Another blog?

I’ll try not to be too navel-gazey, in spite of its genesis being tied to documenting this summer spent in India. The notion of writing something online seems absurd; everyone and noone will read it. While I talk about writing for a living, and occasionally do it, this is different. How? I’m not sure yet. The thing with writing academically is that like this: everyone and noone can potentially read it. So what’s the problem? I can scarcely make myself comment on other people’s blogs. Still, why the fuck not? I blame Dr. Stinky; it was her idea. While I only ever see her at one academic conference once a year at most, somehow I’m compelled to do her bidding.

First: who, me? I’m an academic. I’m Chicana. Married 12 years this summer. No kids. Eldest of six kids. So yeah, bossy. I live in my head, by inclination and by professional training. I teach at a small liberal arts college in Southern California. I’m a tangle of contradictions. I like it that way.

This is an experiment, and it may well go the way of my nose ring. I’m 35 years old, and in late February, while spending time with my sister I got my nose pierced. I felt like I really should have taken care of this impulse a good 20 years ago, but I was really really good back then. And, after all, we were at Venice Beach. Where else would you do it? It was there or Sunset Blvd, really. I prefer the beach.

I realized after having done it that every single one of my siblings had nose rings at one time or another. With the exception of one (who got her septum done) every single one had taken it out before it finished healing: some compelled by parental imperative, others by accident, and the other two because they got infected. Mine was going very well. Colleagues and chums were impressed. It was roundly admired. Even by a very conservative Tia. I thought it was cute. A small sparkly stud.

Then in the past couple weeks, the weather warmed up. It was constantly red. I started the salt soaks. Then this past week, after traveling to the muggy East Coast for the annual meeting of the above-mentioned conference it got worse. It started to hurt. So I took it out.

That’s the thing: it had become more trouble than it was worth. I have enough to think about now: having a pussy, red, painful nose as I get ready for the biggest trip I’ve ever taken didn’t seem like a good idea.

So, if this becomes pussy, red, or painful It’s gone.

Am I rationalizing quitting before I begin? Maybe.

***
It feels like the hugest thing I’ve ever done. It seems bigger than getting married (that seemed natural, like breathing). It seems bigger than moving to the East Coast for graduate school (that too seemed inevitable: I had to do it). This, on the other hand, is entirely voluntary. I don’t have to go. It’s not for work, and while I’d miss the man (who does have to go for work) I’d be OK in the end.

There are lots of questions that plague me about this trip. We’ll be gone for most of the summer. What if something happens to my parents while I’m gone? What if something happens? What if I freak out on the 26 hour trip? What if I freak out while I’m there? What if I lt nervousness win and I don’t go? Is this was aging means? I used to just jump at traveling alone. Loved it. I still enjoy it. I’m jumping at this too. I’m excited about it. And I do think that in the end, the craziness of it all is going to burn the nervousness out of me. I hope so.

The hugeness of it lies in the fact that this is for fun. This is voluntary.

The absurdity of the situation blows my mind. The Mr. is an Englishman. You don’t get more white than that. I’m Chicana. We’re going to India. I’ll be the Corporate Wife. Post-colonial doesn’t begin to cover it.

I’ve never, save for a handful of corporate holiday parties, been “the wife.” I don’t particularly relish the prospect.

I’m taking work with me. I go up for tenure in the Fall. I’ll have plenty to do. We’ll be traveling around seeing things on the weekends. I’ll have lots to write about. Lots of my world to ground myself in.

It’s the closest, however, that I will ever be to seeing what it was like for the Mr. to come to the States: the distance, the dislocation, the newness of everything. He’s the only child from a relatively middle class English household. I’m the eldest of six kids in a working class Mexican-American family. The first time he came to the parental home he was stunned into silence. Six kids, of course doesn’t just mean six kids: it’s the kids and their friends running in and out of the house at all hours. Yelling was a normal mode of communication. For him, yelling meant you were probably trapped in a well or something. It’s only a slight exaggeration to compare the degree of difference. And yet, for me, I know I’m coming home to my regular life in August.

I’m curious to see how this might change me.

****
Credit for the blog’s title goes to Kelly’s song “Let Me Borrow That Top,” the companion piece to “Shoes” I played it for Dr. Stinky and Dr. T. and they laughed so hard they cried as they rolled around in hilarious agony on the conference hotel beds.

I like it because it's both absurd and absolutely true.