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I took these with my phone on our way into work today.

And this is a rendering of Sunday’s game in Lego as imagined by the baby.

I don’t want to stick with the customary format of grace in small things because, as an exercise, it will probably make up the majority of my daily posts and it was starting to depress me to see the same-looking entry over and over.

Anyway.

Today, I found grace in my little basil plant that is surviving, despite my brown thumb. I used a few leaves of it in tonight’s dinner and it was like getting a little kiss of summer.

I also found grace in music. The baby has recently gotten very into J Dilla’s Donuts album. I’ve always liked the whole album, but the past few days that we’ve been listening, I’ve really fallen in love with the track called “Time: The Donut of the Heart.” It’s gorgeous. It feels like a sweet sigh.

Today, I found grace in that disgusting black goop that builds up in the drain of my bathroom sink.

Let me explain.

The baby lost a tooth tonight while we were brushing his teeth, but we didn’t realize this until after he’d spit and rinsed, presumably sending the tooth down the drain. He was pretty upset, but I told him I was sure that the Tooth Fairy would still come, but suggested writing her a note explaining what happened. He wrote, “I lost my tooth, but it came out in my toothpaste. From The Baby. PS XOXOXO From Greedo.”

Why our cat needed to send the Tooth Fairy some love, we don’t know.

In any case, we put the note and his Tooth Fairy pouch under his pillow and looked ahead to brighter days. I decided to check around the bathroom once more to make sure we hadn’t missed it.

I looked on the rug around the toilet and in the bristles of his toothbrush. Finally I pulled the plug out of the drain and saw a little white tooth stuck to the side of the drain, nestled in some of that black goop.

It took some maneuvering and some creative tooling with tweezers, plastic spoons, and eventually a chip clip, but I got it out. The baby was thrilled.

Thanks, goop. Even though you’re gross and made of who-knows-what, thanks for holding on to my kid’s tooth.

Through some weird twist of the UPS fates, a bunch of stuff that we had been waiting on all arrived today:

1. A shiny new 750 GB hard drive so we can store all of our crap there and wipe our desktop Dell clean as it is moaning and groaning far too much for a relatively new computer.

2. A package from Amazon containing The Wire DVD boxed set, which I got on SALE (caps needed there) (thanks to Tracey for the heads up on that), a new transfer of Pieces, and…um…The 30 Day Shred. I caved to peer pressure, alright? Though I’m really not sure when I’m going to do that shit anyway.

3. New movie from Netflix: Paprika.

4. SNUGGIE!!!! OH MY GOD!!!! The husband’s grandmother got him one for Christmas. I don’t know if they were back-ordered or if it she bought it someplace weird but it finally arrived and my god is it a thing of beauty. I’m actually wearing it right now. I give myself two weeks before I’m just rocking it out in public.

5. This conversation from about 30 minutes ago:

*familiar music emanates from my laptop before quickly being silenced by me*
Husband: …
Me: …
Husband: Did you just get Rick Rolled?
Me: Shut up.
Husband: Dude, that’s sad.

1. A cold ginger ale on an upset tummy
2. Buddies who talk you down
3. Watching an episode of The L Word after missing 3.5 seasons and wondering what the hell is going on
4. Nag Champa
5. Hines Ward

I get the feeling I’m being watched.

I’m probably just paranoid, though.

Schmutzie invited me to participate in Grace in Small Things. It’s taken me a few days to get started, but I was just reminded what today is, so it seems like a fitting way to begin such a project. And we’re supposed to do five things but I think today I’ll just do this one, since it’s a biggie.

Today is Blog for Choice day, which honors the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade ruling. So my first positive thing for Grace in Small Things is my reproductive freedom.

I was not always pro-choice. From the time that I was old enough to know what abortion was, I was staunchly pro-life. My very Catholic schools made a point of telling us, especially the girls, how wrong it was. This stayed with me until my teen years when I started rethinking a lot of things, as teenagers tend to do, including my feelings on women being able to decide when they have children, even if that decision includes terminating a pregnancy. I timidly changed my position to pro-choice but not pro-abortion.

A few more years of maturity and realizing that I don’t like people to insert themselves into my personal struggles and maybe I felt the same way toward others put me into pro-choice but kind of ambivalent about the whole thing territory.

Until I got pregnant.

To be fair, I had a lot of supportive people around me and they were all people that I sought comfort and advice from. But there was still a decent dose of pressure. Being as far up shit creek as I was, I didn’t know what exactly to do about my pregnancy, but I knew for sure that I was the one who was going to live with whatever I decided.

I got as far as the doctor’s office and making my appointment and arranging everything when it finally became clear to me that having an abortion was not what I wanted to do.

Ultimately, I obviously decided to continue with the pregnancy, but the experience solidified me as a pro-choice person. I wanted to have my baby, but I could definitely understand not wanting to continue a pregnancy. And I couldn’t imagine being forced in either direction. It’s a hard thing to try to explain to someone who hasn’t been through that situation. But having my rights over my own body and my own life transformed me profoundly.

If you don’t feel the same way that I do, I do not say these things to offend you or to be combative. I only hope to give a little insight in my weird little life and maybe gain some understanding along the way.

Also: good start, dude.

This is a picture of Aretha Franklin singing at yesterday’s inauguration. And that is her hat. And I am here to tell you both the simple and complex reasons why that hat is awesome.

1) It’s grey, which is perfect for a cold, January day.
2) When she was walking to the podium, I wasn’t sure if the hat was decorated with a sculpture of a bird or a bow. Any time I have to struggle with that distinction, that is a fashion win in my book.
3) It has Swarovski crystals on the bow. Nice.
4) It’s on Aretha Motherfuckin Franklin’s head.
5) It was made by milliner Jason Song of Mr. Song Millinery of Detroit, Michigan.

Whether or not Aretha is aware of how symbolic this suddenly makes her hat for me doesn’t really matter.

As I’ve no doubt mentioned here before, I love Detroit. I go there once a year in May for the electronic music festival. Granted, that weekend is tourist-heavy and I’m sure things are different the other 51 weekends of the year. But it’s truly a great city.

Telling people that I like Detroit and that I vacation there (teehee), always elicits bewildered responses. “Detroit??!?! Like, Detroit, Michigan? That Detroit?” Yes, that Detroit. True, Detroit has had it rough for years. And there’s plenty to be depressed about when you look around the city. Factories are abandoned, whole neighborhoods give off a post-apocalyptic vibe, hotels are bombed out shells of their former grandeur. But the city is very much alive.

There’s a palpable sense that Detroit will never die, even if every drop of industry disappears from the 313, even with the already wheezing automakers begging for a bailout. Detroit has music and where there is music, there is life. There is hope. There is a reason to stick your chest out and declare, “This my music, this is my city, this is my country, goddammit. I made it, I breathe it, I sing it and you can never take it from me.”

Driving along Detroit’s long and flat streets you will see plenty of boarded up buildings, but you will also see countless small businesses, including milliners like Mr. Song’s. These businesses make hats for ladies and gentlemen who wear them to parties and events and church. Pass by a church in Detroit on Sunday and you will see a dazzling array of hats on the heads of ladies. The hats make fitting crowns for these ladies who, despite seeing the heart of economic collapse around them, sing in praise of their faith in a higher being and, more importantly, their faith in themselves and their survival, even as the rest of the world turns their back to focus on carving Detroit’s epitaph.

Aretha Franklin moved to Detroit as a child and was/is, of course, one of the brightest stars to come out of Motown. She’s a legend. The only reason that she is The Aretha Franklin is because of her life experiences, which includes growing up in Detroit.

A lot of people have poked fun at her hat, at how over-the-top it was. But I think it’s extremely fitting that a hat from Detroit went to the inauguration and crowned Aretha’s performance. In a way, it’s a symbol of the struggles and perseverance of people in places like The Rust Belt, a reminder that we’re still here, no matter who is in the White House, no matter what corrupt businesspeople do. We’re still here, and we look damn fine in our hats, thank you very much.

Today is supposedly the most depressing day of the year, but I have to say…I’m not feeling it.

I worked and had class today, so it was easy to momentarily forget about all that was going on. Today is, of course, Martin Luther King Jr. Day. The baby asked us the other day if we celebrate MLK and it took me a minute to know how to respond. I mean, we don’t celebrate it like we do other holidays. There isn’t a feast or decorations associated with it, but it is one of those days that we pause to acknowledge that there isn’t just one day for compassion and understanding and battling ignorance, but that we must continue to do so every moment. The husband and I explained this to the baby and told him about other people who have spoken out in the face of injustice, whose words and actions, even their most controversial, we must continue to wear as armor in the war against hate and oppression…Malcolm X, Angela Davis, Nat Turner, Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass.

Tomorrow, of course, we inaugurate Barack Obama. As the hours of George W. Bush’s presidency tick toward their last, I find myself reflecting a lot on how I feel about him as a person. Many times during the last eight years, I said that I hated him, that he made me furious, that he was evil. But I watched video of him the other day in which he answered questions about his presidency and how he felt about it now that it was coming to an end. I realized that I didn’t hate him. I listened to the way he listed the things he regards as “disappointments:” the lack of weapons of mass destruction, never capturing Bin Laden, plastering up that “Mission Accomplished” sign, the extent of the devastation of Katrina, his “inheritance” of an economy in recession. It occurred to me that he doesn’t understand what happened. Thousands and thousands of people died. Whole families were destroyed. These are not disappointments. These are catastrophes that would haunt most people until the end of time. But W., I think, is simply unaware of the reality that we live in under him. He is an unwitting tool of some project steeped in privilege and entitlement, a project that is hopefully gasping its last breaths.

Ultimately, W. is responsible for his actions as president, but the blame (and my rage) can not rest solely on his shoulders. I hope that it will be the legacy of a way of thinking and behaving, that there are people who simply don’t matter, that will die as the books close on W.’s term.

Hope.

It’s such a strange thing, isn’t it? It’s so thrilling but carries with it such an uneasy feeling. Obama doesn’t owe anyone anything and the task of making things right at this time is a job surely far too immense for a couple of measly presidential terms. Honestly, he’s proving a bit too centrist for me and some of his cabinet appointments make me very uncomfortable. But I can wait and see.

That’s my son, right after I let him push the button that cast our vote for Obama and the whole world might as well reside in that blue iris, the same way the President-elect can see the universe in the eyes of his daughters. We have your back, Barack. Show us what you we can do.

With such heavy things pressing on our minds, it’s wonderful to turn to something where the stakes are considerably lower.

Indeed, the Pittsburgh Steelers are going to the Super Bowl. Plenty has been written about how football fans, particularly Steelers fans, are an inexplicably rabid bunch. But I would argue that the anti-football folks are far more rabid. Several seemingly innocent interactions online yesterday quickly turned ugly when folks felt the need to inform me that I am stupid and/or insane for liking football.

I can understand the kneejerk defensiveness. Football is mainstream and we all know how Americans tend to react to behavior that is outside the mainstream. But oddly enough growing up and living in artistic and intellectual circles, my devotion to the Steelers was seen as, at best, a quaint remnant of my blue-collar roots or, at worst, a hint toward my true nature of hideous yinzer Morlock, something to be shed along with my grating and offensive accent and my scandalous desire to simply have fun rather than devoting every waking moment to the elusive goal of enlightenment. This belief that artistic or academic interests are mutually exclusive to football fanaticism is just…stupid.

And besides, I can wax the hell out of some eloquence when it comes to the Steelers and what they mean to Pittsburghers like me. I just know that opening the door last night and hearing the cheers of unbridled joy of people who aren’t even in the game is an amazing experience. And I know that celebrating their Super Bowl XL win on my normally silent main street is something that will flash in my mind right before I die. It’s not really The Win, you see. It’s getting the chance to see people who you normally pass on the street and maybe grunt at just…happy.

I think, as an adult, I’m suppose to get all grumpy about the snow and gripe about how difficult it makes life, but I have to be honest. I love snow. When I was little, I can remember it snowing like this all throughout winter. Now it doesn’t seem to dump the white stuff like it used to, so I get even more excited about snowfall than I did when I was a kid.

The husband played at a club last night and I wasn’t feeling so great so I just stayed home. I ended up watching a couple older movies, namely For Keeps and Hackers.

I had seen For Keeps a couple of times when I was a kid. It was one of those semi-crappy movies that were on HBO constantly in the 80s. This was obviously before I was old enough to really get what was going on in it, but for being a rather melodramatic Lifetime-ish movie, it’s surprisingly bold in its depiction of an unexpected pregnancy and the frightening ways people behave when trying to deal with it. I’ve yet to see anything from pop culture that really accurately depicts how it feels to know that you’re in an icky situation with a pregnancy at a young age, and at the same time struggling with how impossible it is to convince everyone around you that you can make the right decisions for yourself. Juno came very close in many ways. I think both movies hit me in the gut most with some of the things people say to a woman when she’s pregnant and they don’t approve. It’s amazing how honest people get and how ugly that honesty is.

Hackers was another movie I hadn’t seen in years and it was almost painful in its 90s-ness. And it seemed entirely plausible that the people who wrote and directed the movie had never been in the same room as a computer. I nearly choked when they were drooling over a computer’s kick-ass 28.8 bps modem and the constant dubbing of people as 1337.

Errgh, I think I could probably replace this whole post with, “I’m a loser x300.”

Anyway, the Steelers play the AFC championship game in just a few short hours, then the new season of Big Love premieres, THEN The United States of Tara premieres. Just to illustrate how excited I am about those things, I’ll point out that I did nearly all of my reading for this week’s classes yesterday afternoon so that I wouldn’t have to worry about it today at all.