Monday, August 15, 2011

Our first phone conversation

Violet is currently out east with her grandma and uncle while I am here in Brooklyn feeling miserable with a 103 degree fever.  She's there for an entire week and I will be leaving to San Francisco for a Search Marketing conference (oh the joy) tomorrow.  I didn't think it was humanly possible to miss someone so much but my heart feels like it's going to burst into a million little pieces each time I think of not being able to hold her, play with her, laugh with her and just have her little punim next to me.  Luckily I have been getting daily updates from grandma and I even get to talk to Violet on the phone.   Here is how the convo goes:

Me: Hiiiiiii Violet
Violet: Hiii
Me: It's Mama!
Violet:  Hiiii
Me: I miss you so much! I am so glad I get to talk to you. Yay!!
Violet: Yay!
Me: Have you been eating?
Violet: No
Me: well that's not good
Violet: Hiiii
Me: Hiiii. I love you
Violet: Hiii
Me: Hiii?
(Peter takes away the phone and line goes dead)

Good talk!

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Reading Between the Wines

I FINALLY did it; I started a book club!  I have been forcing my book choices upon my friends for years but we never actually got together specifically to discuss what we read. Usually we would chat over IM and those conversations typically went like this:

Me: Did you read (insert random book here)?
Random Friend: Yeah
Me: Good, right?
Random Friend: Yeah

This did not a book club make.  It was time to take the bull by the horns and turn this little hobby into a real book club, with myself as president of course. My first order of business was to pick out ten top rated books of different genres and styles.  The books range from Sedaris short stories to a Vonnegut classic to the poetic writing of Bukowski, with a few fun novels in between.  There are currently 8 people (I will stop taking new applicants after we reach 10) in the club and some of us are friends, some acquaintances and some of us never met. I took the liberty of creating a Facebook group where we can all post questions/comments/thoughts about the books as we read them.  There is also a schedule for meeting times for the next seven months, which will not change unless at least 50% of the book club is unable to attend. The only exception is if a key member (say the president) is unable to attend then surely other arrangements can be made.   The meetings will be held at various restaurants and I will bring handouts for everyone with a list of questions up for discussion.  Last, but not least, I had to come up with a great and catchy name but since I am not that original I stole one off the web and that is how Reading Between the Wines was born .  As you can see, I am taking this quite seriously.

When I  told  Gene he made a confused face and said, "This sounds like English class." OK, so not everyone understands my passion for reading novels but ever since I was a little girl I adored books and even before I knew how to read, my earliest memories are of my parents reading me bedtime stories.   By the time I was 4 years old they read entire novels (one chapter at a time) before bedtime.  I remember looking forward to bedtime knowing that I will soon learn about the adventures that await Pippi Longstocking or what crazy antics Karlson will be up to next.  There is nothing like submerging yourself in a great story that can whisk you a thousand miles away and make you feel warm and fuzzy (technical term) all over.

Gene isn't the only one that thinks I am loopy.  After talking to some of my friends over drinks yesterday, I learned that they all think I have jumped off the deep end.  Luckily they are still participating in what they now call their school assignment. If they keep up that sour attitude, none of them will be getting the extra credit. Besides making fun of me for taking this way too seriously, they are also sure that this club won't make it past 1 or 2 books.  While that is the fate of many book clubs, I assure you Reading Between the Wines will lead a very long shelf life.  Who knows maybe one day I will even loosen the rules of this little dictatorship and let the  members pick the books they want to read.  I said maybe...

Tuesday, August 9, 2011

4 AM Playtime

The last two nights Violet has been waking up in the middle of the night and instead of crying like she usually does, she requests to have playtime.  I have been humoring her (because she has been sick) and taking her out of her crib so we can both sit on the couch and watch the pictures change on our digital frame. Violet likes to tell me all the people she sees in the pictures and so the list begins: papa, baba, baby.....pause....papa, baba, baby.  Even though it's the middle of the night, a motherly pang of jealousy kicks in and I ask her, "what about mama?"  She smiles coyly and continues: baba, papa, baby....baba, papa, baby.  This kid is only a year old and she already knows how to manipulate me.  When she really wants to get me going, she points at the nanny when I ask her, "where is mama?"  Meanwhile everyone tells me she throws the word around like no tomorrow when I am not there.  After about ten minutes she begins to yawn and back to bed she goes.  It might sound crazy, but I kind of enjoyed these last two days where the two of us get to cuddle in the dark while looking at pictures that bring back happy memories of birthdays celebrations, apple picking, family holidays and vacations.  It feels cozy, sweet and makes me wish we could make smores in our non existent fireplace.