I've had 3 experiences like the one you had in my own life.
Me too, and I woke up exhausted on Sunday morning from these crazy dreams - I told my husband about some of them, including one "all the Buffistas were at a swimming pool, sitting around the edge, but someone was in th pool and sinking super-deep, like ocean-deep and I was trying to dive in and rescue her and caught a glimpse of close-cropped ochre hair. I thought "Oh, it's ita, of course she can swim, she's probably OK."
Then I spent Sunday wondering what my brain was using ita and Buffistas as a metaphor for.
Then I spent Sunday wondering what my brain was using ita and Buffistas as a metaphor for.
A very, very interesting question.
I had a kind of odd worlds colliding moment yesterday. One of my friends at work came up to me and said she was sorry to hear about the loss of my friend (from FB) and then said, "I think I knew her--did she used to do krav?" Turns out she took classes with her for awhile years ago. Such a small world.
Then I spent Sunday wondering what my brain was using ita and Buffistas as a metaphor for.
That's so clear it's barely a metaphor anymore. That's as close to a telegram as the subconscious can usually manage. Raq, if you have any dreams like that about the rest of us, do give us a holler, will you?
I was replacing toilet paper on the roll today and thought, "I bet ita has a strong opinion about which direction is appropriate."
I can't claim anything supernatural, but sometime over the weekend, the thought "Has anyone talked to ita?" occurred out of nowhere. I remembered she'd said something about the hospital, so I talked myself out of asking and then someone else did.
I was in the tea shop today. Lovely visit.
On the way home, I thought about how much I've spent on the fancy teas these days, followed by, "I need to learn how to make the most of this. I wonder if I need new equipment? I should ask"...oh. wait.
I rarely come here anymore because I've allowed myself to get overscheduled with life, but this place just feels like such a foundation for who I am as a person that I don't ever even really miss it. I just feel like it's always there, just a background part of me. And I don't mean foundation in that it changed or molded me into the person I am today, or anything specific like that, though I'm sure in many ways it has, but just that it's always been a support when necessary. A place that is always welcoming, soothing, encouraging, knowledgeable, and helpful, and even more importantly: hilarious. Because it's tough to feel comfortable with the other qualities without the hilarity around to shrug off any formality. And ita was such an enormous part of that for me because she's such an enormous part of this board.
I have bunches of memories of ita, and I'm so grateful for that, even as I'm grieving that the world is now a little bit less for not having her here. But the one constant throughout my memories is that I could not stop laughing around her, like at all. To be clear, I laugh fairly easily, but she had a way of putting a person at ease even while she threatened and made fun of you that was just so charming. And just chatting with her briefly was usually all you needed to get dusted with a little bit of that sparkle all over again. She could make something as mundane as driving a person home into an adventure just by being herself.
I mean, she took me home to USC once by the most random roundabout route because she ignored my directions, got us lost, threatened to break my thumbs unless I told her how to get us unlost, and after circling back and trying to find where we went wrong (and being unable to), she offered to leave me on a street corner and declare it "close enough" to school, and that I'd probably learn plenty there for a lot less money, and then she didn't trust me not to be lying when I finally spotted (way way off in the distance, so she didn't see it) the one landmark near USC that is unmistakable: the glowing FELIX sign. What should have been a relatively painless 10 minute trip ended up being a hilarious 35 minute adventure, and I was crying-laughing the whole time. That's just the magic she had. (The lovingly violent magic.)
Ginger,
have you seen this picture from Nilly? [link] That was when ita was trying to show nilly how to punch.
