may, 2009

Tue, 5 May 2009 20:22:23 -0800

I'm not in Mexico. I've barely even left the apartment today, actually; only to Safeway to get a lemon and bread to go with the asparagus soup I'd left simmering on the stove. I'd planned to be on a beach, of course, experimenting with the mutual limits of margaritas and twice-daily yoga practice, but then it seemed the better part of valor to not become a disease vector, to carry swine flu back home. And in an ironic twist, I'm sick now anyhow.

It certainly could have something to do with my weekend: absent the usual yoga, I sang twice with International Orange, celebrated concerts, celebrated Phil & Morgan's wedding, and then did all three in combination. The choir sailed through pieces we'd struggled with all season, our hardest repertoire to date -- or maybe it was the two glasses of champagne at the wedding reception that blunted nerves (funny how I can't even attempt that on viola -- it'll blunt those muscle memories, too). We drank bourbon at David's after Friday's concert: we stayed up too late talking, we sang rounds, we opened another bottle of cava. Singing replaced dinner after the wedding Saturday; a final glass of wine from a smiling, familiar bartender back at the reception replaced a midnight snack. And then even less sleep than that, due to a distress call from Jaime, and drunken comforting.

So it's probably not swine flu. More like champagne flu.

It does mute this time, though; blur the edges: In a buzz of preparation and anticipation, I'd suspended my newspaper, gotten a fancy new lens for my DSLR and a sundress in which to sit on the hypothetical beach, rejected meeting invitations during the stretch, planned to not be oncall. Yet there I was at work yesterday, updating the whiteboard someone placed outside my desk with my latest status (above "applying for the patent on whiteboard tweets"): "not in Mexico." Sigh.

Perhaps my vacation this spring was knee surgery: that week when I sat on the couch, high on hydrocodone, ate T's cupcakes, talked with Olivia, and just slept. (And to show for it, I have a knee, and a foot, both almost entirely pain-free!) Perhaps, despite the fact that the only beach readily accessible to me now is the cold Ocean Beach, I'll take time off and stare at the waves of the Pacific. Because, abroad or no, I really am still waiting.