"Bacc"ing out

I am ready.

I can write without reservation or anxiety. My thesis is complete and my baccalaureate exam a success. There has been much celebrating, but mostly lazing about. And even my celebrations are humble. These include but are not limited to: nibbling on my favorite almond pastry from the local French bakery, glasses of shiraz and cabernet sauvignon, conversation with friends, a plane ticket to Montreal (!), finding the time to discover new music and read Chekhov and Janice Galloway. I'm very interested in how people reward themselves and where one can begin to draw the line between smug self-satisfaction and well-deserved congratulatory behavior. See? Damn this education. It's taught me to think about everything.

So I tried to take a break from thinking, which resulting in me sitting in front of the television for a few hours. But then I found myself watching Jeopardy and MSNBC, which defeats the purpose. Ah, well. I find it very difficult to come to a grinding halt after twenty years of education and formation. But then again, perhaps the difficulty lies in viewing post-graduation as less demanding. I have a feeling that the future will be different in the types of demands that will be placed upon me. They will be more tangible.

I anxiously look forward to joy and pain which I can taste and touch.

An internet representation of my identity (haha)

Drinking two glasses of Argentinian pinot noir before attempting to write more of my thesis is a really embarrassing situation. I managed to excrete a few sentences about the significance of the Cratchit family's Christmas dinner as a sign of non-material giving in contrast to the miserly Scrooge. Then I put on a Smiths record and danced in my room alone to the brink of nausea. I did not want to leave that moment, because it was youthful. It was imaginary, yet real. For I couldn't imagine any other time in my life where I would be willfully engaging in the consumption of alcohol in the fulfillment of my duties. Are there moments in your life when you realize how very privileged you are? Do you consider how you afford to eat, drink, and write because you attend an institution which promotes the saving of the world, one graduate at a time?

I am not myself! I have been reading too much Dostoevsky and I feel like the walls of my cell are closing in on me! Ahhh!

Thank you for reading,
Dr. Gina

Pain de campangne boules baked last week. Please bake your own bread. It takes time, but the pure taste and healthy satisfaction are worth the trouble. Plus, it's cheaper than cheap in the long run!

(Or support your local baker.)

Thank you for the photograph, Heather.

Bare

It feels so magnificent to love someone at this very moment--to not remember who they were years ago, but consider who they are now, in this very moment. And when I talk about love, I am referring to my interactions with everyone, not a love object. Because I do not know how to live any other way. All other emotions function as layers of cloth worn over my heart.

I walked through the glass doors and looked directly into her orange eyes. I did not falter, but smiled, as did she. She recognized me and my love, because I do not wear layers of cloth even though the outside world is frostbitten. The reason I record this moment is because I realized that I did not need her recognition, nor her to reciprocate my love. Loving someone for who they are now, rather than who I knew him or her to be, was the greatest feeling imaginable.