Another thing to add to my list of things that make me happy: character shoes! I got them today. They're they most wonderful shoes in the world. There's a picture of them here - they're the white shoes near the end of the page. But mine are black, not white. I'm so happy. This whole Christmas School thing is beginning to bear an odd resemblance to Cinderella. Actually it has for a while now, with Marney Morrison starring as the fairy godmother. And the glass slippers are Capezios.

My uncle's coming in on the train soon. I have one boring uncle on my dad's side and a few semi-interesting ones on my mom's side. Then there's Uncle David. He's my mom's only full sibling and the only one she actually grew up with. I'm not really sure what he does for a living, since it tends to change often and I can rarely understand his explanations of them, anyway. He used to play saxophone. In high school he had a deal worked out with the local college that they would lend him any instrument he wanted to learn, and in return he would play whenever they needed an extra musician in the orchestra or something. As a result he can play half the instruments in creation. I'm not sure about strings, but I know he does some brass and probably every modern woodwind there is. He used to play for dances at Christmas School, but he's not this year.

He's also amazing with computers. I'm not sure if that's a good or bad thing, because every time he's over at our house he spends half the time glued to the machine. Then when he leaves and we finally get to use it, he's changed all the settings. I'm sure there's some purpose behind this, and he does usually explain what he's doing to us, but we still don't understand what he's done or how to get it back to normal afterwards.

He's sort of like Godfather Drosselmeier from "The Nutcracker" in that he's cool but sort of scary. He smokes a pipe and has a really odd smile. He can do the most amazing things with his eyebrows. He's the same age as my father, but he seems both much older and much younger at the same time. He was the one who told my family what a rave was - even my sister and I had never heard of them until then. He usually gets me a novel for Christmas and reads it before he wraps it, which is fine with me.

So he's coming. I got him Lords and Ladies by Terry Pratchett. He's the only person I know besides Christine I could have given that to.

I'm really loving these shoes. I've been wearing them ever since we came home from the store, ostensibly to break them in. That's good, but really I just love wearing them. For my personal anthology I was going to do an entry on high heels, since those seem to be a part of coming of age for most girls. I got a pair last fall to wear to homecoming, though I didn't end up going at all. They were kind of nifty - little black strappy sandlals with a little rectangular heel. It's wasn't much of a heel, maybe an inch and a half, but they were still undeniably heels and my first. So I was going to take a picture of them and use it for one of my "special interest" entries, since those can be about anything. But I think I'll use a picture of my character shoes instead. That way I'll get to talk about normal heels, but put my own spin on it, too.

You know how in movies when a girl is going to a dance there's always a scene where she comes down the stairs and everyone's stunned? I suppose that's what happens in real life, too, but I've never seen it. Anyway, that's what I felt like coming down the stairs in those shoes. The laundry basket I was carrying at the time didn't even mar the effect. Mom has had a pair of black character shoes in her closet for as long as I can remember. She wears them to contra dances sometimes. When we were little, Allison and I used to put them on and clomp around the house on them. I was dissapointed when I grew out of size sixes because I couldn't ever try on her shoes again. Hers are prettier than mine - the heel is tapered and a little higher than mine. But I still love mine. I can't look at my feet without thinking that this is how I'm supposed to be. When I dream, I am always somehow taller and wiser than I am in real life. A woman, not a girl. A while ago I tried to draw this person, which was difficult because she doesn't have a specific physical image. But one of the drawings I came up with was holding a pair of character shoes in her hand. And that was somehow right. That's who I'm supposed to be. It's who I want to be.

December 20
January 3