Duckfucious Say

People keep asking me when we find out where we're going on our first tour, which is always followed by a speculation that I must be anxious and/or freaking out about it. I've caught myself saying things like, "Yeah, it's driving me nuts!" and "I'm so ready to find out!" But that's actually not the truth. I keep saying it because it seems, conversationally, like the right thing to say.

In reality, I feel very serene and calm about the whole situation and would go so far as to say I don't really think about it all until someone else brings it up. We can't do anything to change or influence where we're going, now or after the decision is made. Right now, since we don't know where we're going, there's nothing we can really do to prepare. What kind of clothes will we need? What kind of car? How will we transport the cat? Will the new country have peanut butter, or no peanut butter?

There are just too many variables to even consider, which makes stressing (or really even thinking too hard) about it totally pointless. It's fun to daydream, of course (the Caribbean!), but it's not worth the energy to speculate and stress out.

I'm not sure where this zen-like feeling of detachment and acceptance has come from, but I'm very glad to feel this way. There's something liberating about knowing that, in a very real and not at all figurative way, our fate is totally out of our hands. Is this what religious people feel like? Or what religious people try to feel like?

I also remember feeling this way about going to college. I like to tell that old chestnut of a story about how I applied to college by taking a quiz on the internet. I took a quiz. It gave me two suggestions, one in Washington and one in Louisiana. I applied to both. I got into both. I went to the one where they seemed to want me the most (and they were like, "hey, money! For you!"). And I don't remember ever thinking, "oh god! What if I made the wrong choice?" I kind of just felt like everywhere you go there are people and trees and cars and problems and ice cream and who cares? I got lucky with Centenary, but even if I had hated it (impossible), it still would not have been worth agonizing over beforehand.

Based on my conversations with everyone in the world, I'm gathering that my lack of anxiety on this front is unusual. Probably so. It's probably a lot more normal to stress out in a situation like this, where seemingly everything is about to change and there's so much uncertainty (thanks again, Centenary, for the heads up on that one!). It sounds really stupid on paper, but when I was planning the wedding and having a bit of a freakout, one of my best friends told me that she relies on the mantra "I am a duck. This is water rolling off my back." It's not a very exotic mantra, and when, in stressful situations, I have said out loud, "I am a duck" (deep breath), people have looked at me like a might be a little bit drunk and possibly my insanity is going to make things worse. However, for me, it's extremely effective. Sometimes I'm naturally a duck. Sometimes not so much. Either way the truth is, that we'll go wherever we go. Some things about it will suck. Some will be awesome. We have no control over it. And for now that's fine.

What's did is did.

Remember that part in Groundhog Day where Bill Murray kidnaps Punxsutawney Phil and let's him drive a truck? Of course you do.

DON'T DRIVE ANGRY!

This is an apt metaphor for our lives right now.

In two weeks, there will be a big ceremony called "Flag Day" where we find out where we're going to live for the next two year and also how long we'll be in DC before we go.

At the beginning of this process we were given the "bid list" and the opportunity to talk directly with the Career Development Officer who will have a big role in deciding where to put us.

Our first task was to think about our priorities for where we'd like to go. We told the CDO that, because we're local hires, our main priority for our first tour is timing. (In other words, because we already live and work DC, we're still paying rent here--which the other new Foreign Service officers who've come in from elsewhere are not.) Our lease goes until July--so that's what we're aiming for. Our other concerns were that 1.) we preferred to be in the Western Hemisphere and 2.) we preferred an English, Spanish, or Portuguese-speaking post.  That should, in theory, be easy for us to get, since fully 50% of the available posts meet all those criteria.

Our second task was to methodically research every post available to us on the Bid List and rank each of them "High", "Medium", or "Low" in preference. And we had the option of providing a short comment on some (but not all) of the posts, if we had something to say about it. For instance, we remarked that, because we have family in the area, Tijuana, Mexico might be a good fit for us, but because we're trying to start a family the "Adults Only" unaccompanied posts were not.

Out of all the posts, we were only allowed to rank 25% of them "low", which I was very concerned about before I actually saw the list. It was a HUGE relief, after ten years of knowing this was what I signed up for if I stayed with Tim, to get the list and be reminded that I am genuinely interested in living in (or at least visiting) most places in the world. I'm human, of course, and I have preferences, but there was nowhere on the bid list that I thought, "if he gets sent there, I'm OUT." Especially since our first tour will only be two years.

So after a lot of hemming and hawing, we sorted out our posts and I'm pleased to report that we ranked a really sizable number of posts as "High" and that we would honestly love to end up in any one those places.

Throughout this whole exercise, however, we have been constantly reminded that Tim signed an agreement making him "WORLDWIDE AVAILABLE". Which means that while they will make every effort to consider our desires. They will ultimately place us wherever (and whenever) we are needed most. That could mean Panama again, with perfect timing, or it could mean Dahran, or Shenyang, or Accra, or Ottowa. (Hint: it will NOT be Ottowa.) As they told us to, we are "hoping for 'High', expecting 'Medium', and prepared for 'Low'".

In other words, while it make look like we are in the driver's seat, ultimately we have gleefully and maybe a little recklessly handed our fate to a large metaphorical rodent name Foreign Service Phil, who is going to take us wherever he damn well pleases. One bit of comfort however, is that I am mostly, if not totally confident, that we will end up better than Bill and Phil, which you may recall, went something like this:

On the bright side though, Bill woke up the next morning to another Groundhog Day, and if our first tour is not great, we will eventually be put somewhere else, and somewhere else again after that. Right now we just have to make it through two more weeks of not knowing.

The Very Long Weekend

It has been strange weekend. We had such great plans for Saturday and Sunday... we were going to take a road trip and spend the weekend snow tubing and hanging out at an indoor water park. What actually happened is that, at approximately 7:18 p.m. Friday night, Tim got hit with some sort of terrible 48-hour flu. So we cancelled those plans and stayed indoors FOREVER. Yesterday I got sick and had to miss our MLK plans. 

Now today we're having a "DC Snowday" which is when everything is cancelled and shut down not because it's actually snowing, but because they're pretty sure it might snow, possibly, sometime soon (it's 11:30 here and the snow just started). One way or another, Tim and I got the day off and I'm making Pasta e Fagioli (i.e., pasta fazool), so, Thanks DC, for your wonderful overreaction to all things weather-related.

As promised, here are my top ten favorite books from last year, in no particular order.

Nova by Samuel R. Delany

I love science fiction, but with a strong qualifier: I love science fiction movies and television, but have never been a huge Science Fiction reader.  Science Fiction novels just aren't as enthralling to me as seeing it on the screen. (Terrible, right?) Nova, however, is one of the more brilliant books I've read in the past few years, in any genre. I'm not sure why it's not more famous (it was nominated for a Hugo Award in 1969, at least). The plot is standard fare: the captain of a star ship puts together a ragtag crew of misfits to embark on a seemingly hopeless quest across the universe that is both personal and political.  The writing, however, is intensely beautiful and the imagery is bold.  The story resonates with mythology: something I'm a huge sucker for.  Given that Samuel Delaney was born in Harlem about 20 years after the Harlem Renaissance, this should all be no big surprise. Basically, I turned the last page and felt like I'd just eaten a rich and satisfying piece of cake, which is exactly how the best books should make you feel.

True Grit by Charles Portis

Just listen to the first paragraph of the book:

People do not give it credence that a fourteen-year-old girl could leave home and go off in the wintertime to avenge her father's blood but it did not seem so strange them, although I will say it did not happen every day.  I was just fourteen years of age when a coward going by the name of Tom Chaney shot my father down in Fort Smith, Arkansas, and robbed him of his life and his horse and $150 in cash money plus two California gold pieces that he carried in his trouser band. 

Here is what happened.

TELL ME that that doesn't make you want to read the rest of the book. You can't. This wonderful little book is told from the POV of Mattie, who has bigger cojones than any character in any Western I've ever read. She is fearless and driven and completely no-nonsense and I'm totally in love with her. The writing is tight and strong and fast-paced and when you reach the end, you feel inclined to flip back to the first page and read it all over again. This book is a pleasure if for no other reason than the amazing way that Mattie verbally eviscerates the drunken, stupid, slovenly men she's forced to rely on for help. Just amazing.

Where'd You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple

This book was on all the best seller lists last year for a very good reason: it's both funny and touching, without being cheesy. This is a novel about a family, a mother, a father, and their daughter. When the mother, Bernadette, disappears, 15-year-old Bee begins putting together the pieces of the puzzle. The whole book is great, but some of the individual scenes alone are enough to make it a worth-while read, including one particularly satisfying scene taking place at a PTO-like event organized by Bernadette's arch nemesis. This is what happens with beautiful, creative people with genius IQs are left to their own devices and it's fantastic.

The Dangerous Animals Club by Stephen Tobolowsky

If you don't know Stephen Tobolowsky's name, I'm 100% certain that you would recognize his face. He has 226 acting credits on IMDB. Though I know and love him most as Ned Ryerson from Groundhog Day. This was a surprising memoir for me; it was more literary than your typical "celebrity" memoir and more well-rounded. It made me nostalgic for things I didn't even know existed. It reminded me of something Stephen King might write, if he had been an actor instead of a writer, maybe because King and Tobolowsky are only a few years apart in age? Nevertheless, I thoroughly enjoyed this collection of stories from Tobolowsky's life, even if the two of us seem to have very little in common.

St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves by Karen Russell

Those of you from the South will, I think, find this one particularly resonant. Also those of you who got degrees in literature from a Liberal Arts school with a strong gender studies leaning. These stories are magical and lovely and sad and mystifying all at once. 'Nuff said.

Joyland by Stephen King

I just can't help it. I just love Stephen King (when he's on his A-game) with every fiber of the marrow in my bones down to the very bottom of my soul.  This book isn't particularly deep or unusual, but it's just satisfying and wonderful and I read the entire thing in one sitting. Joyland is a pulp-fiction murder mystery set in an old amusement park and peopled with your typical amusement-park type characters and it has everything you might want and expect from that sort of book, in addition to having a very satisfying coming-of-age story that makes you feel the way the movie Stand by Me makes you feel. Loved every page of it. (I liked this one better than Dr. Sleep, in case you wondered.)

Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn

After reading Gone Girl, I picked up Gillian Flynn's other two books with a swiftness and found that both of them were also page-turners. While I (and everyone else, apparently) enjoyed Gone Girl (and that twist!) I think this is actually my favorite of the three books. I think what I enjoyed about it is that while there are lots of books in the world about relationships between men and women, there are not as many about relationships between mothers and daughters, or even just women and girls' relationships to one another--and especially not many so gritty and disturbing. My relationship with my mother is NOTHING like the pair in this book and so it was like watching an epic train wreck and not being able to look away.

The Orphan Master's Son by Adam Johnson

I might go so far as to say this was my favorite book of 2013. I am totally fascinated by/terrified of North Korea and I think that this is the first piece of fiction I've ever read about it. This book is masterfully written (it won the Pulitzer), gripping, imaginative, haunting... etc. etc.etc. on and on ad infinitum. I have no way of knowing if the North Korea described in this book is accurate or not, but it doesn't matter. The places and people and culture described in this novel are moving and disturbing all the same.

Let's Pretend This Never Happened: A Mostly True Memoir by Jenny Lawson

Another memoir, this time by the Bloggess herself. I'm fairly certain almost everyone I know has already read this, so I'm not going to go on about it too much.   Jenny Lawson writes about her absurd life with a delicious awareness of said absurdity and of her own (sometimes amusing, sometimes debilitating) fatal flaws, and everyone in the world is the better for it. Period.

The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris

One of the rare instances when the book and the film stand on (almost) equal footing. I would not go so far as to say this book is excellent, but it is surprisingly good.  One of the reasons it stood out for me was that, despite being written and published in the 80's, its point of view is ahead of its time.  I like to read the older novels that famous movies are based on, sometimes to my own detriment. This year I attempted to read The Exorcist and was so disgusted by its cheesy, sexist, overly hysterical vapidness that I put it down 30 pages in. Written when it was, it would have been easy for The Silence of the Lambs to be just as sexist and narrow-minded, but I can't stress enough how happy I was to find that wasn't the case.  The main character of the book is a female FBI agent who has to deal with sexism and stupidity all around her, and who does it fiercely. Her best friend is another female FBI agent, who is African American. The victim is the daughter of a powerful female senator. The villain is a man who wants to be a woman, but this is very important: the book goes out of its way to emphasize that that is not what makes him a deviant. He's "deviant" because he kills people, not because he's transgendered. He's an anomaly. I could go on and on about this forever. I wish I'd read this in college because I would have written an INSANE paper about it.

Honorable Mention:

The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman: a modern fairy tale.

Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal by Mary Roach: a hilarious book about the human digestive tract.

Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell: a refreshing teen romance.

Habibi by Craig Thompson: a stunning graphic novel about the depths of love.

Green River, Running Red: The Real Story of the Green River Killer--America's Deadliest Serial Murderer by Ann Rule: a classic in the True Crime genre, only to be read if you don't mind worrying that everyone around you is a serial killer for three months afterward.

Dishonorable mention: AKA, I read them so you don't have to:

Zombie by Joyce Carol Oates: Obviously, I like disturbing books, but I got absolutely NO enjoyment out of reading this awful book.

The Middlesteins by Jami Attenberg: A depressing book about obesity with zero reward or redemption.

Him Her Him Again the End of Him by Patricia Marx: so promising, to little payoff.

Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld: PLEASE STOP COMPLAINING. I HATE YOU.

Low, Medium, and High

There's something suuuuuper surreal about being handed a long list of cities and then told, "learn about these, because you will be moving to one of them in the next 6 to 18 months."

We got the fabled "bid list" last night. This is the list of posts that Tim and each of his new Foreign Service colleagues might end up in. It's basically the list we've been thinking about for two months (but also: ten years)  We have to read through them, rank them all "high" (yes, I would like to go to there), "medium" (meh), and "low" (I can't even).

You would not believe the Beautiful-Mind style spreadsheet I've created using a color-coded and probably indecipherable rating system designed to squeeze all of the mystery out of this process.

This creates the illusion that we have some choice in where we'll be going. In reality, even though the powers that be will carefully consider what we want, we could pretty much end up anywhere on the list.  (Or off the list. It's subject to change.) It's a very good exercise in being open minded, in reconsidering what's important to you (toilets -- functioning toilets are DEFINITELY important to me), and getting a reality check.

Once we learn where we're going (which will come MUCH faster than I'm prepared for) I will need to make a 'merica bucket list with things at both ends of the spectrum, from going to the top of the Washington Monument (I've lived here for six years and have never done that. THANKS EARTHQUAKE.) to watching episodes of 'Are You Afraid of the Dark' that are only licensed to be played in the U.S. on the internet.

Mostly though, I'm just praying for two things: I don't want to be posted in DC and I do want to go somewhere awesome enough that everyone will come and visit us.

(Also, I want the Broncos to win the Super Bowl, but that's a totally different issue.)

Just a List

Well, I promised to post about the books I read in 2013. It turns out that 60 books is a lot more than my brain can process in one sitting. Stay tuned for reviews of the top ten best books I read this year, but in the meantime here's the straight-up list. See if you can read it without your brain exploding.

The Ocean at the End of the Lane, Gaiman, Neil 

My Horizontal Life: A Collection of One Night Stands, Handler, Chelsea

Zombie, Oates, Joyce Carol

Assassination Vacation, Vowell, Sarah

Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal, Roach, Mary 

Nova, Delany, Samuel R.

True Grit, Portis, Charles

Prep, Sittenfeld, Curtis

Doctor Sleep (The Shining, #2), King, Stephen 

Heartburn, Ephron, Nora

Divergent (Divergent, #1), Roth, Veronica 

Stardust, Gaiman, Neil 

Fables, Vol. 1: Legends in Exile (Fables, #1), Willingham, Bill 

Ragtime, Doctorow, E.L.

Where'd You Go, Bernadette, Semple, Maria 

Habibi, Thompson, Craig

The Fault in Our Stars, Green, John 

Atonement, McEwan, Ian

Eleanor & Park, Rowell, Rainbow 

I Love You, Beth Cooper, Doyle, Larry

The Dangerous Animals Club, Tobolowsky, Stephen

St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves, Russell, Karen 

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (Hitchhiker's Guide, #1), Adams, Douglas

Joyland, King, Stephen 

Lotería, Zambrano, Mario Alberto 

Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness, Cahalan, Susannah 

Him Her Him Again the End of Him, Marx, Patricia

Green River, Running Red: The Real Story of the Green River Killer--America's Deadliest Serial Murderer, Rule, Ann

Coraline, Gaiman, Neil 

Kafka on the Shore, Murakami, Haruki

Tobacco Road, Caldwell, Erskine

The Middlesteins, Attenberg, Jami 

Dark Places, Flynn, Gillian 

The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ, Pullman, Philip

Maniac Magee, Spinelli, Jerry

Little Bee, Cleave, Chris 

Sharp Objects, Flynn, Gillian 

The God of Small Things, Roy, Arundhati

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Dick, Philip K.

How to Be a Woman, Moran, Caitlin

The Orphan Master's Son, Johnson, Adam

The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption, and Pee, Silverman, Sarah

Scott Pilgrim's Finest Hour (Scott Pilgrim, #6), O'Malley, Bryan Lee

Scott Pilgrim Gets It Together (Scott Pilgrim, #4), O'Malley, Bryan Lee

Scott Pilgrim Vs. the Universe (Scott Pilgrim, #5), O'Malley, Bryan Lee

Scott Pilgrim & the Infinite Sadness (Scott Pilgrim, #3), O'Malley, Bryan Lee

Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World (Scott Pilgrim, #2), O'Malley, Bryan Lee

Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life (Scott Pilgrim, #1), O'Malley, Bryan Lee

John Dies at the End (John Dies at the End, #1), Wong, David

The Unraveling (Wool, #4), Howey, Hugh 

Casting Off (Wool, #3), Howey, Hugh 

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Harry Potter, #5), Rowling, J.K.

Proper Gauge (Wool, #2), Howey, Hugh 

The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1), Snicket, Lemony

Wool (Wool, #1), Howey, Hugh 

Let's Pretend This Never Happened: A Mostly True Memoir, Lawson, Jenny 

Beautiful Creatures (Caster Chronicles, #1), Garcia, Kami 

Ender's Game (The Ender Quintet, #1), Card, Orson Scott

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Harry Potter, #4), Rowling, J.K.

The Silence of the Lambs (Hannibal Lecter, #2), Harris, Thomas

Caught a fish and dropped it in. Finnegan, begin again.

Forget the past ten days. I feel like today is actual New Years Day.  Yesterday was Tim's last day as a civil servant. His training for the Foreign Service begins on Monday.  What does that mean for me?

First, it means that my day-to-day life changes: I won't be commuting to and from work with him every day, having lunch together, or chatting on MS Communicator. I realize that this level of communication with one's spouse throughout the day is abnormal. I get it. But I'll still miss it.

Second, it means that things are going to change very rapidly over the next six weeks. While Tim attends training every day, I will also have about one training or event to go to every week, which makes me really, really happy that I already know the ins and outs of the State Department and won't have to 1) try to get oriented as a visitor 2) commute for training or 3) explain the process to my boss. She already knows more about it than I do, so she's SUPER understanding that I'll be leaving for large parts of the day sort of randomly.

I am NOT a resolutions person to begin with. My life's resolution is not to suck at being a person and I don't feel the need to renew that commitment every year. If I DID make resolutions, they would probably be the normal ones:

Travel more
Read more books
Be happy with my job
Lose weight
Have a baby*
Blog more

*I know this is not a "normal" resolution

As for traveling, this will not be an issue. We find out on February 14th where we'll be headed. This has a sort of delicious symmetry, as it's not only Valentine's day, which is the day TEN YEARS AGO that Tim told me his life's dream was to live in Brazil and that he wanted me to go with him; it is also the day before his 30th birthday.

Reading more books: let's be honest, this isn't really a problem.

Be happy with my job: This astonishes even me, but shhhhh, listen.... **I actually am happy with my job**  Psychologically speaking, it could be in part because I know I'll be leaving it sometime in the next 3-12 months. But I really, actually like it. Also, even if I didn't, I'm VERY excited about the prospects for my career while we're abroad. I'm equally excited about being unemployed (I am SO good at it) as I am about the idea of possibly working at a post abroad.

Losing weight? This is America. Everyone wants to lose weight. Even skinny people. When I'm unemployed I'll work out more. Or I'll get pregnant and will eat a lot and this will happen:

Let's be honest, that already happens.

The blog: well, see? Here we are.

Basically, the moral of this story is that we've been thinking and talking and working towards the Foreign Service for a very, very long time and it's starting to really sink in that it's happening right now.  I will try to write more, if not for you, then because good or bad or both I don't want to forget.