Several months ago, I somewhat impulsively bought
tickets to the Orchestra Seattle/Seattle Chamber Singers performance of The
Messiah. One of my volunteers is a singer with the Chamber, and swore that they
were known for doing the best Messiah in Seattle. The tickets were relatively
cheap, and at the time I thought, “Why not? It’ll be fun,” I thought. “And Mr. Typist loves classical music!”
The concert was last night, and I spent the week
peppering Mr. Typist with little reminders in order to mentally prepare him for
the trauma of having to be around other people. The day before, the orchestra
had sent out an e-mail reminder for the event, which mentioned that it did not
start at 7:30 like I initially thought, but instead at 6:00—there was pre-concert concert, then the actual
concert, with two intermissions. That, coupled with the long drive, meant we
were facing at least a five hour commitment. Still, we both stoically steeled
our girders, each one thinking the other would be disappointed if we didn’t go.
We had a gloomy, silent early dinner, during which Mr. Typist suddenly blurted
out, “Why are we going to this
concert again?” at which point I reminded him that I bought the tickets months
ago, knowing that he loves classical music. Then I added, “We don’t have to go.” And he was all like, “No,
no. We’ll go.” And then I was all like, “Really, we don’t have to”, to which he
responded, “Well, do you want to go?”
leading me to wanly admit that no, actually, I didn’t really want to go. He
looked like he had gotten a stay of execution. I felt like a total philistine, but by that
time it was pitch black outside and pouring down rain, I had been having a nice
day decompressing from my first week on the new job by playing video games, and
I wasn’t up to facing a crowd of people and three daunting hours of music that
I don’t understand or have any particular love for. So there you have it--we
blew off a culturally enrichening activity in favor of staying home in our
sweatpants and watching TV. I regret nothing.
I still can’t face the query letter. I’ve now
stooped to considering work-arounds, such as having a drone fly my novel through
the window of an agent. I know I need to quit being such a ninny about this and
just get it done, but I’ve already faced starting a new job last week, and I’ll
be facing Christmas this week, which is grinding me down emotionally this year,
and I just don’t have the mental discipline left to tackle it right now.
Mr. Typist and I took a longish walk today and
partway through, both of my hips locked up so badly I thought I might not make
it home. Despite my best efforts to stretch regularly, my hips have been really
painful lately, to the point that I’ve wondered if I have arthritis. Mr. Typist
offered to massage my gluts when we got home, and upon first contact, I howled
with agony and begged him not to press so hard. He lightly touched my arm and
said, “It was literally that much
pressure.” Holy cow, folks. Somehow over the last month or so, the muscles in
my hips have gotten into a knotted, inflamed, cement-glueish mess of fascia and
corded tendons. I have no idea how it happened. It took half of the Seahawks
game, a hot water bottle, and a lot of patience, but Mr. Typist finally managed
to work out some of the knots. It’s still a mess, but a least it’s an improvement.
The problem with the deep hip flexors is that it’s virtually impossible to stretch them,
and once they lock up, you’re hosed. I had no idea how bad mine had gotten. Mr.
Typist is hereby recruited into daily massage duty until they get sorted out.
I know some folks love Christmas, but for
others, it can be a tough time. For those in the second category, have a bit of
a laugh:
--Kristen McHenry
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