the worst limitations on earth

that I will never get to be Russian. Or Jewish. I will never get to live on a small vineyard, and smell the rusty cellar. That I can't go back to being 5 years old, and how magical Barbie commercials were back then.
That I will never get to be a man and marry that cute asian girl that works at Matt's Starbucks. That I won't get to spend a day with Jenny Lewis and make jokes with her. That I won't ever be in the 1800's England, wear those long dresses and meet Mr. Darcy at a ball. (well I met him in a ballroom, but I can't go back there either, it's too long and too late) I won't ever speak French in Morocco or even chop down Amazon overgrowth with a machete.

But I somehow think that heaven will make up for this. That the experience of being with God forever is going to bypass the simple things I will never click out in this life. And I also guess that is why we read.
And then the other thing, is that no girl will ever live exactly in my mind. She won't wake up with 2 hours of sleep and argue with Darrell every morning. She won't shake her hands out cuz they hurt playing my bass. She won't listen to everything on my iPod, I don't think. Sometimes I meet her, close to me, and she is something close to what being in love is, to me.
But she disappears to St. George, or to the arms of a lover.
She disappears to fight global warming.
She smirks, and we are the same but live differently.


What it is, is this: its okay to keep meeting different people who are really the same, and really you, and really lovely.

I worked 11 days in a row without a break, and now, I am sitting here with nothing interesting to say.

I'm starting to think I have carpal tunnel syndrome. I wake up in the night, but my arms are still sleeping.

I am drinking possibly 2 or 3 Passion Tea Lemonades a day.

Celisse and I have exhausted the Redbox, and my arms are tan.

We met often, but never in anything but midnight. And by midnight I mean, it was in the dark.
"Barbara," he says to me. "I do not think you would ever love me if you could see my haircut in the light of day."
But I said, "Kiss me," and I ran my hands through the supposedly uneven hair on top of his head. We would spend the nights doing anything. Once, we sawed open the watermelons in my neighbor's yard. We scarfed them.
One night, we sat on my back porch and smoked 4 packs of cigarettes between us, for a new record. To be honest, I didn't smoke even all of that, but still I loved him.
And even another, we took the dogs for a run, 2 miles in the dark until we lay down in a field of mulch. When I tried to pick up a cactus, he didn't even say anything, and I had serious pain for a day or two.
But that was when I ran into him at the grocery store. I didn't know it was him, but he says to me, "Baby!"
And I looked at him curiously, and he comes up to me close and says low, "Honey, I mean I knew what you looked like. I saw pictures one time."
And here is what I said, I said, "Sid? That is you?" Because, for one, I recognized his voice, although the man in front of me looked like he had seen less better days than a meat grinder and his hair cut. Really. It was as atrocious as he had made it out to be.
So I took a moment to wonder. Does true love come that often? Fanatic love? The kind that makes you run wild in the night and cut down all the tulips in front of city hall when even though there is the Police Station right there? And I said to myself, hell no it does not come that often.
But it was too late because my face had scrunched up into wrinkles that the Botox can't undo, and he sees it with his eyes. Nope, this is not going to work even what with the running wild in the night.
"Sid, what you said. About the haircut," I shrug, clutching my grocery cart even closer as an ocean of bright commercialism in between us.
"I always told you, Barb. And you shoulda called it off months ago," meat-grinder-face walks away slowly from me.
"But Sid," I say to him. "I will always remember the tulips," I giggle. "And breaking into the prosthetics warehouse."
A little smile breaks out into that huge red face of his, and he sighs. But you just don't know til you know.

This is your appropriate and courteous reminder that we're bringing a truckload of something (undiscloseable in this letter) and we need you to fill out the appropriate forms and don't even think about wearing the brown shoes or showing up without the appropriate compensation. You can expect us June 5th, at approximately 4pm, give or take what the traffic lights are doing for us at that time of day. Something unnecessary, but duly appreciated by our truckers is a six pack of literally anything. But that's maybe just if you want to put a smile on their faces. We do not expect to be tipped.

Respectfully yours,

CRSJ INC.

Rachel has a gym membership
Part II
with special guest Celisse Hamburglar

Redbox rentals, cut to commercial break
sleeping in, and recording studio and house church
and basically - commercial break - having a night that makes me remember that everyday is the best day of my life.
Glamor. Semi-charmed kinda life.
But it's the same as it was two weeks ago. I just got happy.