Jenny Holiday

Pack your bags for happily ever after

Ob-la-di ob-la-da

I’m like, are you kidding me? I couldn’t even buy toilet paper in Toronto for that

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The Longest Telephone Message Ever, from Lulu, whom I’d just seen a couple hours ago and also just spoken on the phone with maybe 30 minutes ago.

Jenny, Jenny, Jenny! It’s me. Anyway, I’m just having a Diet Pepsi waiting for my husband to get home. I’m almost all chatted out but I had to leave you this little message because I knew only you would appreciate it. Okay, so I come home, you call, we talk, blah, blah, blah. I have dinner. I run a bath. My father calls. He leaves a message. I call him back. I’m like, what are you doing? He’s like, I had a busy week. Why? Cause I spent 21,000 dollars. What?! What did you spend all that money on? Oh, I bought a cottage. I’m like, what? A cottage. Acottage for 21 thousand dollars. Anyway, he’s so excited. I’m like, are you kidding me? I couldn’t even buy toilet paper in Toronto for that. Anyway, it’s winterized. The guy sold it with all the furniture and everything in it. And get this, this is he part where you and I would not buy it. It is in the tiniest, tiniest little Newfoundland stereotypical fishing community. But he loves that. When he bought it he slept in it that night. The guy gave him the keys right there on the spot. Everyone came over, they had a barbeque. They all know each other now. They went to buy beer and it’s for sale in some guy’s house. My father knocks and the guy says, what the hell are you doing knocking? Nobody knocks here, man. Anyway, he didn’t say man, they spoke in Newfanese. Anyway, I had to leave you this long message. I’m exhausted and now I’m going to fall asleep. Haaaaaaa! I think we’re going to go Sean’s friend’s cottage tomorrow. I’m kind of excited now that I had that conversation with my father. I’m feeling pretty excited about life. Anyway don’t get all teary eyed caused I’m leaving you a sappy message. Youknew I was excited tonight because when you walked home with me from work I was a big chatterbox and I just need to have a little conversation, even if it’s with myself. [pause] I know you’re laughing at me. [pause] Bye.

Someone has stolen my flowerpot

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Someone has stolen my flowerpot, Chicklets. And as much as that seems like it should be a metaphor for something sexual, it’s not. It’s just the hard literal truth. They left the little drainage tray thingy but made off with an entire pot that I had sitting by the gate that marks the beginning of my yard. What is the matter with teenagers these days? Aren’t they busy enough shooting up and giving each other blow jobs between algebra and civics? Oh, wait, they don’t teach civics anymore, that must be the problem…

I know it was Evil Teens that stole my flowerpot, because you hear them at all hours in my neighbourhood, marauding, their pierced chins jutting skyward. I read recently about this device called The Mosquito, which is supposed to repel them by emitting an annoying sound that only teenagers can hear! Can you imagine?

The best part is that the Evil Teens are reappropriating it and using it as a ring tone, so the grown-ups can’t hear their cell phones ringing. I will grudgingly admit that that kind of ingenuity is worth a flowerpot or two.

Mutation Research to Observatory

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Sometimes on my lunch break at work I go read in a science library . It’s attractive because it has nice carrels to sit in near walls of windows and unlike most libraries these days, it’s quiet. To get to my spot, I walk though stacks of periodicals. There are signs on the ends of the shelves that help you orient yourself if you’re looking for journals. But instead of saying J-K and just using the alphabet, they use the actual titles of the journals as breaks. So you get things like:

Journal of Molecular Biology to Kinesiology

My very, very favorite aisle is labelled:

Mutation Research to Observatory

I try to walk down it every time I’m in the library because I think it brings me good luck.

I got an e-mail out of the blue from a Jennifer Hall who was looking for Jennifer Hall, but I was not the Jennifer Hall she wanted

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My sister e-mailed recently with the earth-shattering news that there is a teacher at our old high school named Jennifer Hall, which is, of course, my name. It turns out she even teaches geography, which is, of course, what I studied. It’s possible that she’s an alternate version of me (or I’m an alternate version of her). Imagine if I’d moved back to Minnesota after my master’s in geography, as planned. What would I have done? Probably kicked around for a while aimless until I decided to suck it up and go to teachers’ college. And wouldn’t it be ironic that I’d end up teaching at my old high school? I shall think of this Jennifer Hall every time I get grumpy. As we like to say in Minnesota, it could be worse.

Once I got an e-mail out of the blue from a Jennifer Hall who was looking for another Jennifer Hall, but I was not the Jennifer Hall she wanted, it turned out. She was Jennifer Hall who went by Jen and she had been born, she said, in the same hospital on the same day as the other Jennifer Hall, who actually went by Jennifer. They’d been in touch for part of their lives and now Jen was looking for Jennifer. Was I her? Alas, I was not.

Mr. Mock thought that since we were Jennifer, Jenny, and Jen Hall, perhaps we could form a crime-fighting syndicate. I thought this an excellent idea and imagined that we could wear disco outfits whilst vanquishing evil, and even suggested it, but Jen Hall wasn’t interested.

Greetings from paradise, or suburban ennui

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Lulu sends her regards. While she and her husband are cavorting in paradise this week, Mr. Mock and I have moved into their condo to take care of their cat Mr. Leonard and to facilitate some repairs at our place that will render our bathroom unusable for a week.

I’m a pedestrian in suburbia this week, Chicklets. Off work, I’m just puttering around, hanging with Leonard. So the other day I thought I’d walk to a nearby mall because I’m in need of some lady clothes for work. It’s a ten-minute walk and yet it isn’t meant to be walked. Semis come barreling off the highway ramp that feeds into the arterial you’re strolling along. Then at one point, the mall in your sights, the sidewalk ends and you have to walk along these grassy embankment thingys. It was quite an adventure.

It also turns out there’s a conspiracy among the second run and art house cinemas to not have matinees any more. The only movies you can see at one o’clock are blockbusters. Who knew?

I secretly think that the universe might be extra revealing to a girl around her birthday

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Leaving work this afternoon, on the eve of my 32nd birthday, I thought I should start looking for signs. You know, like omens. I do this every year on my birthday because even though I know it’s stupid, I secretly think that the universe might be extra revealing to a girl around her birthday. At least it can’t hurt to keep your eyes peeled, is all I’m saying.

The city was carpeted by low-hanging fog. Fog in January! The snow has all melted so it kind of looks like spring, the yucky early weeks of spring where the snow melts to unveil garbage and waterlogged leaves and all sorts of ugliness. Except at least in the springtime, it’s actually, you know, spring.

As I headed toward the subway station, I could hear someone playing a saxophone. The musician was quite talented but I could not see him/her, given the fog and the crowds of commuters. It was one of those slow mournful kind of saxophone songs. It seemed familiar but I couldn’t place it. Anyway, it matched the fog.

“This is not a good sign,” I said to myself. “It will be difficult to spin this in a way that accords at all with my image of what the universe should be saying to me on the eve of my 32nd birthday.”

As I opened the door to the station I was debating whether it was best to accept that the year ahead was bound to be foggy and mournful, symbolized by a lone saxophonist in a crowd of people who just want to get home, or to abandon entirely my whole system of looking for signs, deciding instead that the year ahead will be rational, sensible, and totally ungoverned by the unseen.

But lo! I realized with a jolt that I did recognize the song. It was Blondie’s The Tide is High! It’s just that it was practically unrecognizable, you know, due to the mournfulness and such. “I’m not the kind of girl who gives up just like that,” Debbie Harry informs us calmly. “Oh no!” This is one of the earliest pop songs I remember because I used to dance around to it at my neighbour’s house, where we listened to it on 8-Track. It is still a favorite and is already programmed into the iPod for Saturday’s big bash.

So clearly, not only is this meant to be my theme song for the new year, it was being played in such a cryptic and nearly-unrecognizable format because it was meant as a sign that only I would recognize. Duh.

The tide is high, but I’m holding on.

 

 

A girl has to make her own milestones in this life

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Chicklets, I must start with a disclaimer. Remember how this blog is not about me? Because that would be boring and vain and excruciating? Well, you must grant me an exception in the coming weeks, because I am about to turn 32. And I have been waiting to turn 32 as long as I can remember.

I like to blame/credit fashion magazines. I read them as a preteen. If you are familiar with fashion mags, you will know what I am calling the “woman on the street” feature, usually near the front. They hit the street and they ask “normal” women a question. Could be, “what is the one cosmetic you’d have to have, even if stranded on a desert island?” Could be, “if someone cheats once and is truly sorry, should you give them another chance?”

In my mind the women who answered these questions were always total glamazons with fascinating jobs. They were fashion editors, investment bankers, and chefs. And they were always 32!

Q. What is the desert island cosmetic you cannot live without?

A. “Mascara. Everything else is dispensable, but pale lashes are to be avoided at all costs!” –Samantha, 32, stylist.

Wow!, thought my 12-year-old self. When I’m 32, I’m going to have my shit together. I am going to be a world famous astronomer/writer and live in a castle with my adoring boyfriend who also happens to be the president of France and we will have 12 adopted orphans. And I will NEVER have pale lashes.

Well, Chicklets, I’ve decided that a girl has to make her own milestones in this life. Twenty-one was uneventful. I didn’t mind turning 30. So 32 is coming up, and I don’t live in a castle, and Mr. Mock is an urban planner instead of the president of France. But he speaks French! And I’m not an astronomer (too much math, it turns out) but I am a writer, if not of the famous variety. And I’ll pass on the 12 orphans, but that’s my prerogative. Because I’m soon to be 32!

I’m an antisocial sort, and I can’t think when I last threw a party. Maybe never, unless you count having your girlfriends over for bad movies and fancy drinks. But I’ve decided to throw myself a big old party. And I’m sorry to say that even though this blog is not supposed to be about me, you’re going to be hearing a lot about my 32nd birthday party in the coming weeks.

I am striving for grandeur

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Chicklets, I am ailing. I’m convalescing. Hence the long absence. And the worst part is that Mr. Mock is out of town so there’s no one to run to the store for orange juice, mindless videos, and Nyquil. (Because being moderately ill in our society, I’ve decided, is all about consumption. We focus our otherwise sharp minds on the pressing question of what to consume next that will comfort/entertain/cure us. Our world shrinks until it’s just us unwrapping the new hot water bottle and cursing ourselves for forgetting to buy drinking straws).

Remember how this blog is not supposed to be about me, though? I was thinking of Lulu and her 12 Steps to Enlightenment when I read this column by Garrison Keillor, one of my enduring heroes.

He recommends grandeur as an alternative to therapy, when self-pity creeps into one’s heart. It is a brilliant idea. And because he lives in Minesota, the Land of 10,000 Lakes, he recommends a stroll onto the ice on your nearest lake as the quickest route to grandeur:

You could be living in south Minneapolis, in a neighborhood of comfortable homes with DSL and HBO and nearby shops selling latte and cranberry scones, but if you walk a few blocks to Lake Calhoun and stride out onto the ice, suddenly you are in Tolstoy’s “War and Peace,” waiting for Natasha and Prince Andrei to come lickety-split through the birch forest in the sleigh. The moment you leave shore, you are gripped by a sense of grandeur.

His point is that in doing this, you have to, to adpot Lulu’s terminology, get over your own self.

And when is one most prone to self pity but when one is ailing alone in the dead of winter? I am striving for grandeur, Chicklets.

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