charlotte bronte's works. i'd graduated with that english degree without ever having read dickens, too.

can you imagine this? i'm certain there are dozens of other classical authors revered by educators of all sorts which are considered to be necessary to the literary world, which they would be appalled to know i'd not read.

do you know what made me want to read pride and prejudice?

the trailer for the knightley/macfadyen version of the tale.

actually, a particular quote from the film, spoken by mr. darcy to ms. bennett after having professed, to his chagrin, his interest in marriage to her. could you expect me to rejoice in the inferiority of your circumstances?

i love this line. i love how it cuts. i love how the word choice -- the sharpness of the k and the x and the ct sounds, the bite of it, the hiss of the soft c and the s and even the f -- contributes to the sentiment expressed. there's such disdain there. such frustration, not just in that sentiment, nor its language, but in the delivery of it, as well. it's a fantastic line. marvelous, really. and it, more than any other, sums up mr. darcy quite well, i think.

i hunted up that bit of script while at work one day, so eager was i to see the film, to know the story. i printed out the page or two of dialogue i'd found, and, after work, taken it in to macaroni grill with me to study while i had dinner.

actually, i did more than study it. i took my red and blue crayons and diagrammed the whole of those sentences -- darcy's in blue, bennett's in red -- on the butcher paper that covered my table's cloth.

this version of the film interested me enough that i purchased a cheap barnes and noble classics version of p and p and read it, painstakingly and begrudgingly, for the most part, cover to cover.

while i can concede that ms. austen can construct some fantastic prose, her propensity for girlish, frivolous detail is pretty annoying.

i am not a fan.

and then the cinematic world introduced me to becoming jane a couple of years later.

and oh, how my heart broke for her.

every time i've watched this movie, i've stood firmly in the knowledge that she was right to refuse mr. wisley, and she was right to turn back, to go home rather than run away with mr. lefroy. but the first few times i watched her departures from him, first from his uncle's residence and later on the morning of her elopement after she'd discovered the letter from his family, i bawled. quietly, of course, but still ...

and every time, i've been gung ho against the notion that she should marry wisley. because he is, as her father has said, a booby.

it must be age. my birthday is less than twelve weeks away, and i am abhorring this one. it's far, far too close to forty for my comfort.

it has to be age. there's no other reason for it. but this morning, as i watched the story unfold, i began to think wisley wasn't so bad. wealthy, tall, decent voice ...

oh, god. i think i'm going to be sick. this shift in my opinion of him is not good at all.

it wasn't THAT long ago that i was mocking his character.

i hate watching this movie. it crushes my spirit every time. and yet, i feel compelled to torment myself with it. so typical of a woman, right?

i'm blaming this on jane eyre.

i saw the trailer for it a couple of weeks ago, and it got me thinking about these women, factual or fictional, who are deprived of lives of love and passion.

i've not read jane eyre. i was tempted to watch the bbc production of it a while back but talked myself out of it. probably because mr. rochester sounds like an idiot.

do you think that because i am poor, obscure, plain and little that i am soulless and heartless?

if there were a line that could convince me to see this film, that would be it. but it doesn't compel me nearly as well as mr. darcy's line did.

mostly because it's spoken to mr. rochester, and i just told you what i think of him.

my father says i'm a whole lot more sentimental than i let on, than i am comfortable with, and this is true to an extent.

but sentiment hasn't ever really done me much good, so i see no point in showing off that bit of my character.

the point of all this is that i feel sorry for these women, these janes who live so much of their lives without the thing they most desire for themselves.

i read wikipedia's synopsis of jane eyre, and i know she gets her guy in the end -- after mr. rochester's wife burns the house down and kills herself and blinds her husband and whatnot. (this would be the other reason why i can't bring myself to read it ... way too much tragedy for my tastes.)

oh. crap. maybe you've not read it.

i saw the trailer for this film the other day and it brought memories of becoming jane to mind, which of course had me itching to watch it again.

again.

so i will go to sleep sad and sentimental.

again.

bronte, by the way, married and became pregnant but died before giving birth. she was thirty-nine. austen received a proposal from a wealthy but pathetic man which she accepted, then refused the following day. she never married. she died at forty-two.

and here, these two women wrote all these stories that are so well-loved by so many (though i cannot say that i am one of that many, but still ... i can respect others' appreciation for their works) ... at least they've left the world these.

i have given nothing but a couple of chapters to my friends and a few snippets to my readers.

because unlike these women, i cannot seem to find the courage to write about love when i find it so lacking in my own life.

and this is how i shall end my day.

again.