cindy's world

Waiting for people behind me to finish boarding the plane for my 9:40 p.m. flight out of San Jose airport, I stared out the window and caught a magnificent fireworks show. It must’ve gone on for half an hour. I was impressed by the firework that goes up in one unit, then sprays red sparks out such that they line up and make a huge heart in the sky. I don’t know how they control the direction of and and distance traveled by the sparks for such a formation. There were 3 of those.

The view below was beautiful after take-off. The brightly lit grid beneath me was punctuated here and there by small circlets of color exploding and glittering as people on the ground celebrated our nation’s birthday. I don’t know why I thought fireworks reached as high as planes fly. From the sky, the fireworks seemed to be tiny mushroom caps right at the city surface. From the ground, the fireworks are gargantuan umbrellas of color, fire and smoke reaching across the heavens. I was relieved to discover this difference, and kicked myself for having my camera packed away in the overhead storage bin so that I couldn’t document my enlightenment.

I will add more photos later when I receive a copy of Jimmy’s photos (documenting our insanity on Monday), and when I get to my better photo editing program at home so I can crop out all the dead space around the photo. Meanwhile, this photo is representative of Monday:

Our trial attorney asked me an hour ago which beach I had gone to in San Jose, and I could not remember. He started naming all these beaches, and none of them sound right. The point is, it doesn’t matter. The location was a variable; it was how I felt that was the surprising constant. There was a big crowd at our beach event and although most were strangers, I was comfortable enough to completely be stupid. My camera battery died so the really stupid photos are on Jimmy’s camera. Things like my standing on Diana and Jen’s backs and shoulders in a human pyramid, and our imitating the famous photo of the flag-raising at Iwo Jima… only instead of Feb 19, 1945, it was July 4, 2005; instead of the American flag it was a beach umbrella; instead of the US Navy it was Val, Jen and myself; instead of the battlefield rocks it was Diana’s ass.

Good times. At one point I looked around, fully aware of my high level of contentment and comfort, and then it suddenly hit me that later that evening I would be on a flight home and this beach, these people, are so far away from “home.” That was a strange feeling.

I’m sorry to have missed the beach night bonfire, but very happy to have participated in the antics of the day. I am grateful to all of these people who have befriended me and taken me in at a very hard time in my life, and have shown me by their mere existence that continued faith in people, friendships, and connectivity is warranted. Thanks, guys.

Saturday:

There is something so satisfying about hanging out with these people, a lot of whom I have only met once before, a month ago. From grocery shopping and cooking with Brad to laughing at Mike’s renditions of events to rebonding with Diana over each other’s social miseries to watching Jen’s sweet silliness to making fun of Jimmy under the stars to falling asleep outside and waking up just prior to hypothermia setting in. I perched so long on top of the stone-topped cooking range in Diana’s backyard last nite chatting with people that I think I bruised my butt-bone (okay, so I’m not an anatomy genius). I told them as I sat out there watching the stars get brighter as the night got darker (mostly because Diana couldn’t figure out how to turn the lights on outside; turned out the timer switch was unplugged) that it’s amazing how comfortable I was there that evening. I didn’t feel left out even tho a lot of the night was spent out of the circle of main conversation, and I felt totally at peace and safe. There was no worrying that someone was gonna get drunk and out of hand, or that there was some subplot going on so I’d better keep an eye open and watch my back. And I’ve only known a lot of these people a month. Amazing. Oh yeah. And the lasagnes turned out pretty well, if I can trust the compliments of the guests. The largest compliments were the guys who went back for seconds, and Henry’s girlfriend whose parents own(ed?) an Italian restaurant and who said that this is the best Italian food she’s ever tasted that an Asian person made. These people felt like kin.

Sunday:

Sunday isn’t over yet as it’s right before 9pm and it looks like we’re getting ready to go out again. I accomplished two things. The first is the realization that people who I’d thought were perfect and so admirable, I found out today is as human as the rest of us, and everyone has issues. I’m not sure if this is a good discovery, but over time I’m sure its effect will be revealed. The second thing is that I finally got a tan. I wore my bikini to Melanie’s (right photo, whose back you see) annual July 4th pool party and had good food and…well…interesting company. I didn’t mingle as much as I could have, but there were enough people I liked around me that I didn’t feel compelled to go out of my comfort zone. Jimmy, thanks for letting me throw you over my shoulder onto the grass. Now I know never to throw a fully-clothed adult while I’m in my bikini. Ouch, the fabric burn on my shoulder and shoulder blade…

I’m supposed to be packing and otherwise getting ready for my trip tomorrow, and what am I doing? This:


Disney’s Mulan in traditional Asian garb… Cindy in traditional Asian garb (2nd from left).
Okay, so maybe there are SOME similarities between me and Mulan. (For new readers, refer to 6-27-05 post, “Cindy the Cartoon“.)

At the gym at lunch, I laid back on the bench for the lat pull-down machine to do a set of chest exercises with dumbbells. In mid-set, out of the corner of my eye I saw an older guy walk around and sit down at the perpendicular and connected machine that works calves. He had been sitting on a nearby bench taking a rest and watching me do my circuit. When I got back up to do lat pull-downs again, I noticed that he had taken the pin out of my weight stack and was using it for his calves machine! How rude! There were free weight stacks all around us connected to our machine that no one was using! I leaned left and took the pin off an unoccupied stack and put it silently into my weight. He watched me do this but didn’t say anything and continued his set. I added my irritation to my glower power from yesterday and had a super-aggressive workout. But after I stepped off the cardio machine onto the sliding scale…HOW THE HELL DID I GAIN 5 LBS THIS WEEK?! 4 days straight of jujitsu, 2 hrs each, AND I still worked out at the gym 3 days this week, and I GAINED weight?!

The glower resumes.

My b-day flowers are beautiful, blossoming, and fragrant. These photos (taken with my dinky cameraphone) really don’t do the bouquet justice, because from where I’m looking at the actual thing it’s clear there are 25 roses 2 feet tall. It’s hard to believe that when they came, they were this little scrunched up pile of buds in a tight rectangular box. I remember Grace’s wedding florist, Ernie, telling me “When roses are given in love, they’ll bloom. When they’re not, they’ll stay budded and wilt as buds.” I used to have all my roses wilt in buds. I guess Vicky and Peter really love me.