my modern mullet

by the amazing (fellow mainer) brian at shag salon, boston. you can't see my 'party in back' from this view. brian rocks it every time.

tell me how you met

last week i went speed dating. i had fun, but didn't meet anyone i wanted to see again. it's kind of hard to imagine meeting someone that way. or maybe it's just hard to imagine meeting someone from the physics department. who knows?

i want to know how you met your spouse/partner/significant other/someone else you love. was it on a date? did you like her or him right away? my friends max and leslie have known each other since they were little kids and they didn't like each other at all. he thought she was annoying, and she thought he was mean.

OK, so here's mine:

one day i came home from visiting my cousin and my mom was sitting on the couch. we started talking, and it took me a few moments to notice that between my mom and the navy blue arm of the couch was a little black puppy. he was very quiet, waiting for me to notice him. when i did, i picked him up right away. he was very soft and wiggly and i already knew i loved him. that was rimmy and that happened almost 16 years ago!

speed dating

so...i went to harvard grad student speed dating. it was at a very nice restaurant/bar, and i had fun. i did not, however, meet mr. right...or ms. right for that matter. i don't know what to say except that all of the guys were harvard students, most of them were very nice, and seemed to be terrified of me. i don't think they appreciated local food, weird music or my outfit. still, it was fun to see who was out there. my favorite moment:

me: nice to meet you! i'm a composer.
guy from the physics dept: oh, really? well, i don't actually like music. i never listen to it.
me: you never listen to any music? at all? what do you like to do?
guy: well, tonight i'm going to see the star trek movie...

this was my warm weather outfit.

don't worry, i did shave my legs. the top and vest are a little set from cop copine. shorts by target. the scarf is from the very dangerous LF. i liked the individual pieces but didn't feel like i got the combination quite right. it looks kind of matchy don't you think?

90 degrees???

oh dear...must dig out summer clothes! also, must shave legs...

jacket open or closed?

i look bad-ass today

something new for peter: brain surgery!

last week my godfather peter did something new, but not too much fun. he had surgery. fortunately, by the time i arrived at the hospital he was doing well and took a rather impressive walk down the hallway. he also looked dashing in his pressure stockings.

surgery is never pleasant but it was great to see alison and also katie, whom i hadn't seen since i was...9?? and it's always nice to see janet and peter and charlotte. even under less than ideal circumstances.

i contributed to pete's recovery by bringing a tiny daffodil and by eating several of pete's saltines. i secretly wanted his graham crackers too, but didn't feel like it was appropriate to ask the post-op guy for his graham crackers. too bad...i've been wanting graham crackers ever since.

here's to a speedy recovery for peter, and let's hope that his first brain surgery was also his last!

this is my coin in the trevi fountain

you are supposed to put a coin in the trevi fountain to make sure you come back to rome.

i know i'll come back, but just to be sure, i put a little coin in the courtyard fountain when no one was looking.

'skills' addendum

my conversation hieri pomeriggio with romano, the very kind older gentleman who drives us to the airport.

me: hi, romano! remember me? i'm hillary and i was here two years ago--

romano: oh, yes! with long hair.

me: yes, that's me! would it be possible to take me to the airport on sunday morning? my flight leaves at 7.

romano: 7..ok, i'll be downstairs at 5.

me: thank you! i'm so sorry, i know it's very...

romano: [word i don't know]?

me: er...i know 5 o'clock is very...

romano: [same word]?

me: er...yes...

milo in rome, or, dear zoe, i was thinking about you in flüghafen münchen

my milo in maine tees came to rome with me. this is a picture of me on the gianicolo wearing one with a pulpo on it. sometimes people ask about my tees and it's fun to tell them i'm from maine and my clothes are, too.


i was wearing this blue shirt when we stopped in munich on the way from paris to rome. i thought about zoe landing in germany in the fall and knowing she would be there for a year. the year is almost halfway done now.

skills

so...
i studied italian for about 3 weeks, but i also lived here for 5 months. so my italian skills are...bizarre.

here's the thing: i love speaking italian, and do it with a certain amount of confidence. my pronunciation isn't terrible either, so when speaking with me, most italians identify me as (obviously) a non-native speaker, but they often continue with me in italian rather than switching to english. where it gets weird is this: there are a lot of very obvious and basic words that i don't know. after a few sentences, i sound like someone who speaks the language, but is too stupid to know the names of, say, the colors, or the parts of the body. this was my conversation this morning with the pharmacist:

me (in italian): good morning! i went running this morning in the park, and i...

pharmacist (confused): what?

me: i hurt myself, on my...

pharmacist: on your what??

me: (rolls up sleeve to show scraped arm)

pharmacist: oh...on your ARM.

me: yes! can i please have some antibiotic ointment?

oh hi guys!

look! i went to the beautiful church of santa maria sopra minerva, and found a few of my friends inside:

animali in liberta

this weekend i visited dana and don and lulu in gubbio. i LOVE dana and don and lulu.

gubbio is the kind of place you don't imagine that people really live. it looks amazing ALL THE TIME. i wake up and say "the mornings are beautiful here!" and then in the afternoon i think "wow, the afternoons here are lovely" and so on.

lulu liked barking at me. she thought i had been brought in to provide her with entertainment.
i could hear some sheep but i couldn't find them. i saw a deer, though.

why are nuns funny?

perhaps because you don't expect them to do normal things like eat lunch. in rome they look like old-fashioned nuns in habits, and there are many of them, especially here, near st. peter's.

when i lived here two years ago, one day i went for a run down a street i didn't recognize. it was deserted, and there were a few abandoned motorini laying around, so i was nervous. when i finally reached the end of the street, i was in another country: the vatican.

when i was little i kind of wanted to be a nun. not for any religious calling whatsoever but because i wanted to wear a habit and live in a place that looks just like this:

it's spring here, which is another new thing! there are three types of flowers: tiny white ones that look like daisies, even tinier purple ones, and daffodils.

the aventine

today i climbed the aventine hill. this is something i did once and always dreamed of doing again. on the aventine is the tower of a church that i always looked at when i lived in rome before, and today i went there. it was san anselmo.

it's a long walk up the aventine and i guess not too many people did it because there was no one else in beautiful santa sabina.
i lit candles for ann and mimi. rome is like a place i lived in and never saw. i see it now, and it's amazing.

what was wrong with me??

anyway...grateful for the second chance.

i woke up, and rome was outside my window

yesterday was mimi's birthday and today i woke up and it was spring in rome. i went outside and there were tiny flowers and little chirping birds. it was like i got on a plane and flew to paradise.

i've been to rome quite a few times now but i guess this is the first time with my eyes open.

i took a long walk to all the places i remembered to make sure they were still there. the place i like to buy socks had moved, but i found it. a restaurant that i liked moved closer. i couldn't find the pantheon but i found the gelato place near it. first things first!

andiamo!

thank you for your comments!

little owl guy and I are on our way. I'm wearing my leggings from wal-mart.

HELP: what does 60 degrees feel like??

i need some help! apparently the average temperature in roma right now is 60 during the day and 45 at night. i don't really know what that feels like...it seems like here in new england it's either hot or cold. what do you wear when it's 60 degrees?

my preemptive strike on jet lag

on wednesday i'm going to paris and then to roma. yippee!!!

today was a day of many new things: i ate at pat's cafe with nicky, visited betty, and ate half of an avocado sandwich (betty's...oops) that janet had made. here's what i'm doing tomorrow: getting up at 6. tuesday i'm getting up at 5, and wednesday--you guessed it--4! which is 10 in parigi and not too crazy a time to wke up. this is a test to see if it's possible to avoid jet lag by messing yourself up on purpose, in advance.

check back and see how i did!

dear catholic church: if you're trying to get rid of me, you're doing GREAT

so...it's ash wednesday, and i went to church.

for those of you who are shocked, let me explain:

-i'm doing a new thing every day, and part of it is going to every harvard building, and the st. paul church isn't conveniently open every day for visitors the way, say, st. peter's is...you know, in THE VATICAN?

-i wanted to hear the children's choir.

-i like this kind of thing. not church necessarily, but ash wednesday. honestly, if there were a church that were as left-wing as i am (believe me, there isn't) i might actually go to it. i like community, and i like ritual, and values that you might even think were christian, like, uh, caring about others...i even like God!

here's what i DON'T like: hearing the phrase 'pro-life' five times during the homily (and reading it twice in the handout, idiotically titled 'take five for lent'), a pretentious boob of a priest who panders to us by using slang terms like "whatever" and "now, a word from our sponsor," or a congregation that LAUGHS at said slang terms.

help!

in general, with some exceptions, of course, my experience of harvard--both the institution and the student body--has been one of intelligence, tolerance, and critical thought. woohoo! i made the mistake of thinking that some of this could have infiltrated harvard's catholic church. well...granny was wrong, and granny is sad about this. i like having the option of going to church even if i don't always choose to go, and i don't really want to switch over to a church that serves grape juice. i may have to become anglican, because the last time i went to anglican church, they served sherry!

the children's choir, on a different note (haha! no pun intended!) was lovely. as the little guys walked by in their little choir outfits, i noticed how adorable they were.

i wonder if the priest was noticing the same thing.

new things

this year i'm turning 30, and i want to do something new every day, even if it's just a little thing. yesterday i went to widener library for the first time. today (drumroll please) i used the recumbent bike at the gym! i never used the...other bikes...(the opposite of recumbent: erect??) because i can't adjust them to my size, but this particular recumbent bike was easy to adjust, and fit me fine. at first it didn't feel like a very challenging workout, but by the end i could really feel the burn in my booty.

tell me what new things you're doing! they can be ridiculous things like mine.

the mystical quarterly

so...if you go to Harvard with me, STOP READING RIGHT HERE.

did you stop?

today i went to widener library. since widener is Harvard's largest and most famous library, you would think this was not a big deal. it was a big deal for me, though, because i had never been there. not even once, in 4.5 years. i often go to the music library, but usually when i want to read an actual book that is completely unrelated to music, i order it from amazon. however, since i am only teaching one section this semester, i decided to try and do something new every day, even if it's just going in a building for the first time. i looked up some books that were related to my dissertation, and off to widener i went.

you have to have a harvard id even to enter widener. i swiped mine and the gate opened and i went in. when you first go in there is a huge staircase that leads up to our copy of the gutenberg bible in a fancy display case. i looked at it and noted how elegantly it was typeset; unfortunately you aren't allowed to take pictures. then i went looking for my books, but i couldn't find the place where the books are (stacks! i couldn't find the stacks.) i didn't want to ask anybody where the stacks were since most people go to widener every day, so i just walked and walked around and finally found a little poster that showed where the call numbers are and my books were supposed to be in 3-east so i took the elevator up to 3, and it was a weird floor with no people on it, and no books either. finally, i was helped out by the custodian, who gently pointed out that 1)this was not the stacks and 2)this was the sixth floor.

down the stairs again! i found a map and started again, and found the stacks, and 3-east, where my book supposedly was. 3-east houses the religious mysticism section. woohoo! did you know there is a journal called 'the mystical quarterly'? i really wanted to take a picture (as well as a picture of the 'BS' aisle...close to my book which was a 'BV') but that's against the rules! i found my book 'between exaltation and infamy' and also another one called 'cloud of unknowing' which seemed appropriate for some reason.

i found the book-checkout place, took out my book despite owing large fines, visited the ladies' room, visited the cafe, and left. nobody even noticed i was wearing my cannabis leaf belt!

in summary: going to widener was well worth the trip, and i look forward to going back, just as long as i'm not too pressed for time...

i have a new haircut!

i love my new haircut. brian from shag salon cuts my hair. brian is cool because he is a kick-ass hairstylist, and because he's from maine, too.

the adventures of a new driver

i think i can remember every time i have gone to the gas station. this is not because i've gone so few times--in fact, i go frequently--but because each time is an adventure. i always forget which side my gas tank is on, and this time was no exception, so i did some very challenging mental calculations about how to get my car situated correctly without starting completely over again. i backed up and then pulled forward on the other side of the island. now, you see, normally i end up about ten feet away from the gas pump and have to either move the car again or stretch the nozzle as far as it will go, which looks ridiculous. this time, however, i overcompensated and pulled too close to the gas pump, which meant that i had to sort of shimmy-wiggle myself out the door and squeeze between the pump and the car, and then reverse this process when i was done. this was great entertainment for the poeple who were inexplicably hanging out outside of the cumberland farms...hopefully my next car will be entirely electric.

finally, an ed hardy hoodie!

this is a short post because the clock is ticking on my chamber orchestra piece for le NEM. tick tick. for the last ten days or so i've worn one ridiculous sweatpants-type-outfit after the next. then yesterday, janet saved me once again. now i have a sweatshirt that is AWESOME instead of ridiculous, and was not ridiculously priced either, due to janet's persistence and bargain-shopping acumen...i had looked for one for months and never found anything under $99.