waiting for meatloaf

listening to opera while my meatloaf cooks. i was going to read while i drank my coffee (with a scoop of nancy' s super-secret-recipe of hot chocolate in it!) but i couldnt turn it off. Les Miserables....ah. here's the thing about loving opera music: it's hard to sing along, so you just kindoff have to listen. well, okay, i do actually sing along. loudly. like, top of my lungs loudly. and i imitate all the inflections, and act out just a little bit, too. it's hard to hit some of those male bass notes, but if i dig deep and enter triple-chin mode, i can reach them more or less. at least for the common person, singing along with opera is a very vulnerable, honest activity. when you sing along with a typical pop song or even basic jazz, you tend to at least blend in. but with opera, you stick out like the vegetable plate on the holiday snack table.
at least it's clear you're doing it all for love and not for some kind of accolade or affirmation.

i cant stop typing up the words as i hear them. they're just so brilliant that i want to see them written down. reminds me of the time i watched The Princess Bride and wrote it down word for word. didn't do anything with that little notebook and those hours and hours of tedious work, but at least i know the script of that movie very well.
i like to see words written down; i LOVE grammar. i love looking at a sentence and seeing parts of speech and parts of sentence and clause types...like a secret code emerging from the page that only a select few see.

"a heart full of love. a heart full of song. i'm doing everything all wrong. oh god, for shame, i do not even know your name. dear mamosielle, wont you say? will you tell?"
"a heart full of love. no fear, no regrets. "
"my name is marius ponmercy."
"and mine's cosette."
"cosette, i dont know what to say."
"then make no sound."
"i am lost."
"i am found."

(if only i could rhyme that naturally in my poetry, my husband might understand it :). )
i want to introduce myself in song from now on.

oh darn, the CD ended. switching to disc 2--waiting with bated breath. what happens??!??!?!? ive only listened to it 50,000 times. i hear new things every time, though. new words, new inflection, new notes, new meaning. that's another thing i love about words. endless discovery.



made it to the end of the first week...the first week back from Christmas break. (switching subjects now. like when you transition with a new acquaintance from small talk to some serious get-to-know-you stuff. keep up.) i was so exhausted all week that i almost had no hope of getting back into my grove. today was better though; amazing what a little sleep will do. or, rather, a lot of sleep. i dont mind going to bed early. i dont think it's the sign of old age--i think that's just from irresponsible people trying to make responsible people feel bad for being prudent. besides, it's not even about "not being able" to stay up late. its simply that i love sinking into my bed and relaxing. bed is one of the only places where i'm not doing ANYTHING so forgive me if i'm there when 8pm rolls around. sheesh.

i used to sing this song--"On my Own"--all the time when i was in high school. high school is a good time to identify with Eponine since she's usually singing about how she would surrender everything for marius and he wont even look at her. id like to say i'm a realistic kind of person who usually falls in with the character who doesn't get everything they want, because thats a true reflection of the world we live in...but i'm totally not. i buy into the heroine everytime--especially when she is getting the money, the man, the perfect job (which is a total crock in movies, by the way, because main characters always seem to have money but never work and have all this time to enjoy what they have; can't blame them though. i dont think id want to watch a movie about a couple who get up early, go to work for 8 hours, see each other over dinner for 4 hours and then go to bed and start all over again. not very exciting stuff.) i think i changed subjects in my parenthesis because i cant remember what i was talking about in the first place. oh, yeah, im absolutely the person who wants a happy ending. ill admit that a movie is good even if it has a sad ending (point in case: 500 Days of Summer), but if i'm escaping into a movie, i sort of WANT it to lie to me and leave me happy and hopeful.

oh yes, "Little Fall of Rain." i memorized this one too, and often sang it with my friend jessi elder. i always sang the guy part because i could reach those notes, and could pick out the harmony. i liked to sing the girl part, though, because of that one part when she has to pretend to be in pain...it was so...DRAMATIC. marius does have a weepy tone at the end of his part, though, so i did get to be theatrical. we thought we were SO COOL. well, I thought i was so cool singing operatic songs with my friend. now that i think back on it, i'm sure we were ridiculous.

MEATLOAF!!!