z is for zounds!

which is short for "christ's wounds" and is a curse shakespeare invoked a lot in his plays. and maybe my invoking that so close to easter is a little insensitive.

but i finally told my supervisor. well, i let my position paper on providence/"god as cause" tell him. i agonized over that assignment, but once it came time to write it, and i decided to take the plunge, it wasn't very hard. in the end, it was more apologetic (in both senses) than i'd really intended. but i was relieved to have finally told him, even though this will definitely change everything. *everything.*

here's are two excerpts:

"Most of all, however, a historian advances human understanding of history. This seemingly intuitive statement demands some meditation: The historian does not conduct research for her own satisfaction, spurred only by her own curiosity. She does the work of history in order that she might communicate both findings and interpretations to a world desirous of meaning. The historian is not only a reader, but a writer."

"The Biblical scholar need not be a native speaker of Hebrew. An acquired fluency in the language of his source material is sufficient. So, too, a historian of Christianity must be conversant in the doctrine of providence. In many cases, she will have been completely immersed in that theology. Yet it need not be her own."

y is for yes, indeed.

i think i understand a little. and i want to help.

x is for xylophilous

i like calling my apartment "my treehouse," for a couple of reasons: it's the third floor of a house, accessible by a skinny metal outdoor staircase, and when i stand on the top landing, i really am among the tree tops. likewise, when i look out my bedroom windows or crawl out onto the fire escape, i'm chillin' with trees. also, all of my furniture is wooden, i have those wickery baskets all over the place, and the floors are old and tired parquet. i feel cozy in my little nest :)

it's been seven months since i moved in and in another five i'll be probably be heading out. staying here through the summer isn't ideal - rent isn't free and i'd love to spend more time with cori and james before they leave for the uk. but i signed a rental contract, and l'arche will need me to cover vacations, so here i'll be at least some of the time.

while i'm trying very hard not to do too much planning until i have all my papers and my thesis proposal done, thoughts of summertime still dance in my head. research trips, breathing deeply in the ravine near my parents' house, a summer course, going to the park with nancy and pat, holidays in collingwood, shakespeare in high park, and this treehouse: wood aglow with sunshine, breezes blowing from the bedroom through the kitchen and out the front door, tanning on the back stoop with a book on my face, evenings of sipping smirnoff ice on the fire escape. i really want to make the most of having my own space - and this space, in particular - while i can.

you're welcome to join me :)

w is for wedding!

corina and james are married! and dov knows how to look like a very creepy passer-by:)

but, seriously: though there were some delays and surprises - broken furnace, broken necklace, iron barfed rusty water on dov's shirt, spa morning took an hour longer than anticipated and involved a minor scolding from the hairdresser - the bride's side eventually made it to the u of t campus to take photos on the west side of university college.

the groom's family were patiently waiting with smiles and corina's bouquet, having already completed the requisite combinatorics exercise and taken all of their photos.



james' dad held coats while we tried out all the possible combos:

- cori & james
- cori & james & cori's parents, cori & james & james' parents
- cori & james & cori's family, cori & james & james' family
- cori & parents, corina & siblings, corina & siblings & dov
- cori's family, cori's family & dov
- all the siblings, siblings & significant others
- both families, both families & significant others, both families & significant others & james' friends

despite the sunshine, it was pretty cold out there and whenever we weren't on-camera we huddled for warmth!

right, so off to city hall!

there was a bit of a wait there, but soon it was our turn to fill up the little wedding chamber. cori and james glowed, the tissues ran out, the justice of the peace spoke beautifully, we got ink on our fingers, and ioana and dov passed around truffles once the pronouncement of husband and wife was made.

i really appreciated that there was no hint that this was simply one of a thousand weddings the justice had performed in his career. he made their moment significant, and it really felt like he valued the role he played.

but enough reflection... dinner time! off to the courtyard restaurant in yorkville!

the food was yummy, but i have no pictures of it! gulash, spinach crespelle, and apple strudel were my choices, while others enjoyed combinations of spinach salad, salmon, chicken snitzel, and some chocolate crepe dessert. not all on one plate.

soon after the moldovian musicians showed up, my mom and ana grabbed the mic and sang. while unplanned (by the rest of us), this definitely broke the ice! in fact, it wasn't long before the wait staff pulled the carpets away to make room for dancing! (pictured here) romanian, italian, cuban, and other sweet tunes led the feet of bride, groom, family, and friends. oh, and yes: i did request "hava nagila."



there had been sufficient wine served to ensure touching speechs (i cried through the end of mine), and we topped it all of with champagne, chocolate-hazelnut cake, and a little more dancing.

one of the things i mentioned in my speech was that, standing beside cori as she recited her vows, it occured to me how many of those promises she and james have already been keeping for three and a half years. the wedding shouldn't really be a beginning... it should be a celebration of what already is, and what is to come.

v e pentru viaţă, care este şi grea şi frumoasă!*

* v is for life, which is both hard and beautiful!

u is for unpredictable

as hug-an-engineer day ends and pi day threatens to dawn, i reflect on the messiness of life. (the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter may be a constant, but it is after all an irrational one.)

their flights were delayed, but ioana and dov finally arrived and we sat down to the lovely late supper mom had prepared. cori put on her dress and we helped her choose jewellery. we decided which dress i should wear, too. then the heater broke. also, cori's necklace. so we drank champagne and i mended the string.

there were wee arguments along the way and cori's skin began reacting to the stress, but by now we've all pretty much settled in to bed/couch for the night, supported by the diligent work of some strategically placed space heaters.

"life is messy," i said to cori as i hugged her "good night."

i hope that getting so tangible a reminder of that on the eve of her wedding was as instructive as it was ironic. the truth is that promises like the one corina and james are making tomorrow aren't about an immaculate ideal, but about reality. cori says that, very early on, she told james just that: "i want something real," she said.

fifteen hours from now they will commit to walking through the messiness of that reality together. it occurs to me that you can never know what you're going to face, but you can know who you'll face it with. maybe when you're walking hand-in-hand even a mess can be a beautiful adventure.

t is for taking risks

some times you just have to do the crazy thing because it's the right thing - critics be damned! that sort of creative courage is hard to come by, i think. i mean, many people do insane things just to shock or otherwise provoke those around them, but that isn't particularly cool to me. neither is breaking rules for the hell of it. nor selfishly and recklessly disregarding how your behaviour affects others. those are super-childish things.

but doing something you need to do, despite how others might react, is in fact a deeply mature thing.

that's why this news story has impressed me so very much: a few guys got together and took stuffed crust pizza to very next logical level - buffalo-chicken-stuffed-crust pizza!!!

they tried three different variants of buffalo chicken, topped the pizzas with tomato sauce, lots of cheese, veggies, and even some meat, and offered a blue cheese sauce for dipping. the results of their ground-breaking, earth-shaking, and courageous experiment are recorded on their blog. do give it a read... i'm definitely tempted to try it myself!

inspired by the gentlemen at mealticket, i thought eating supper would be a good idea. for the second time in recent weeks, ashwyn and i tried to go to "bar on locke." no dice! so we ducked in at nearby il fiasco. so super!

we started off with the baked brie and fruit salsa. it was really a dry fruit salad but, all the same, the saltiness of the phyllo-wrapped cheese was cut by the sweet/tart combo of green and red apples, strawberries, and some other yummies. the brie and phyllo were in brilliant proportion! often one overwhelms the other, but not so here! i must add that it was very well constructed from an aesthetic point of view, as well :)

since ashwyn claims to be a vegetarian, he ordered the mediterranean pie - spinach, goat and feta cheese, roasted red peppers and phyllo. there was tomato sauce and pesto around the edges, and he seemed pretty happy. in case you're actually looking at the online menu, do note that the price has increased since the website was last updated.

i have few qualms of my omnivority, so i ordered the cashew crusted chicken stuffed with a goat-cheese-and-sundried-tomato paste and served with a small serving of a potato dish, green beans, carrots, broccoli, and zucchini. for starters, the crispy cashews and creamy stuffing were a beautiful contrast. the potato was surprising - technically it wasn't unlike a scalloped potato bake... but it wasn't creamy at all, and held together very well. it actually defies description!

some women who had been sitting near us had ordered maple creme brulee, and ashwyn followed suit. again, no complaints. meanwhile, i ordered passion fruit ice cream, in light of my recent discovery that this mysterious crop is as visually off-putting (inside) as it is tangy and delectable. (at corina's shower i brushed passion fruit guts on the asparagus to add notes of citrus-esque yum. mission accomplished!) the the dessert felt more like a sorbet than a dairy product. i was struck by the intense taste, which was essentially fresh and tart... not unlike myself!

in retrospect, there was a lot of dairy on our little table. il fiasco features cheese and seafood quite prominently, and also offers an impressive wine menu for such a teeny place. there are about ten seats up front, with a handful more at the bar, and more tables as one wanders toward the back. incidentally, the light fixture in the bathroom was beautiful! there are twinkly lights decorating the front space, and the decor is generally simple but somehow both warm and modern... not unlike myself!

il fiasco is definitely worth a return trip, in part because its menu offers many opportunities for exploration.

and i'm all about taking crazy risks.

s is for saucy

the last while has been a whirlwind!

between all the busyness of papers and presentations, weird nightmares, mini-conferences that involved travel (cambridge and ottawa), awkward dates, the death of a family friend, corina's bridal shower, commuting to do laundry, going into toronto to shop for the wedding, day and night shifts at work, looong (but often wonderful) meetings, living out of suitcase for a bit, and the typical barriers to real grocery runs, circumstances have not been ideal for cooking from scratch. in fact, apart from the snacks at that shower, i don't think i've prepared anything in about a month!

little did i know what i was missing out on...



i could have been feeding saucy onion rings to cute boys by now?! i seriously need to re-evaluate my priorities!

p.s. no preservatives? soooo hot!

r is for reconciliation

i'm doing some research on donatism for my bib theo's interdisciplinary volume on forgiveness and reconciliation. these christian schismatics from north africa were survivors of the diocletian persecution... and they didn't want to re-admit lapsed christians into their churches. having endured imprisonment and torture, it was especially hard to summon up respect for clerics who had folded out of fear of the same. the christianity of north africa was distinct from both that of the eastern roman empire and that of the european world... and many of those distinctives cemented their resolve. for one hundred years donatism persisted as a schism, before being declared a heresy. it never actually disappeared until three hundred years later, when islam swept through the region.

i've been thinking about how difficult it is do combat the effects of inherited pain and institutionalized resentment. and how for sure you can't combat those without offering consolation. without coming alongside. like so many things that matter, reconciliation demands imagination. and in the midst of anger and hurt - even when they're inherited rather than immediate - it's hard to imagine anything else. but it helps to know that others hope for you. maybe, like anger and hurt, that hope can be contagious.

p.s. regarding my last post: no, i haven't gone off the rails permanently. i blog and journal and talk to people to prevent *just* that :)

q is for quitting time...

... i.e. right now.

one time my mom, sister, and i were "talking about boys." when my dad came into the room and wanted to watch a movie, my mom stopped him: "we're talking about boys. do you have anything to contribute?"

"all they want is sex. turn the tv back on."

some people think that because i can sniff a typo a mile away and i'm a(n incompetent) perfectionist that i must be pretty negative. but the truth is, i'm an eternal optimist. i really want to believe the best about people... and i hope hope hope until it hurts.

newsflash: it hurts. and i kinda think i'm done hoping that my dad was wrong.

i once told someone i loved that when i looked at him, i didn't see an acorn - i saw an oak tree. he told me that he didn't know anything about how to grow into an oak tree. i told him the acorn doesn't know, either. but a few months later, after we had misunderstood and hurt each other countless more times, i realized i was tired of getting pummelled with acorns.

all relationships are based on imagination: imagining that i can be more generous, imagining that you can be more thoughtful, imagining that sharing a life with someone is even possible.

but what happens when your heart runs out of creativity? what happens when it's too tired to dream anymore? what happens when "love always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres; love never fails." (1 cor. 13:7) sounds like a big lie?

i give up.

p is for prosciutto

pork and i have a strange relationship. i'm really quite ambivalent about it. (truth be told, i have no idea what it thinks of me.) bacon and pork chops are fantastic, but the ham+melon thing makes no sense to me, and pancetta is odd in more ways than one.

despite all that, i'd heard such goooood things about prosciutto that i decided to give it a try by making up some super sandwiches: two slices of swiss, one thin slice of prosciutto wrapped around three spears of asparagus, and a squeeze or two of honey mustard. arrange on pre-toasted multigrain bread, and broil in the oven until the cheese melts.

you'll be tempted to just stare, basking in its beauty and aroma... but please don't forget to eat it!

o is for otta-otta wa-wa

there really isn't enough internet ink to describe my "weekend" in ottawa. i was there for a mennonite central committee student seminar - pursuing security in an insecure world.

aside from the formal agenda, there was time to eat sushi with heather, look for a dress for corina's wedding (no luck!), gawk at ice sculptures, try my first beavertail, enjoy a good steak, and catch up with mel for the first time in nearly two years! the weekend was jam-packed and wonderful, apart from snow bullets, puddles, bitter wind, and the fact that the tv in our room stopped working after i watched american's best dance crew.

but back to the seminar... it covered food security, poverty in canada, principles of non-violence, and restorative justice. we ate butter chicken and shawarma and chatted about khadr, fair trade, and obamamania. i was offended by the candy sold at the war museum's gift shop and the elevator broke while we were in the peace tower on parliament hill. there was a lot in there to think about, but i'll just share three:

one: a long trek through the snow led us to the war museum, where we wandered independently, at our own pace. on the way to the four galleries, there's a display of photographs depicting battlefields from the first world war. they're downright brilliant - the colours, the clarity, the composition. and this deeply disturbed me. when i take photos of nancy, kevin, michael, and pat, they often don't turn out very well. it's hard to capture on (digital) film the beauty i see in my friends at l'arche, because that beauty isn't always aesthetic. by contrast, these battlefields - the sites of countless bloody, torturous deaths - were absolutely, even devastatingly, gorgeous. the irony was almost palpable.

two: finally, something occurred to me at the war museum as well as during the tour of parliament, after we'd spent a little time in the memorial chamber. my thought was, is there room for expansion? has the museum set aside space for a gallery devoted to future wars? where will the names of the 108 soldiers who have died in afghanistan go?

there's something deeply disturbing about the need to make room for reminders of future death and devestation. that question's been haunting me. maybe in a good way.

three: the last gallery in the museum is a catch-all, covering everything since world war ii. one creative display featured music videos of some songs addressing the cold war: genesis, u2, elton john, the scorpions, and so on. who knew that the final countdown was not so much about magic tricks as it was about mutually assured destruction? (wait... given gob's mad skillz, those two might not be so different.)



another of the songs on the list was nena's 99 luftballoons. the (english) lyrics are super - all the more so if you've read the backstory.

n is for nightmare

over the last few months, my dreams have gotten more vivid. they've always been pretty weird, but they've become more detailed and memorable. and emotional.

a couple of nights ago, i couldn't sleep because of a bad storm - my windows are pretty lousy, and the wind made an enormous racket. i lay awake for about two hours, holding wesley close and fighting to find slumber again... but i also had a lot on my mind, and the coincidence of storms within and without left me sleepless.

since then my sleep's been quite shallow. (i know this because elements of "the west wing" have snuck in, which means i could hear the dvds playing on my laptop.) i've decided to avoid naps from now on because they leave me grouchy and throw off my clock even more.

last night, i dreamt that a bunch of us were being held at gunpoint in my parents' house. i managed to sneak away and kept trying to call 911 as i ran down the snowy road toward the main street. i misdialed. my fingers fumbled, my cellphone locked. it rang and rang and no one picked up. i begged the people i passed to get help, but they waved me off.

i was simply overcome with helplessness and anxiety. how overcome? well, this morning i found mystery bruises. also, one of my teeth is slightly chipped. my desire for genuine rest is taking a turn for the desperate.

she's talking in her sleep -
it's keepin' me awake,
and anna begins to toss and turn,
and every word is nonsense, but i understand...
~ counting crows, "anna begins"

m is for mandolins and memories

this song has defined so many moments in my life... listening to it feels like a solid, all-enveloping hug from a faithful friend. i remember that chris hated it and ross and i bonded over it and that adam duritz rocks my world. you know, when he's not busy killing me softly with his song.

when kindness falls like rain...

(start at the one minute mark)

l is for leeks

first off, leeks remind me of elwyn. back when we all worked together, he was working in "r"zone and a customer came up to let him know that another customer was taking a leak. elwyn's british ears thought he said "lead" (as in cord, i guess)... the truth was an unpleasant surprise. this is still funny to me after more than five years :)

secondly, they remind me of yum. check them out! they're incredibly pretty and the taste is equally lovely... that mild bite mingles with whatever it's cookin' with... mmmmm. when they're sliced up, they even look like little bullseyes. and the reason you want to slice 'em is that they have dirt trapped in all kinds of cracks and crannies, and the best way to get all that out (or so the internet tells me) is to cut the leek into coins and swirl it around in water until the grit is loosened up. then we scoop the coins out of the water! easy as (leeky) pie.

after looking left and right for recipes, i decided to create a leek, spinach, and spinach risotto, only using wild rice. so, wild rice isn't ideal... it's a bit too tough. from my understanding, the point of frying the rice before adding broth is to crack the grain so that the liquid can enter in. a) yummy flavours on the inside and b) faster cooking. in any case, wild rice ain't meant for this. and it's not super starchy, which means it doesn't turn out so naturally creamy.

what i'm confessing here is that maybe what i actually made doesn't officially count as risotto. but i'm ok with that. and you should be ok with it, too. ok? and you know why? 'cause it tasted marvelous!!! especially with the spinachy, leeky, shrimy, green oniony, craisiny deliciousness i added :D

give leeks a try... and not just in potato soup. you'll be glad you did.

k is for kisses

cannot *believe* i've only been awake for thirteen hours... it's been a dense day.

i) a group session for our "carving out your discipline" position papers: two hours of peer review, with ginger cake! i still don't know how my work contributes to humanity, exactly.

ii) research on jeanne guyon: this led to general commentaries on the phenomenon of mysticism among women, which in turn led to simone de beauvoir's chapter on women mystics in "second sex." there was a great deal to process there, and i'll be reflecting about it here when i can. but, to start with: i'm not as healthy as i wish i were.

iii) cornerstone: walking home with charles, cleaning for an inspection, making a birthday card, teaching theresa how to use excel, decorating, drinking on the job, having a party, coming thisclose to trying guitar hero, almost making a med error (i blame the wine!), and helping bev get ready for bed.

iv) so tired. didn't bother going home... came straight from cornerstone to charbonneau, to sleep. trying to decide if i can stay awake long enough to laugh at jon.

vi) by the way, brian and beverly both kissed me today. plus, brian took my hand and sat me on the couch and passed me his jungle book colouring pad and some crayons. the glittery and metallic crayons are especially wonderful.

the crayons weren't really the point, though. it was the kisses that made my world all sparkly.

j is for just desserts

it's been so very long since we've had a food story. let's fix that right now! on wednesday, i took a break from my jeanne guyon marathon at freeway to run across the street and peruse the yummies at denninger's. two stellar purchases resulted! first off, a viennese cheesecake that is ricotta rather than cream cheese based. which is how we do things in europe, you see! so, if you're looking for something more than brotherly love, do yourself a favour and acquire your very own slice of this heavenly, raisiny, light-as-a-feather, baked dessert. pronto! (shoot... something tells me that wasn't german...)


so, lemons are wicked! i picked some up the other day. and then i put them into my shopping basket, took them to the cashier and paid for them. then they decorated my kitchen counter for a bit. the trouble is, i don't actually have a zester. the humanity! so i tried to use my cheese grater to help make my ginger cake zestfully yum... with mixed success. fortunately, i have been told that presentation isn't everything!


so, what was the second purchase? the stuff that gave the ginger cake its name: crystalized ginger. it's superhot to eat on its own, but i'd bought it with every intention of using it in baking anyway. i sliced it thinly and tossed it into the cake mix, along with green tea ginger ale (rather than oil). the result was kinda crumbly: the online vegan consensus seems to be that pop can replace oil/milk/eggs, but i decided to add one banana for binding. it did not suffice. nevertheless, yum was achieved! along with the ginger candy (middle) are homemade tangerine salt (left) and some dried cranberries (right) dad brought home from his bridge game. i like the colours together :)

i is for irony

there are episodes of the west wing that are inextricably linked to episodes in my own life. i started watching the show during the summer before the second season. the first episode i ever saw was celestial navigation. i missed the first hour of the brilliant season premiere (in the shadow of two gunmen), and came home waiting for the second hour to finish, so i could watch the tape from beginning to end. that was my first year in university, and i never missed a night. often, my family would watch with me.

between the second and third seasons, along with the tragedy of 9/11, my family imploded. i remember watching isaac and ishmael at the mcarthurs', shortly after we had moved in. having people over to our apartment to watch the women of qumar. calling ildiko and screaming in her ear after commencement.

between the fourth and fifth seasons, i moved to alberta. while sleeping on the couch in front of angie's computer, i dreamt about zoey bartlet's abduction. i stopped watching on a regular basis after aaron sorkin and thomas schlamme left the show, but read about it once in a while. finally, in 2007, i bought all seven seasons on dvd. i'm often in the process of rewatching them in order.

the last episode i watched with my family was two cathedrals. i don't remember who else was there, but i know dad was. it's a very emotional episode: in the wake of a devestating personal loss, president bartlet reveals to the world that he has had an undisclosed disease for eight years. in the mix, he ponders re-election and questions his faith.

two scenes especially stand out: first, bartlet standing in the midst of national cathedral, cursing God in latin. second, bartlet making his way from the white house, post-revelation, to the press conference. dire straits plays "brothers in arms" in the background, and the faces of the staffers remind us how much is riding on the question he will undoubtedly be asked by reporters: will you be seeking a second term?

my dad and i debated the pseudo-cliffhanger in may. by the time it was resolved in late september, we were no longer watching together.

the reasons why my family imploded weren't simple. and the last eight years have been a long process of healing without talking about it. at first, some of the reasons just weren't a point of friction anymore. then, surprisingly, some of the reasons simply ceased to exist.

we were actually talking about that on the way home from dinner last night. just me and dad. i said, "i'm not sure how it happened, and i didn't plan on it happening." we pulled into the driveway and he elbowed me playfully. "well, i'm glad it did."

i don't know if i'm glad it happened. i don't really know what's happening at all. but as we watched "the west wing" later that night - the few episodes i'd brought with me simply because they were next - i was consumed by the irony of watching bartlet curse in latin and listening to dire straits... with my dad. again.

these mist covered mountains
are a home now for me
but my home is the lowlands
and always will be
some day you'll return to
your valleys and your farms
and you'll no longer burn
to be brothers in arms
~ dire straits

p.s. i gave dad that irony shirt a while ago... he has iron issues.

h is for hohote

i actually had to leave class today. în hohote. i'm just heartbroken. i sat in the bathroom stall, sobbing, for 20 minutes before returning to gather up my stuff.

it stings and burns and aches.

i just don't understand.

and i don't know why it's taken me so long to really feel it.

will we ever heal from this and that? and from whatever it is that all of it comes from?

g is (taken) for granted

following my recent laptop catastrophe/calamity/tragedy, gepetto and i held hands and proceded through the five stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance) with grace and humour. it's been a difficult process, but we've leaned on each other and have great hope that the healing will continue.

but scars will remain, and one of the most marked is the now defunct letter g. consider: it's right there, in the middle of keyboard, begging to be used! and so very many participles rely on it! i can't even call gepetto's name without it!

the irony is that i have been teased for my pronunication of (hard) g's on more than one occasion, and since this catastrophic and calamitous tragedy, my class notes and emails have resembled a southern hymnbook.

so, in memory of my recent loss, i offer a brief (and by no means comprehensive) list of other things i take for granted, in the hopes that by naming them now they won't decide to crap out on me in the spirit of that immortal principle: "you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone."

- big yellow taxis
- the letter x, the key for which is also not working
- the shift+f7 (the thesaurus function) which has helped me avoid that letter while enhancing my vocabulary
- platelets and white blood cells. (all blood cells, really, but those white ones have been doing a bang-up job lately!) i'm a klutz of sorts, and have really put these little guys to work over the years: overtime, called back from holidays, you name it.
- music
- forgiveness. a handful of people in my life have been very, very kind to me, tolerating more than they should have, because they had hope for me. and loved me. and were capable of giving, even in their hurt.
- equality. i've never actually felt discriminated against for being a woman or an immigrant... and i'm realizing the degree to which my experience is a function of the particular time and place in which i live. it's quite crazy. and humbling.
- time
- colours. especially blue, green, and persimmon. and purple. they feel like beauty to me.
- money. it's always come, somehow or other.
- literacy
- bobby pins. i rarely reuse one, because i'm quite careless about putting them away when i take them out... also, i destroy them. it's a nervous habit.
- today