Narcissus
28
Aug
2007
After a few months of muscle pump (minus that month where I kept missing class), I have to say, my slightly-less-puny biceps are my proudest achievement ever.
Here in Katie’s Head
Family history
25
Aug
2007
When I was in seventh grade, I interviewed my paternal grandfather about growing up during the Depression (he was born in 1915). He told me about how he wore the same button-down shirt and corduroy pants every day for two years. And that he worked as a paper boy — delivering the same newspaper that I now work for, he recently reminded me — when he was in college.
(As an aside, I’ve always thought our Kansas history courses sorely lacked the common-folk experience that I find in Grandpa’s anecdotes.)
My grandparents all spoke German at home when they were kids. I don’t think they spoke it much around my dad and his brother and sister — although that may be because Grandpa spoke low German and Grandma spoke high German, so they didn’t agree on the right way to say things.
Grandpa turned 92 this spring. There are many stories that he can’t remember anymore. And at Christmastime when we sing carols, because he can’t hear so well, sometimes he gets lost on the words and starts singing the German version of the lyrics because that’s how they sang it when he was young. But sometimes he tells great little stories — and when he does, a hear a German accent that I don’t hear other times.
My dad emailed me this today:
Katie,
I was visiting with my Dad today. I thought I would tell you his stories ( to help me not forget). I was asking him about his grandfather — the one that immigrated here from Ukraine. Dad pronounced it Ukaraine.
Dad’s grandpa got off the train in Peabody, and wagons took people to the Moundridge area were he had enough cash to buy a square mile of land. He had his wife and two girls. Three more girls and five boys were eventually born here. At some point he moved to Butler county and farmed for a while, and then later moved to the Aulne area (in Marion County). He was a skilled orchard man, good with grafting of trees, and usually had the best orchards in the area.
Dad was telling me that there was a saying about his grandpa, which he told me in German and translated as “He gave him one like Lohrenz gave the tom cat.” Evidently some tom cat was coming around the area and causing problems. He caught the cat by the hind legs and swung him around his head and over the house. The cat landed about a block away and took off like a bolt. Someone in the next town, ~20 mile away, reported that the cat was still running scared there.
I called Dad later to ask a little more about this story. Dad remarked that a story that cast his grandpa — or any Lohrenz, really — as a badass tough guy doesn’t really ring true. It seems, down through the generations, all us Lohrenzes think of ourselves as thoroughly harmless but outsiders find us distinctly more intimidating.
Writer’s braindeath
24
Aug
2007
A massive project has sapped my creative energy, constantly demonstrated by the following conversation:
Me: What about the _____? Should we _______ or _______?
Boss: Hmm. What do you think?
Me: I really don’t care.
Lather, rinse, wait half an hour, repeat.
So while it’d be more amusing to say New Boyfriend is what’s kept me from blogging, I just can’t string together a sentence these days.
Maybe he’s actually a decent guy
11
Aug
2007
There’s a guy who lives downstairs from me who never wears a shirt.
And he reminds me of an ex so it completely skeeves me out.
Also, it doesn’t help that every time we run into each other, I’m doing something stupid.
So.
Dear neighbor,
Have you considered wearing a shirt? I mean, I’m 100% for going clothing-optional while you’re at home, but the courtyard and the laundry room are, uh… So, have you considered wearing a shirt?
And I’m sure it’s obvious at this point that I’m an absolute klutz, but I really am smarter than I’ve been acting for the past day or two.
And the look of panic in my eyes? It’s because you look exactly like this asshole I dated for a couple of months a very long time ago.
Apprehensively yours,
Katie
Pretty much the best thing that can happen to a woman
11
Aug
2007
Oh, I forgot the most exciting (for me) part of the Target adventure.
My mission was to buy some new pants. My old pants, the pants I bought over the last couple of years when I was forced to accept my size-10-ness, were too big. Not that I don’t thoroughly enjoy wearing saggy pants to work — you know, bringing a street influence to office wear.
Maybe this is a good place for a random rant. Since, oh, high school, all the pants I’ve had to pick from in stores have been low-waisted. I’ve gotten used to this. And now that (a) higher (more normal) waists have come back into style and (b) I’ve started shopping more at Real Grown Up stores, I have acquired some pants that confuse the hell out of me. Why do they come up to my natural waist? This means the pockets are hidden waaaay up under my dress shirt, so it looks like I’m trying to feel myself up when I reach for something in my pocket. I don’t want to have to keep buying cheap shit from the juniors section for the rest of my life, but I can’t handle womens section pants.
Anyway. I am at Target. I grab a couple pairs of size 8s and head to the dressing room.
The first pair is, ugh, the pockets are all wrong. The fabric is too thin. It hangs badly. Screw these pants.
The second pair I like. Wait, no. Are these 10s? No, they’re 8s. Why are they so big? I hold out the waist band away from my body. I’m thinking, “I could get fat again and these would still fit. AWESOME.” Because my brain has long since forgotten that size 6 exists. The last time I bought something with a number that small, I was still in high school.
And of course all women know how inconsistent sizes are these days. So while half the reason I walked out of Target with a size 6 pair of striped gray capris is that I’ve lost a little over twenty pounds, the other half is size inflation and lack of standard sizing.
But that truth did not stop me from prancing around my apartment in my size 6 pants with a stupid smile for a good hour today.
At least it wasn’t my boss
10
Aug
2007
I had a good day. I felt like turning up the iPod and dancing around because, uh, just because. My morning was good, my lunch was good, my afternoon was more productive than usual and that is always good.
So I needed to savor the goodness. By shopping. Because my ovaries told me to.
I started at Target because, hello, there is no 20-something in the States who doesn’t OMG LOVE Target.
I wandered around, tried on some clothes, picked up a pair of pants and some black not-insanely-tall heels and continued wandering.
I knew there was something I was going to get. I couldn’t remember. It was something I could get at a drug store, but that was as much as my memory could recover. So I start wandering down aisles.
Oooh, razors. Maybe I needed razor cartridges? Or maybe I wanted to upgrade to one of those five-bladed wonders? I keep browsing and end up in Nair land. I start reading the packaging because, whoa, the list of precautions fascinates me. I hear the squeak of shopping cart wheels further down the aisle, but don’t look up because, well, who cares that some stranger sees me reading the back of the bottles, completely wide-eyed.
Then I pick up a can of some sort of foam, off-brand Nair-like stuff. Foam? Is there any drug store product that hasn’t been turned into a foam yet? And I start reading the directions, my jaw slowly dropping at all the bizarro WARNING!s. Apparently you can’t get it anywhere near regular soap or you’ll die. I keep reading and arrive at the most shocking instruction possible. I’m horrified and I let out a loud gasp.
At this point, from behind me comes a low and slightly nasal, “Hi, Katie.”
I turn. It’s a newsroom department head. He always makes me nervous because, um, he’s funnier than me and he outranks me. (How often do you think that happens?)
“Hi,” I say, trying to put down the can as coolly as possible. “Those product descriptions are really scary.”
And I flee the aisle.
At this point, I have no idea whatsoever was on that can that made me gasp. Something truly disturbing, apparently, but at the point that I was interrupted, that horrible thought dropped out of my short-term memory and was lost forever.
So Arlice, while I am totally mortified that senior editor caught me totally caught up in the drama of Nair, thanks for erasing something really gross from my brain permanently. I’m pretty sure you did me a favor.
