21 XII 2001 - 21:55 - vita15

All right. Tonight is the longest night of the year (unless you're in the Southern Hemisphere, I suppose). My mother claims that she can tell the difference, but I think it's all in her head. I used to know a fancy word for that, but knowledge has been seeping out of my head over this break. I'll take a guess and say it's "psychosomatic," but don't come running to me if you misuse it in a sentence.

I have been quite unproductive so far. Three days of break, and I have not practiced or done anything of import. On the other hand, I have read enough slash fiction to fill a very thick binder, I've rearranged my Diaryland archive to reflect the changing of the seasons, and I have gotten an exposition for a sonata more or less composed (although I'm not too happy about the orchestration, especially as it's a piano reduction. For whatever reason, I just can't bend my mind to hear it and translate it to the piano...)

In an hour, the biggest Chinese channel on network television in San Francisco will go off the air. My parents will never again be able to watch Chinese soap operas with annoying theme music that repeats itself every five minutes - and you know, I'm sort of sad about this, if only because it'll be one less thing to needle them about. And, you know, some of their "learn Chinese" programs are really useful. Oh! And I won't be able to listen to "fruit grandmother" in the early mornings anymore. *sigh* Although I always did wonder about "fruit grandmother," since she was rather obviously a he. With a really good falsetto, but still.

A., even if you are enjoying your break, I demand that you respond to my obsessive email.

It's raining a lot out here. My sisters, having come in from the East Coast, say that the weather is unseasonably warm over there and that there's been very little precipitation over there. If that's the case, then it seems we've made up for it here; some places in the Sierras are measuring three times more snow than is normal for this point in the season, and rainfall totals for San Francisco are about double what the average is and more than double what we had last year at this time. Did anyone follow the syntax of the last few sentences? Good, because I didn't.

I think I'm going to get Doc Martens, but first I need to figure out what stores around here sell them. Those of you who live in the Bay Area: where in SF can I get Docs?

You know, it's nice to have people around me who will cater to my superstitions. See, I'm only a few steps away from the medieval view that sneezing = gradual losing of soul. And how does one restore this soul? you ask. Well, this is actually one explanation for why people say "Bless you!" Another explanation has to do with the Black Death, but that's less fun. So anyway. I'm not too far removed from this view. Which would mean that I really, really like it when people say "Bless you!" after I sneeze.

Well, apparently they just don't say anything in China.

Now, growing up in a household where Chinese, English, and on occassion, Taiwanese, Japanese, and the language of hallucinations are spoken (the last three usually when my grandmother or other paternal relatives are about), I'd be fine with something muttered hastily in another language.

But God damn it, people should cater to *my* superstitions. Which is why I like going to school. Because even if they don't know that I happen to be particularly mad where this is concerned, they say it. Because society has taught them that it's the nice thing to do.

So what do I do?

I go home. And after I sneeze, I bless myself.

How sad is that?

Luckily for me, my sisters are coming home, and for a week or two, I won't have to do it for myself.

Oh, would that I could get by without that silly ritual! Except, wait, I can. I just feel... odd.

But that's nothing new then, is it?