On Sleeplessness

The main problem of my week so far is that I am not sleeping. I go to sleep and toss and turn and wake up ten to fifteen times nightly, half the time without any blankets covering me and then my alarm goes off and I hit snooze a few times and I'm late to work and I never feel rested. It's not good. In fact, I recently saw a TV ad which told me about how I could take a Tylenol PM before bed and all my aches and pains would go away and I'd also get a restful night sleep and I actually thought, "Hey, that sounds like a great product." This from the girl who recently stopped taking all pills and pill-shaped objects except for multi-vitamins. Sleeping aids are SO against my principles.

On "Legends"

When I was in Phoenix last week at the meeting of credit union leagues from border states, I had lunch with some guys. One from California, one from Texas. They were old, probably older than my dad... or close. I knew they were the CEO's of their leagues and since most people there were CEOs I didn't think much of it. We talked about the California fires and Arnold and how beautiful New Mexico is and how I used to live in El Paso, no biggie.

So when I came back and told my boss who I hung out with he had a look of shock on his face and said something like "both of those guys are legends" At first I was like... "Oh no, I hope I didn't say anything offensive if they're legends... I should have been more nervous and and and...." But then I realized they were just nice guys who might be legends to people who devote lifetimes to credit unions. (Thus far, I am not one of those people.)

On Wanderlust

I have been having serious travel urges as of late. I feel a constant need to flee to a Latin American country, this is not new, but now the urge is spreading. I heard Jacque Chiraq talking about combating anti-semitism on NPR last night and suddenly became aware of the fact that I absolutely NEEDED to be in France at that moment, needed to be around French people and hear them and hang out in cafes...all this despite the fact that I absolutely HATED French class in high school, have very little understanding of the language and don't usually long to visit the country. Then this morning Tony Blair was talking about Bush's visit to England and instead of the seething hatred that I usually feel when our president is mentioned, I just got lost in the British accent and started imagining myself in London (ok, more than imagining, I got an impatient feeling and started thinking about purchasing airfare.) Then I re-read an e-mail from my friend Christine about how she's in Tokyo as I am typing and... well... I'm sure you can fill in the rest. I'll just say that it involved fantasies of Sushi-eating. I must develop a plan to somehow be paid to travel around the world and immerse myself in different cultures.

On Rejection

I got my long-awaited response from Fourth Genre last night. They will not be publishing my essay on living along the U.S. Mexico border. I was so hoping they would.

They sent a two paragraph rejection letter telling me I should submit again and that some of their readers had comments that might be helpful to me.

Comment one said "This is exactly the kind of personal cultural criticism Fourth Genre should encourage." (O.K. sounds like that person was in favor of publishing.)

Comment two was less memorable but said that the reader enjoyed the essay but wanted to know more about the narrator (that would be me) This is valid and perhaps slightly helpful. I will look at adding more of myself into the prose...

Overall, this was a rejection letter that made me feel mostly warm and fuzzy instead of giving me that sinking feeling I usually get from life's rejections. But it left me feeling perplexed as to why they didn't publish it. I mean, if you're going to include criticism in the rejection letter, shouldn't it be just that...criticism?

Back to square one. If anyone knows of a place that would like to publish a terrific essay on the ambiguity of living along an international border, please contact me.