I have been sadly negligent of my blog these past few months. Aside from posting about a Jane Austen book giveaway (from which I won a beautiful book on the life and times of the famous author), I have barely touched (in a rhetorical sense, of course) my blog. The other day my best friend called me out on it, requesting, nay, demanding, that I post something soon, because, to quote her, "It's looking pretty dead these days."
I realize that complaining on how I haven't touched my blog for some time is a pathetic way of starting up again, but I do have an excuse. Several, in fact. So here they are:
1. I moved
Yes, I moved. Really and truly moved. It was frightening, and exciting, and hard. (Try packing your whole life into several large suitcases.) I now live in a lovely little studio apartment on the outskirts of Manassas, Virginia. It is very far from my homeland of crazy, yet lovable, California. Fortunately, I have relatives just down the road, and my best friend Jen is coming to live with me. (I tell her I'm glad she's coming because it will keep me from being lonely, but really it's because she'll pay half of the rent.)
I am enjoying Northern Virginia. I am not very fond of the city. I'm not very fond of cities in general; I guess I'll always be a small town girl. I'm not very fond of Virginia drivers, either. They're terribly bad at using their turn signals, and they have two very strange habits. One is if they're stopped at a red light, and are first in line, they'll gradually start inching up into the intersection. It's not going to get you there any faster, people. Also, when they stop at a light, they leave about one to two car-lengths between them and the car in front of them, and often start inching up during the red light. Consequently it's stop-and-go traffic at a red light. Really, people? The other thing that really bothers me is the roads. Whoever thought up the roads in Virginia as on drugs. They are nothing like the neat and tidy grid-based roads of California. They meander, they are never straight, and they get narrow in strange places. And of course there is the strange phenomenon of a road not going through an intersection. In Virginia, the road stops at the main intersection and becomes a different road on the other side. Why? I ask. You may ask the same question. No one really knows. It's the East Coast. And then there are always several roads of the same name that are not connected or even near each other in any way. It makes directions terribly hard to follow. I have been lost many times.
Yet, despite the terrible road systems and bad drivers, it is a beautiful place, Virginia. I love all the green trees and grass, and the wildness of it. Virginia landscape is not tame. There are beautiful and interesting houses everywhere. There is the history, as well. It gives me a thrill of delight every time I think that people walked this ground that I am walking hundreds of years ago. This is where the first Americans walked. This is where the great bloody war between the North and the South was fought. Right here. The soundtrack from Gettysburg swells in my head as I drive down Sudley Road, past the Manassas battlefield. One of these days I'll actually stop my car and walk that battlefield. Though really, wasn't all of Virginia a battlefield?
2. I have been job-hunting
All right, that isn't really an excuse, since not having a job gives me plenty of time to blog.
3. I got a job
Not really an excuse either, since I haven't started my new job, or rather, jobs, yet. I am a teacher now! And here I was thinking that since it was so late in the summer I'd have to settle for a nanny or retail job. I'm not thrilled about the early mornings (school starts at 8 am), but it's only four days a week. I'll be able to recuperate on the last three days. Oh, and I'm also a violin teacher, and unlike California, I have a lot of students. People actually commit to things here. What a novel concept.
4. I joined the Manassas Symphony Orchestra
Okay, this isn't really a list of excuses any more. I think it's becoming a list of the exciting things that have happened to me since July 2014. Yes, I auditioned for MSO and am playing second violin. I haven't played second violin in a very long time, aside from a short stint in the Antelope Valley Symphony during the Rite of Spring. It's very different, but I'm enjoying it all the same. It's a very good group. We had our first concert last Sunday. Now let me ask, what is it about orchestra directors and bad jokes? And what is it about orchestra directors having at least one child that plays the cello? Maybe this is not such a widespread phenomenon as I think it is, but I do find it intriguing.
5. I've been, um, writing a lot
It's rather embarrassing to list this, since if I've been writing a lot, I should be posting a lot. My mind doesn't always work that way.
6. I discovered the Prince William County Library System
Now that is a good discovery. There are two large libraries right in Manassas! Please don't judge me when I say I have gone in and sniffed the books. It's a thing I do. The books in the PWC library system have a lovely smell, every single one of them. I'm not sure why. They also have a great "friends of the library" sale room, and you can fill a bag of books for $2. It really doesn't get any better than that.
So there are some excuses. Whether you take them or not is up to you. I really am going to try more to update my blog at least a few times a week. At least once a week.
