thatnight.net

The day of my ninth grade semi-formal, my little sister Molly, who was seven at the time, stood in the driveway in her Easter dress as me and my friends busied ourselves with rolling our eyes and seeing how many poses we could accomplish with our dates without touching them.

Molly is unlike my fifteen-year-old self in several ways, most outwardly in her distaste for makeup and boys. Also, she’s on her way to eventually growing to be at least a foot taller than I am.

For years after that dance, and even after I started this website, she pretty much constantly looked a lot like this.

Every weekday, I pick her up for lacrosse practice, and her t-shirts are two sizes too big, her sweatpants are falling halfway down her hips, and her curly hair is wrapped in a frizzy ponytail on top of her head.

This past Friday was her ninth grade semi and I helped her get ready, thinking to myself the entire time, can someone get this girl a modeling contract?

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When I was little, every Sunday, my grandfather would wake me up and we’d hop the 51C bus to Carson Street to attend our tiny church.

There weren’t many children, but every summer, they shipped the few of us up the mountains to Northern Pennsylvania for church camp. From ages 10 to 16, we would be grouped into cabins and assembled for Orthodox mass in between kickball and lunch. And also, swimming and dinner. And dinner and bedtime.

Aside from the churching, there were small classes arranged during the day, and while the boys learned to write in Ukrainian, the girls would be shuffled off and given linen and colored thread. Sometimes we learned to dance. Once, we were lectured on how to stuff pirogies while giving birth.

One summer, when I was 14, I had a thing with a tall, blue-eyed boy, and the match was looked on so approvingly that by the time camp was over, I cried for hours because, how will I be able to wait until next year to demonstrate my eternal love through black and red embroidery? All of my dreams! My dreams!

Somehow, word traveled back to my little church, and for two years, the fragile old women layered in long, solid fabric would scuffle over to me with smiles on their faces and joy in their eyes, take my hands, and ask in heavy accents, how is your Ukrainian friend? And then they asked who would be catering the wedding.

As I got older, the women teaching our Sunday-school classes transitioned from older mothers and once-immigrants to the girls who, at that time, were only four or five years older than my 15-year-old self, and wore the thin, gentle scarves over their hair, a sign of marriage and motherhood.

Somewhere in there, church became less of a routine. Meaning we stopped going. My sister was baptized, and that was the end of it. Molly, now 14, never attended church camp. Her dreams consist of fame and New York City. I’ve started asking her about boyfriends and she’s all, look, being interested in boys totally interferes with my plans of not being interested in boys. And sometimes I feel like she could really teach me something, but I’m too busy channeling my babushka-wearing ancestors to concentrate.

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“Hey, how old are you?”

“I’ll be 22 in two weeks, Pap.”

“Aren’t you married yet?”

“No.”

“Why don’t you get away from that dog and go meet some boys?”

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I never cared much about family members stumbling upon this website. It wasn’t made particularly to keep anyone in touch with my life, nor was it a big secret that would shut everything down if discovered. With my site address plastered on the five o’clock news a few days ago, however, even my preteen cousins texted me to let me know that they’re occasionally stopping by.

And also that drug dealers are pushing “pop rock-esque” strawberry meth. Warn your children. (Thanks, Emily.)

This leaves me in a curious place. I was never too raunchy of a person to begin with, but I do feel the need to, uh, abridge, at least some topics, like, for instance, the things I would have liked to do with my insanely gorgeous Shakespeare professor after office hours sophomore year.

Like scrutinize the gender hierarchy in The Taming of the Shrew. (Hey, Mom.)

I’m not exactly sure where I’m going with this. It’s been a slow morning. The Steelers are currently losing to the Browns and I’ve been compiling a list of things that I want to write about that I’ve avoided in the past.

Hopefully both will turn out to be winners.

Here are a some pictures to provide closure:

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This is my sister, Molly. She’s 13.

Earlier this summer, before entering 8th grade, Molly found out that her best friend had a lump on her brain. A few weeks later, the lump was found to be cancerous. In these past five months, Molly has matured quicker and more completely than I thought possible in that amount of time. In five months, she went from a Hannah Montana lunatic to a picture of perseverance. Or maybe, now she’s just both.

Her best friend, Chelsea, is unyielding and beautiful. Her triumphs have made it easy to forget she’s barely a teenager. And, she’s a hockey fan. She loves the Penguins, people.

The girls found out a week ago that Sidney Crosby was offering his private box for last night’s game. They were whisked via limo (packed with Halloween gift bags and sparkling cider) to the arena where they were able to watch the game from, literally, the best seats in the house. I sent Molly out with my camera and she came back with some great stories.

As they were getting ready to leave, they were greeted by Mario Lemieux in the hallway.

And then, followed quickly by a mess of excited shrieks, Sidney appeared and hung out until it was time to go. He posed for pictures and presented Chelsea with the game puck. Molly’s attitude towards boys in general has remained indifferent throughout middle school, and so when she called me afterwards, it was the first time I’d heard her say, “Wow, this man is gorgeous,” and, “Hey, he’s your age...hint.”

I was told the night, from the beginning, kept getting better. I am so excited for them, and certain there was no one there that night more deserving.

The full picture set can be found here.

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My cousin Mark, a soldier in the army, is being deployed to Iraq sometime next week. For a while, I was kind of impartial about the whole thing, which is terrible, I know, although I’ve always had the mindset that he was invincible. That, in addition to the fact that dialog about the war has been made so cliché and redundant, that feeling any real danger in the situation was emotionally unreachable for me.

My family is angry about the whole thing, him leaving college, and joining the army. Maybe it’s my relationship to him, in addition to our similar age and opinions, that has made me unable to say, “You’ve ruined your life.” As much as I disagree with our country’s position in Iraq, I don’t believe that he’s made a mistake. He’s made a decision. What good will it do to chastise him, especially when I don’t think he deserves to be chastised?

I wasn’t sad until I actually saw him yesterday. I’ve always seen him as my powerful, more mature cousin. Yesterday, though, I saw him as a 21-year-old. I’m just hoping things work out.

On a side note, there are going to be some changes around this website. Hopefully, they’ll all be good ones.

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I went to a fair last night after work. It was big, for a church carnival. They had a massive fruit stand right in the middle of it, with all kinds of stuff, so I stopped to buy some. My feet were bare. I left the heels in the car and walked along the stone path, being careful to keep away from whirling children and large, clumsy men. I stood at the stand, chatting with a loud, dark, self-proclaimed Sicilian. When he started going off about The Godfather, I became completely aware of myself – the floor-length wispy skirt, bare feet, long and messy hair – all while balancing a box of grapes on my shoulder with one arm and discussing gelati. I never met my Italian grandparents, but if they were watching the peasant girl at the fruit stand, I’m confident they would’ve recognized me.

I have a new masthead. Rich made it. He’s wonderful.

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The family sits around in lawn chairs, enjoying the 95-degree weather.

Aunt: “They say you’re supposed to spend three-month’s salary on an engagement ring.”

Derrick rolls eyes.

Rachel: “Yeah, I heard that in Knocked Up. Anyway, Derrick’s uninterested in the subject.”

Aunt (jokingly): “Well, you know, he doesn’t have to be the husband.”

Light laughter ensues.

Samantha, age 7, chimes in from pool: “Yeah! He could be the wife!”

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Qualities to be looked for and admired in significant others:

• The ability to cut fruit one-handed
• A family much different from one’s own
• A desire to carry all of the grocery bags to the house
• A similar desire to remove garbage bags from the house
• A willingness to be the driver when traveling
• Acceptance, or slight disregard of, excessive computer attachment
• Toleration of ridiculously awful television
• Creative ability, or at the very least, appreciation of creative ability in others
• Gratitude for the purchase of atmospheric-scent-enhancing candles
• Bonus: The capability to select a tolerable scent other than vanilla
• Selfless removal of chin stubble from sink nooks
• Abundant laughter, and the causing thereof
• Appreciation of mascara and Jon Stewart
• A mastery of denim
• Good teeth

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I’ve always been somewhat domestic, but over the past few months, since the boyfriend and I got our own place, I’ve been less able to hide it. I’ve been nesting.

I hate that term, and cringe when referring to myself as doing so, but it’s something I can’t escape from. I recognize this but don’t understand it, this impulse that has me acting ten years older than I am, needing to buy curtains and antiques to decorate our home for the practically nonexistent visitors.

What am I expecting? A dinner party? What am I going to do, invite over my professors and serve snail? I doubt Martha Stewart spent her 21st birthday crocheting afghans for her potholders.

Though now that I think about it, I’m probably wrong.

And what was I thinking when I chose flowers for my first masthead on the new layout? Pots of flowers?! And they’re fake! Pots of fake flowers!

In any event, I took some socks this morning and made a sock dog to sit on my rocking chair, partly because I saw one in some magazine and it looked cute, mostly because the feminist inside of me is getting her ass kicked by a Stepford wife.

Come to think of it, owning a rocking chair probably accounts for at least half the problem.

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