recoveringmale

I interviewed at Reed today. It went perfectly. Nothing left to do but wait.
Not twenty minutes after that, I got a call from one of the places I'd applied, and I think I may finally have a job. Naturally this put me in an excellent mood. Had it taken much longer, I'd have been forced to moved back home for 6 months or so (assuming I get into school), until fall semester began. To me, this was the worst thing imaginable, something I was desperate to avoid. But you get paranoid looking for work around here. Isn't it the worst job economy in the country still? I was starting to despair, either way. I dont get confirmation about it till Sunday, but Im pretty sure I got it. Hallelujah.
I drove over to the Lone Fir Pioneer Cemetery this afternoon, taking the tip from starisea. I had planned on taking photographs, but once I got out of my car I found Id left the camera at home. I imagine some part of me did it intentionally. So I just tucked a book under my arm and walked in. It was indeed peaceful. I havent spent too much time in graveyards, but I do like them. Walking between headstones, being careful not to step on any. Some are so small they can disappear in the overgrown grass. I used to feel I ought to not walk over peoples graves, but then, I doubt if theyd really mind. Also, I cant determine exactly which way theyre laying from the headstone. And finally, theyre six feet under anyway.
A crypt, a century old, like a little stone bakery with curved gates of rusted metal. Spires that looked like pieces from a giant game of chess. Families. Two infants lay next to each other, one only three days old, the other only a few weeks. There was a headstone which lacked dates, simply revealing that its inhabitant had been born a woman in the 1800s but died a man in 1920. I imagined that the dead all hung around watching the living, bemused, like they do in the show Six Feet Under. Would I appear to them as a foolish young man, walking amongst graves to ponder mortality? I guess so. But I really don't think they mind my passing through.
As I walked, a Loudon Wainwright III song floated through my head...

I go to the graveyard
where we all must go
among the dead and buried there
just so I will know
what it's like beneath those trees
listening to that wind
I go to to the graveyard
and I'll be back again.

And it is St. Patricks Day. Entirely meaningless to me, being perhaps an eighth Irish and not a big drinker at all. But as an excuse to go celebrate the completion of the application process and the end of the job search, it will do just fine.

And if you know me, you'll know where to find me