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I was born in Phoenix, Arizona, and remained there until my parents divorced in 1977. This made Disneyland, or Bisneyland, as I called it then, a favorite vacation, because we could drive there. It was like a family-friendly Las Vegas.
I think it was on such vacations that I first became terrified of sports team mascots and costumes in which the wearer’s eyes are concealed from view. If eyes are the window to the soul, the person inside the creepy costume might have a really putrid one and I would have no idea. This has always been bothersome.
My parents tell me that when the Disneyland characters would come up and try to hug me, I would run screaming, red ringlets bobbing behind me, cold sweat of fear beading my tiny brow. I did not want those freaky creatures touching me. Animals were not supposed to look like that and I knew it. They were unnatural. Creepy.
(I would later add ventriloquist dummies to my list of horrible things to avoid, after my cousin Amy told me that hers would sometimes talk to her at night from within the closet. And clowns because, well, look at them. Sheesh. Who decided clowns were a good idea?)
I have an early, mildly traumatic memory associated with the mouse-shaped helium-filled balloons from Disneyland as well, because I brought one home from our vacation there, and my Aunt Carolyn popped it. She was jokingly chasing me around the house, threatening to pop my floating rodent with a lit cigarette and whoops! It really happened.
(Yes, chasing a little girl with a lit cigarette. Ah, the seventies. Nowadays you’re a monster if you smoke within twenty feet of a child, but back then we kids were trapped in seatbelt-less cars with chain smokers faster than you can say “emphysema.”)
To get me to stop crying, she promised me she’d get me another Mickey Mouse balloon. Every time she came over to our house from that point on, I asked her about it. “Have you gone to Bisneyland to get me a new balloon yet?”
She never got me a new balloon. I never trusted her again. She was in it with the monsters in the mascot costumes, as far as I was concerned.
As I got older, I realized I still had this fear of people hidden in costumes. It was completely irrational and pointless, but aren’t most fears, really?
I remember in college, going to a grocery store with a friend. As we crossed the parking lot, I stopped dead in my tracks when I spotted a Kool-Aid Man hovering around the entrance. Big, round pitcher, eerie smile painted on, not a real eyeball in sight. There could be anyone or anything inside there, man.
He was greeting people, but might as well have been eating people, for the way it made me feel. I suddenly realized that my heart was pounding and I was sweating, adrenaline pumping, poised for fight or flight.
I was shocked to find that this childhood fear I giggled about was still very real. The funny Disneyland anecdotes my parents would tell about their non-trusting little girl versus the big cartoon characters were more than stories. I was now a grown woman having a ridiculous reaction to some person trying to make a dollar in a humiliating way. Logically I knew this, but emotionally, I believed that huge pitcher with legs was full of the cherry red blood of children.
I could not go into the store that day.
My friend thought I was being ridiculous. I did too. Didn’t change a thing.
Later, when confronted with a giant sandwich outside of a sub shop, I would be unable to get out of my car and enter the restaurant. There was no coupon in the world worth having to touch the hand of the Sandwich of Death.
A boyfriend aware of this phobia, upon spotting someone in a mascot costume standing roadside to promote a business, liked to cross traffic lanes to try to get my passenger side as close to the creature as possible. Screaming ensued; windows were rolled up; sometimes I’d have to duck down as far as the seatbelt would let me and cover my head. This was highly entertaining for one of us.
I’ve been thinking about this lately because I now have a child of my own. My son will be four this winter, and we have been invited to stay with California friends next summer, which would make a trip to Disneyland inevitable.
I am wondering how my son will react. But mostly, I am wondering how hard it will be to hide my own fear from him.
So far I have hidden my fear of the dentist from him by making his father take him. Not a very impressive display of parenting on my part, but my son loves the dentist.
I also recently managed to hide my “nervous flyer” feelings from him so well that I actually convinced myself to stop being afraid, mid-flight to Phoenix. While the metal tube in which we were encased was racing through the clouds, I tried to make my son see it as miraculous, rather than scary, and ended up believing it. My son even told me he wants to be a pilot when he grows up, the first declaration of the sort to come out of his mouth.
I’m hoping that a trip to Disneyland will have the same effect. I’ll be so busy trying to make it a positive experience for my child that I will face my fears and get over my illogical phobia of costume-clad creatures once and for all.
Or I will flip out and finally attack one of them.
Either way, it will make a good story, right?
It’s sniffing your delicious head, little boy. Run!
I boarded the plane headed for Phoenix. One of my MySpace friends had suddenly died and we were all going to her funeral. We were in her top thirty-two, after all. That meant a lot to us.
Jennifer had stopped commenting on blogs and leaving her blinking, flashing “Have a nice day!” messages in our comment sections. She seemed to completely disappear from the cyber realm in which we existed together, and we were all wondering where she had gone.
A quick glance at her profile answered our questions. Her sister Anne had recently posted an explanation online; it seemed our friend had been in a car accident. She was killed instantly.
Her MySpace page immediately became a memorial website and the comment section was rapidly filling with messages about how much we’d all miss her.
Jen’s MySpace friends were invited by her sister to the funeral in Phoenix this weekend, and many of us agreed to attend. It was a sad excuse to meet the people we’d been getting to know online for so long, but we decided Jennifer would have wanted it this way.
Anne had been remarkably helpful in facilitating the attendance of Jennifer’s online friends at the funeral, arranging to pick each of us up at the Phoenix airport. She even made a deal with a nearby hotel to provide affordable rooms. I was touched by the kindness of the airlines and lodging, providing cheap rates and discounts for us all.
The funeral was scheduled for Saturday evening, so we decided to fly in Friday afternoon to have an impromptu memorial service and meet each other in person. Anne suggested this, actually, and rented the recreation room of the hotel we were all staying in to give us a large meeting place.
Despite the sad reason for being there in the first place, I was really excited to finally see these people I’d been getting to know online for over a year. Jennifer had always been a boisterous, fun girl and said, “Any excuse for a party!” I hoped she really meant it and wasn’t looking down on us from the ghost world for having a getting-to-know-you celebration in the aftermath of her sudden death.
I deplaned and walked through the Sky Harbor terminal until I saw the sign with “Alexa” on it. That’s me, I thought as I greeted the driver. We drove away from the airport, passing palm trees and saguaro cactuses as we traveled along the heat-shimmering road.
The hotel was really nice and I couldn’t get over the low price as I got ready for the MySpace friends party. Make-up and hair to my liking, I walked down the hallway to finally meet my online friends in real life.
At the entrance to the large recreation room, there was a big sign that shouted, “Welcome Jennifer’s Internet Friends!” in a bold font. I couldn’t believe Anne went through the trouble to have such professional-looking signs printed up for this gathering. She really had her wits about her for someone who had just lost her sister. I felt momentarily jealous of her coolness under pressure, decided that was unkind of me and entered the room.
There were over fifty people there. An anorexic-looking blonde girl quickly walked over to me with a somber smile and introduced herself. A man with a large camera followed her closely, filming our meeting.
“I’m Jennifer’s sister, Anne. Thank you so much for coming… Alexa?” she said questioningly.
“Yes, I’m Alexa. Call me Alex. How did you know?” I asked.
“I recognized you from your MySpace pics,” she replied. She gestured toward the camera. “I hope you don’t mind that I’m having Jennifer’s memorial filmed by a professional crew. There were a lot of internet friends who couldn’t make it to Phoenix, and I want to put this on You Tube so they can feel like they were here. Jennifer would have loved it.”
“How many MySpace friends did Jennifer have?” I wondered aloud. It seemed like the room was full of people.
“Oh, this isn’t even a third of her MySpace friends. She was also popular on Facebook, Friendster and Twitter. My sister was a friend to everyone she met,” she said, shaking her head sadly.
She quickly had me sign a release form so that she could use my filmed moments in her You Tube memorial, stating it was just a formality. I didn’t mind. I had nothing to hide, after all. That’s why I was on the internet in the first place, right?
After thanking her for being such a great hostess and offering my condolences on her loss, I left Anne and the camera guy to walk over to the open bar. I decided that Jennifer and Anne must come from money, as I ordered a free beer. I left my usual twenty percent tip because I’ve had that job, took a deep breath, and looked around.
Standing at the bar, I scanned the room for familiar faces. Everyone was engrossed in conversation, with Anne and the cameraman recording the memories people shared about Jennifer for internet posterity. Some people were crying in front of the camera while others laughed, sharing different thoughts on the loss.
I quickly drained my beer and ordered another one. I was really nervous about meeting all of these people with whom I’d been chatting so intimately on blog comment boards for the last year. We knew so much about each other, yet nothing at all. It was a strange dichotomy, and hard to marry with my usual go-to friendship formula.
I spotted Kaitlin. She was a sassy, outspoken woman with cool Nordic blonde good looks and one of those mouths that makes even the straightest girl feel stirrings. She met my eyes as I noticed her; the recognition clicked and her expression brightened.
“Alexa!? Alex! Is that you!? It is you!!” she squealed, and came running over to hug me warmly. “It’s so nice to actually meet you in real life!”
I told her it was great to meet her too, and asked her what she thought of all the cameras.
“It seems kind of weird to me, honestly,” she whispered under her breath. “But if Jennifer’s sister Anne thinks it’s necessary, then I guess it makes sense, right?”
I nodded and we stood together making small talk, surveying the crowd of people that seemed to be growing larger every minute. We noticed another friend we often talked to online as she walked through the door, with the cursory introduction and welcome by Anne and the cameraman. She refused to sign the release form. Brooke. Of course.
Brooke was petite, with pale skin and dark hair. She had goth vibe going on. She liked the Vampire Wars application and sent fanged fairies as Facebook gifts. She was dressed in her usual all-black attire, leather boots and wore her signature blood red lipstick. Thinner than I expected with dark under-eye circles, she looked like Snow White’s sister who freebased poison instead of eating tainted apples. She didn’t look like she ate much of anything, actually. Kaitlin and I recognized her instantly.
“Brooke! Over here!” We both shouted her name and waved her over.
She glided our way and stared around the room incredulously. “What the fuck is all this shit?” she asked us.
Brooke was a blunt person. She didn’t waste time on niceties in the written comment format, so it didn’t shock me that she’d work blue with her first sentence spoken in real life. I would have been more shocked if she acted sweet and demure, honestly.
“We don’t really know either,” I told her. “Jen’s sister Anne seems to think Jen would have wanted her online friends who couldn’t be here to be able to watch her informal friends-only memorial on You Tube.”
“Well I think that having a film crew at a private memorial is completely fucked up. I’ll probably write a blog about it when I get home,” she answered. “I’ll put it on MySpace and we can talk about it some more, because I feel like an asshole complaining about it here.”
We agreed to revisit the topic in our blogs and continued to walk around the room, drinking free booze and meeting all of the people we knew only from online pictures and occasional written blurbs. It was a strange sociological phenomenon that made me uneasy and out-of-my-element all night. The whole thing felt like a weird dream I’d have after drinking and playing on the computer too late.
After foolishly moving from beer to the hard stuff and drunkenly slurring to the cameras about what a cool person Jennifer was, I hung out with my cyber-friends and stumbled back to the hotel room late. I used the laptop computer I’d brought to see if I had any new messages waiting before I passed out, already dreading tomorrow’s more serious service.
I awoke the next day feeling hung-over and strange. I had the “Where the hell am I?” moment as I looked around the hotel room until I remembered. Today is Jennifer’s funeral. My stomach clenched with nervous energy. I was not looking forward to it.
I grabbed the water bottle I’d placed next to the bed in a burst of surprising drunken forethought and chugged. I felt like I’d crawled through a desert with straight vodka in my canteen and only cigarettes to eat.
After spending the day online chatting with friends (some of them in the same hotel), I got in the shower and prepared for Jen’s evening service, wondering if her sister Anne and the camera guy were going to film the actual funeral. It seemed kind of disrespectful and I really hoped not. I also knew I would cry and I didn’t want it caught on tape for all to see.
The funeral home was conveniently a few blocks from the hotel. Anne seemed to have planned everything out perfectly. Once there, I found my internet inner circle of blog commenters and we huddled together in a group with our fold-up chairs pushed together.
The funeral home looked brand-new, like it had been very recently built. The light fixtures were Eames-style modern, like hanging cream bubbles with brushed nickel hardware, and the floors were tiled in a rich chocolate brown. The shiny, black coffin was up front on a huge stone table—it almost seemed like an altar—placed on a shaggy, furry cream rug. White roses in silver vases and deep red candles covered every surface, flames flickering. It didn’t have the seventies, drab wood paneling feel of most funeral homes. It felt like MTV Death Cribs.
I could see Jennifer lying peacefully in the coffin, just the very top bit of her pretty face. She looked like she was sleeping. Her hair looked great. I’d never been to an open-casket funeral and thought the dead would look much worse than she did. She was holding a bouquet of white roses and wearing dark red dress that matched the candles. I had no idea that death could be such a fashion statement and was once again impressed with Jennifer’s sister for her amazing attention to detail.
I noticed the Guns ‘N’ Roses song “November Rain” was playing through overhead speakers. How unbearably trite, I thought to myself, vowing to write down the songs I wanted to be played at my own funeral.
As we waited for some sort of religious leader to walk to the front and start the proceedings, I realized I didn’t know to which religion Jennifer belonged. I realized that I didn’t even know her last name; where she grew up or where she went to school. It hit me that I really didn’t know anything about her, or any of the other living people in the room, for that matter. I was suddenly overcome by the urge to run out of the funeral home back to the hotel. This was all starting to feel really weird. I looked around uneasily and noticed many other people murmuring to each other, with confused faces like mine.
Before I could bolt (or more likely, discuss bolting with my friends), Anne walked to the front of the room with a cameraman behind her, filming every word. She said loudly, “I have an announcement to make and all I ask is that everyone here please listen to every word before you rise to judgment.”
The murmuring stopped and the room was silent in anticipation. Anne nodded, smiled and continued addressing the room.
“This is not actually a funeral and I am not actually Jennifer’s sister. My name is Anne, but I work for a television network. This event we’ve been filming is the pilot for a new reality show that we are hoping will be a really big hit. Those of you who signed the waivers will be featured on the first episode. It’s called Virtual 2 Reality and the premise of the show is to help people who have met solely through social networking websites meet in real life for the first time. We think it will be a fascinating sociological study of the new ways we make friends via the internet and… most importantly… really great television!”
We stared at each other with mouths agape in disbelief as she continued, “We didn’t mean to trick you, but we didn’t think as many of you would agree to come if it wasn’t for a serious reason. We apologize for the scare and you will be reimbursed for your travel expenses, as well as paid a respectable fee for your camera time. And I think you will all be happy to know that Jennifer is an actress who is alive and quite well!”
She clapped her hands and Jennifer, who had up until this moment remained motionless in the coffin, suddenly sat up and smiled, waving at the room full of people, still seated in our chairs in shocked silence. Someone started to clap along with Anne, and soon much of the room broke out in applause. Some people sat still with furious hands in their laps, and some people were crying tears of relief, but overall, the group seemed to recover from the shock very quickly.
People jumped up and ran over to Jennifer as she climbed out of the coffin for hugs. I could see them already vying for their fifteen minutes, schmoozing Anne and the cameraman, giving interviews and reactions to the bogus funeral. Kaitlin was up front, laughing and smiling for the camera, and I was shocked. I never pegged her as an attention whore.
You know the people I mentioned, the ones who were not clapping and furious? Yeah, I was one of those. I looked at Brooke, who had more color on her pancake-pale face than I’d ever seen. She hissed, “This is fucking bullshit. I’m out of here, Alex,” and stood up. I followed. We went straight to the hotel bar and got ridiculously drunk. We talked for hours and exchanged phone numbers, vowing to make a point of getting together in person at least once a year. We hugged at the end of the night and went to our rooms to sleep it off before the morning flights Anne had booked for us.
I arrived early at the airport, got a cup of coffee at Starbucks, cursing their moronic sizing system as I asked the snooty barista for, “I don’t know, a really big one, I guess,” with a roll of my eyes. I found a table and opened up my laptop. I had one hell of a crazy blog to write.
Dear Kraft Macaroni and Cheese,
Oh, we are such grand old friends. You and your delightfully versatile pal Ramen Noodles were there for me in college, and I will never forget the way you kept me alive during the more financially bereft phases of my existence. Never.
We even endured the British boyfriend together, and his irritating way of referring to you as “Kraft Dinner” instead of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese (or even Kraft Cheese and Macaroni, in a nod to the old advertising campaign that showcased exactly how cheesy and delicious you really are, my friend). We rolled our eyes at each other conspiratorially behind his back, and mocked him by saying “Kroooffft Dinn-ahhhh” when he left the room. We had fun, didn’t we?
But the honeymoon is over, I’m sorry to say. I am afraid I am breaking up with you, Kraft Macaroni and Cheese, even though it makes me a little bit sad.
The first reason is that I have a child now; a child who would eat you for every single meal, if allowed. I cook you so often that I am ridiculously sick of smelling your hot, milky cheese and starch smell. I am nauseous right now just thinking about you.
The second reason is that since giving birth, simple, starchy carbohydrates seem to instantly turn me into a fat girl in a free chocolate store. I look at your bloated, white puffy pasta-ness and gain weight.
It’s just not working out between us anymore, Kraft Macaroni and Cheese, but thanks for the years of service and loyalty. It’s not you, it’s me. I swear.
Tell Bread to call me,
Tawni
Dear Husband,
You are a wonderful father to our son and I appreciate you more than I can put into words.
Perhaps your all-around awesomeness is why I tolerated it when you taught our toddler to reply, “Chicken butt!” to those asking him to, “Guess what?”
And I only winced a little when you taught the young lad all about having the “meat farts,” and laughed as he repeated the term back to you in his little three-year-old lisping dialect as “meat fawts.”
But the other day, when our child informed me from the toilet that he was about to “squeeze one out” for me, I decided that it was time to have this talk with you and make a request:
Please stop making our son disgusting.
I love you,
Tawni
Dear Girl at Lowe’s,
I was buying plants for my garden and in a really great mood. Planting things brings me joy.
I was standing in one of two lines and the register opened up on the other one.
Rather than run over to the register ahead of the man in front of me in our line, I asked him if he would like to go over to the now-open register, since he’d been standing there longer. He was chivalrous and deferred to me; I thought this was incredibly sweet of him.
Imagine my surprise when you darted into the open spot ahead of both of us, even though you had just walked up and hadn’t stood in a line at all.
I waited for you to finish being rung up and tried to make eye contact with you the entire time, hoping you might say something, or maybe acknowledge what you had done. You very obviously avoided my gaze and hurried away, so I know you were fully aware of your pathetic, out-for-number-one register queue move.
In conclusion, Girl at Lowe’s, you will probably get a lot further in this life with a “nice guys finish last” mode of behavior than I ever have by trying to be a kind, considerate person; but I have a strong feeling that when we both get to the end of the ride, you’re going to like yourself a lot less than I will.
Just a hunch,
Tawni
Dear Bathroom Scale,
My husband is a tall, large man, but he is by no means overweight, so I know that he did not break you. You could have chosen to split in half when stepped upon by anyone. You were a cheap purchase made of brittle plastic.
Thank you for choosing him anyway.
Love ya babe,
Tawni
Dear Rhett from the Old 97’s,
I saw your band play at Mayfest a few weeks ago.
Your voice is awesome and the cool “swaying from side to side” dance you do while playing guitar reminds me of a happy little kid. It could look goofy done by the wrong person, but you totally pull it off. When you wind-milled your guitar and danced like Elvis, well, I can admit it; I swooned.
You also played a guitar that was old. I have a lot of love for a guitarist playing an obviously adored, good old guitar with the wood worn through from years of strumming. You won’t give up your Number One for a new, shiny guitar, will you? You’re loyal. The kind of person who won’t sell out their best friend for a better deal. The kind of person who wouldn’t steal the spouse of another person. You are that kind of person, aren’t you, Rhett?
After your show, as we walked to the car, my husband said, “Rhett is so charismatic! I couldn’t look away from him! He’s definitely got something,” and was really impressed with you. I could tell he was actually perplexed and maybe a bit uncomfortable with his infatuation. (Manfatuation, if you will.) He’s a beer and football loving guy’s guy. I’ve never heard him say anything like this about another man. Ever.
Another guy friend of mine later referred to you as his “mancrush.” When I told my husband this, he replied, “Yeah… I’d fuck him! I’m not gay, but I’d fuck him! He’s beautiful.”
I tried not to be threatened when my husband professed his lust for you this second time, but I thought you might like to know that you know that you are having this mesmerizing affect on completely heterosexual men, you enchanting warlock of music and rhythm.
Back off, he’s mine,
Tawni
P.S. I love your hair.
I have a new hobby.
My body, unbeknownst to my brain, has taken up the pastime of getting burned in old lady-ish ways.
I am typing this with my hands.
My right hand is happy, smooth and doing relatively well, as hands go. No aches, no complaints.
My left hand is covered with gray, peeling skin because I decided to open, directly onto the hand, a container of vegetables I was steaming.
My brain had no idea, of course. My brain is tired these days. A combination of new motherhood, a light case of insomnia and being in my thirties, most likely. Perhaps an occasional alcoholic drink too late in the day is to blame as well.
I think this time of weakness and distraction is why the body is able to sneak these autopilot-induced afflictions upon it.
So I burned my hand steaming vegetables.
Such an elderly way to burn my hand. I might as well have burned it heating up cat food for the more finicky of my 25 cats. Or whilst ironing my lace doilies.
A few months ago, my thumb had the bubbles of 3rd degree burns rippling across its shiny, red epidermis, thanks to a beef stew.
The best part being that I don’t eat beef stew. I can’t. I am actually tested-by-the-allergist allergic to red meat.
My husband and I were driving to Norman, Oklahoma to his alma mater to see an OU football game. His parents watched our son for us, so we made them a pot of beef stew in our crock pot to eat as a thank you.
(Flowers, schmowers. In the Midwest, we give BEEF as a thank you. Don’t worry about it. Mind your business.)
I managed to burn my thumb by pulling the lid off to give the gross stew a stir right before we left. I scooted the pot closer. It sloshed. My skin disintegrated and blistered.
Never mind that I had spent 20 minutes straightening my hair with a glowingly hot ceramic straightening iron before I did this. Nope. That would be an entirely too young way to burn myself.
My husband pointed out that he had matching burn scars on the very same thumb. We decided that was terribly romantic, in an Angelina and Billy Bob sort of way.
It hurt so bad, even wrapped in gauze with numbing ointment, that I was having trouble ignoring it on the way there. Once we arrived in Norman, I was forced to drink many beers. Just for the pain relief, mind you. Ahem.
Lest you think that maybe my body’s new hobby of getting burned in old lady-ish ways is merely a sign that I should stay out of the kitchen, I must tell you that I even managed to get burned in my own bed. This is where the old lady part comes in full force.
It’s cold here in the winter. I do not like the cold. There are few things I dislike more than being cold.
When I moved to Los Angeles in 2001, I said to myself, “Ahhhhh, Self. We found our open-minded people, we found our warm climate, we are home. Way to go, Self.” Inner high-five.
I was never coming back to this shit. I even sold all of my sweaters and winter clothes to the used clothing store on La Brea. Nope. Never gonna need those silly things again. Those ridiculous garments are for cold people.
Then I got knocked up, decided that I couldn’t imagine my kid not having a backyard and only parks full of homeless people and drug addicts to play in while growing up in a tiny apartment with his over-worked parents.
Damn. Back to the land of affordable housing and trees.
And cold. Don’t forget that part.
Sure wish I could get my chocolate brown shearling coat back from that store on La Brea. I loved that fucking coat.
This winter, I was occasionally driven to sleeping in my zip-up L.L. Bean fleece robe, like a giant, wizened and sun-damaged infant, floating in one of those larval-looking sleep sacks.
But as a lifelong naked sleeper, this made me crazy. My OCD (Quirks! They’re just QUIRKS!) absolutely would not allow pajamas, so I started putting a heating pad in my bed before I got in, to heat it up.
I would warm up my spot and crawl in bed to lie on top of the heating pad, feeling warmer than I had all damned day long. Like a cat in the window-streaming sun patch. Sometimes I would fall asleep on the heating pad. Ahhhh.
Until I burned my hip. Yes, my hip. My old lady hip.
At least I didn’t break it, right?
Right where the hip bone pokes out, I discovered a blister one day. It didn’t really hurt, so I’m kind of embarrassed to admit that I didn’t notice it immediately. I think I was putting on lotion and kind of went, “Huh? What’s this? Is it a bug bite? Eeeeew. It’s a blister!”
I hadn’t used the heating pad the night before, so it was on my hip at least a day before I realized it. It made me feel out-of-touch with my body, like one of those fat women who suddenly gives birth without realizing they’re pregnant.
Big nasty blister on my hip.
Yup. Try to control yourselves, fellas. I’m spoken for.
Maybe next time, for a grand finale in my series of creepy old lady burns, I’ll try to burn a bulging varicose vein. An elderly injury coup de grace.
It’s going to be fantastic.
Stop shuddering. You’ve seen worse.
I hope you’re having a lovely day, my friends.
Yesterday, I made my husband pull the car over so I could grab a large pink Easter egg off the side of the road. He was annoyed and mildly repulsed by my impulse.
“I’m going to see you walking along the side of the road pushing a shopping cart someday, aren’t I?” he later asked me.
We spotted the egg on the way to his parents’ house for an Easter dinner gathering. Big, at least seven inches long, and pastel pink. I said, “I want to go back and get that egg!” He refused to stop the car.
I obsessed on the way into his parents’ house, “It might have had money inside, or a severed hand or something cool!” He rolled his eyes and we went in to greet his family, my son running ahead to assume doorbell pushing duties.
Hours later, when we left, I decided that if the egg was still there, I had to grab it. My curious brain would be going full-blast for the rest of the week if I didn’t find out if there was anything inside.
I do this a lot. It’s one of the more irritating facets of my personal brand of crazy; most of the time, I have endless questions galloping through my brain that must be answered. Must. Be. Answered.
I can’t merely observe life; my mind has to take it to the next level every time. I have to know why and how and who and when and where and the sociological implications of such, no matter how trivial the subject might seem. I have been told that I missed my calling as a forensic scientist. (Usually by someone trying to tell me in a very kind way that they want me to shut the hell up. But still. It counts.)
For these reasons, Google is one of the best things ever invented, as far as I’m concerned. I call it the “SEE? I’m not crazy!” engine. (Example: “There WAS a television show in the seventies called Lucan about a guy raised by wolves! It ran for one year. SEE? I’m not crazy!”)
We pulled up to the stop sign turning out of the neighborhood; across the street sat the egg, nestled on the muddy embankment. Waiting for me. Why did the crazy lady cross the road? Such jokes whispered themselves mockingly inside my head.
“It’s probably just an old, deflated balloon,” sneered my husband.
“I saw seams! It’s not an old balloon, it’s plastic! I SAW SEAMS,” I snapped back.
I had to run in the rain, across a busy-ish street to get it, but I waited until all cars had passed and sprinted. I grabbed the big pink egg and raced back to the dry car.
Inside was a note that said: “Way to risk your safety and well-being for a stupid plastic egg, you moron.” I looked around for the cameras in anger.
Okay, no, just kidding. I thought that might be more exciting than the truth, but I cannot tell a lie. It was indeed a plastic egg, but not the kind that opens, the kind you might place in your front yard as an Easter decoration. Like, next to the plastic goose statue you change into festive holiday outfits. I was disappointed, of course, but at least there wasn’t a severed hand inside, right?
My husband said, “You probably just stole the calling card left behind by the Easter Killer.”
I laughed and replied in my best police officer voice, “Yeah, Sarge. We found this body in the woods near the side of the road… oh, the humanity. But we have no idea why the vagina was stuffed full of Peeps? Odd, that.”
Which might have been a little bit funny in a dark humor sort of way if I hadn’t spelled out the word vagina. Spelling out words kind of takes the punch out of a punchline, I have noticed since having a child.
But my son was in the back seat and I didn’t feel like trying to answer the “What is a vagina, Mommy?” question just yet. He immediately asked, “What are Peeps, Mommy?” so it was a good call.
We got home and put our son to bed, sweating, twitching and riding a sugar high that kept him up chattering and singing in his room for hours after we tucked him in. Ahhhh, holidays. Why are they all synonymous with sugar?
I scrubbed and disinfected the giant pink egg. I gave it to my son to play with this morning. He wasn’t very excited about it. I probably should have rolled it in candy.
I hope you had a hoppy Easter, my friends.
(Just deal with it. I will never call it anything but “Hoppy Easter” no matter what you say or how much you groan. It is so ridiculous, cute and awful to say this, that it circles back around to awesome in my head.)
(A girl in sixth grade who hated my guts often wore a shirt with bunnies on it that said: “You’re no bunny ‘til some bunny loves you!” and it also haunts me to this day.)
My cousin Laina lives in Phoenix. She and I were both pregnant for the first time, at the same time, which was a wonderful thing. We were able to whine about all of the bodily changes and pregnancy discomforts via email and it really helped to be able to talk to someone going through the exact same thing.
My due date was two months ahead of hers, almost to the day. We each went into labor on our due date and gave birth the day after our due date. What can we say? Elise and Miles are punctual kids. (Their names are also only one letter away from having all of the same letters. I just noticed that. Cool!)
This vacation marked the first time our children would meet each other and I was so excited about it.
Laina told my mom to let me know that Elise doesn’t like boys very much, so don’t take it personally if she didn’t like Miles immediately. I coached Miles in preparation for this by teaching him to say, “You’re pretty,” upon meeting Elise. I hoped this would warm her up to him. What girl doesn’t like to hear that, right?
We were at the zoo when they first met. I prompted him and he told her she was pretty. They got along great after a few minutes of getting used to each other. It was kind of amazing to me how quickly they seemed like pals and absolutely adorable watching them together.
Laina and I took the two of them over to look at some zoo animals while we waited to ride the train. Elise, whom I think is a little doll, reached out for Miles and they actually held hands for a minute. Laina and I squealed, and I got a few pictures of the extreme cuteness:
Can you stand it?
At the zoo, Miles rode his first big boy ride. It was a log ride, the kind that channels you around in a carved-out log boat that floats on water, culminating in a suspense-filled climb up a giant hill with a stomach-turning drop at the end.
Miles spotted the ride, and being the innocent creature that he is, didn’t even consider the tremendous drop involved. He begged and pleaded to go on it. “Please, Mommy? I want to go on the ride! Please?”
I refrained from telling him it was scary because I don’t want to pass my own fears on to him. I am not the roller coaster type. I try to pass it off as a strong case of survival instinct, but if I’m being honest with you, I’ll admit that I’m just a tremendous chicken. And laugh if you want, but I have a child now, so I have enough stress in my life to prematurely gray my hair without adding “sheer terror two hundred feet in the air” to the list.
Luckily for Miles, Grandpa is not a roller coaster ride chicken and volunteered to take him on it. What a good sport! You had to be 36 inches to ride this ride and Miles is 39, so they hopped into a log. Here’s a picture of them heading into the wet unknown:
Immediately after they took off, I was struck by a raging case of the What Have I Dones? That was my baby I just sent tumbling down a waterfall, after all. I raced over to the bottom of the drop at the end of the ride to capture the moment, and I’m somewhat embarrassed to admit that my hands were shaking so hard with fear for my child that I had trouble working the camera.
My dad said that when they got to the top of the big hill at the end, Miles wanted off the stupid log, like RIGHT NOW. It suddenly occurred to him that it was about to get scary. Toddlers don’t keep many thoughts to themselves, so I’d imagine the dialogue was pretty much like the one in my head that keeps me off of such rides. Poor kid. He really had no idea what he was in for.
Which makes it that much funnier. And heart-breaking. All at the same time. I was a swirling vortex of relief, dark humor, and sympathy as they got to the bottom of the ride and I saw my son’s unhappy little face:
Awwww. Look at that little lip sticking out.
The good news is that he was upset for about thirty seconds after he got off the ride and over it completely before we even made it to the aquarium to look at all of the cool ocean creatures.
We had a great time at the zoo and followed it with a pizza and pool party at my parents’ house.
At the pizza by the pool party, Elise and Miles swam, played and had a good time. Their pool antics together will be featured in my next blog. Get excited!
We spent the first day at my parents’ house settling in and relaxing by the pool. We decided a mellow rest of the day after the excitement of the airport and plane would be good for Miles, allow him to become acclimated with his new surroundings. He has somewhat limited experience dealing with new situations.
His daddy and I really try to give him a solid routine and a dependable (albeit boring) life, because we want him to feel confident and secure. Life can be unpredictable, hectic and crazy, and I want home to always be that safe place he can go to get away from the stress, no matter what age he might be.
So far this approach seems to be working. The separation anxiety child-rearing books warned me about seems to have skipped him almost completely. He is so confident, outgoing and friendly that he greets every stranger with a hello and a smile. He knows his parents “have his back” and I’m going to make sure he realizes this is for the rest of his life, not just until he turns eighteen. Parenthood is forever.
It probably doesn’t hurt that he has Mr. Entertainment (read: Mr. Ham) for a father and role model, but I’m also really amazed by how much biology has played a role, as far as my son’s personality goes.
One of the most shocking realizations for me as a parent is how much they are already born their own person. Pre-parenthood, in my college psychology classes, we childless twenty-somethings diligently debated Nature versus Nurture. We read our Child Psychology textbooks and thought we were so smart. Ha, I now say to childless twenty-something me. Ha.
I always imagined that when you raised a child, that meant you shaped them to be what you wanted—your version of a good person. Now that I actually have one, the reality seems to be that you just try to get to know whomever you win in the chromosomal lottery, and hope to teach them some manners, morals and common sense before they make their own way out into the world.
Don’t get me wrong, Miles has picked up so many words, phrases and habits from his parents. (Sometimes not even the ones we’d rather he didn’t!) We definitely influence him and teach him things. I’m just constantly amazed by how much my three-year-old is already his own person.
For example, his father is very much into sports and always has been, so we kind of assumed there would be an immediate interest. But Miles is much more into the creative stuff. He wants to do art projects, listen to and play music, sing, dance and he’s already learning to read. Much more intellectual and artistic than athletic. He has every type of toy involving a ball or a goal, so of course he wants a drum set, a guitar and an iPod more than anything. This may all change, of course, but it is so interesting to me that he already has such definite preferences.
Okay, time for one of my delightful, focus-attaining segues now… ahem… let’s see… here we go:
Speaking of learning to read, here is a picture of Miles reading books on his Grampa’s lap:
My little sister sculpted those horse models in the cabinet behind them.
Okay, so that segue was a little stiff. We’ll just stick to the rambling, disjointed show-and-tell format from here on out, yes?
The first thing we did the next day of vacation was go visit my sister Sommer’s house. She is an artist and an animal lover, so Miles was very eager to meet her and her pets. I’ve been telling him about his Aunt Sommer the artist who has horses, chickens and puppies his whole life, after all.
The first thing we did when we got there was pet the dogs and feed the chickens. Miles rolled around on the ground with one of the bigger puppies and nearly drowned from all the sloppy puppy kisses. We were yelling, “Stand up, Miles! Stand up!” because every time he got down on the ground, my sister’s 50-60 pound puppy (yes, puppy… still growing!) would roll around all over him and lick him. It was hilarious.
I regret not getting photos of this, but more than that, I regret not getting photos of Miles riding a horse for the first time. Doh! I was too busy walking on one side of him, prepared to pull him off if anything happened, as my sister walked on the other side, holding him and leading her very gentle mare. He went a few feet and then decided he’d had enough, but he was smiling and thrilled to ride his first horse as we pulled him off her back.
My sister had some baby chicks that had hatched in her incubator and a baby duck, so she let Miles hold the baby duck. It was ridiculously cute, and I remembered to get pictures:
Two cuties.
The tiny little duck beak was so adorable.
It had tiny little webbed duck feet too. I wanted to chew on them.
Awwwwwww.
Coming up next blog: Miles meets his adorable second-cousin Elise.
Hope you’re having a lovely day, and appreciate the self-control I just showed by not making some sort of “ducky day” pun. You’re welcome.
I just tucked my son into bed.
I am with him all day long, so my husband always reads him the bedtime stories that are part of our goodnight process. I kiss him goodnight and leave the two of them snuggled in bed together for story time.
At the door on the way out, I turn and say, “Have a good night-night, I’ll see you in the morning. Mommy loves Miles!” and as per our ritual, my son replies, “Miles loves Mommy!”
Sometimes Miles adds, “Don’t let the bedbugs bite,” because he heard it on a cartoon.
(Thank you, Little Bear. Appreciate that. How about you do an episode where you explain to my constantly over-analyzing brain why the parent bears wear clothes and the kid bear runs around naked? That would actually be helpful to me.)
I have never liked the “Don’t let the bedbugs bite” saying, which I’m assuming hearkens back to the days when bedbugs were a very real problem. It seems morbid and makes me itchy. One of those creepy “Ring Around the Rosy” things where the cutesy saying is actually about some archaic and gruesome malady.
So when my son started saying it, I found a way to spin it cute. He has a favorite stuffed toy my mother gave him. It is a rainbow-colored bug that we named Nightbug once he decided he had to have it nearby in order to sleep.
So when he says “Don’t let the bedbugs bite,” I reply: “If they do, give ‘em a kiss ‘cause it’s Nightbug!”
This always makes my son giggle. Unfortunately, this makes my husband wince. He is not fond of my attempt to make bugs in our son’s bed into a friendly thing. He is not okay with it at all. Annoyed eye-rolls aplenty at my cheesiness. Sometimes I sneer at him in reply on my way out.
(I also get the eye-rolls when I say “in my elephant” rather than “in my element.”)
(I can’t help it.)
He is also not okay with it when I combine “Knock your self out!” and “Eat your heart out!” into the bizarre and therefore much more entertaining saying: “Knock your heart out!”
He actually gets angry. (So of course I say it even more. You married folks know what I’m talking about.)
Knock your heart out.
A funny band-mate of mine did this by accident one time and it stuck. Years ago. Isn’t it odd how certain things stick with you?
My husband sometimes sarcastically says, “And if ifs and buts were candy and nuts, we’d all have a wonderful Christmas,” in reference to wishing we’d done things differently.
I had an ex who said basically the same thing in a more crass way. He used to say, “And if shit were butter, we’d spread it on bread.” I always remembered that one. I have a soft spot for crass. I hope I’m one of those old ladies who curses a lot.
That said… I also hope that unlike my grandmother on my biological father’s side, I do not curse openly in the presence of children. My son met his great-grandmother (he’s named after her maiden name of Miles) for the first time recently in Phoenix, and I still can’t believe he didn’t learn some lovely new words to share with the nice ladies who teach his church preschool.
She dropped every single curse word you can imagine, save for the F-bomb. And I’m sure if we’d just had more time she would have found a way to work that one in.
My grandma would curse; I’d give my younger sister Sommer who was with us the Official WTF? Look, and then glance nonchalantly at Miles, hoping he hadn’t noticed. I got lucky—he was immersed in his toys every time.
I’m no delicate flower. I’m often the first one seated at the Table of Inappropriateness and will drop a “That’s what SHE said!” whenever humanly possible, but I was really shocked. This woman raised four kids, for goodness sakes. She knows better than to call someone an asshole in front of a three-year-old.
I got sick the night before we flew to Arizona, which really sucked. I had hoped to try to see my friend Tammy who lives in Tuscon while we were there, but my wretched illness combined with the fact that every day was filled with a family event made me not even try.
My entire family, both mother’s and father’s sides, live in Arizona. I was born there and nearly everyone I’m immediately related to in the world resides there. So when I go there, it is a whirlwind to try and visit as much of the family as possible. A really fun whirlwind, but a whirlwind nonetheless.
Miles caught my cold during our last day or so there. He’s almost over it, but it is hanging on in my weak lungs as usual. I’m hoping it doesn’t turn into pneumonia again, but my chest is hurting and I’m exhausted. Damn it. I have things to do.
It is so weird how all of my respiratory illnesses go straight into pneumonia now. I am pretty certain I’m going to be one of those older folks who dies from pneumonia, and I am one hundred percent surprised. I would not have picked “lungs” as my weak spot.
I’ve been a singer my whole life, a good swimmer, and I used to run for miles without any effort. My legs would give out before my lungs when I’d go for a run. I’ve always thought I had really strong lungs. I would have pegged the liver as my wimpy organ. Who knew?
I just re-read this blog and realized I’m giving you a written snapshot into the way my brain hops from one thing to another, traveling on the raveling threads of different thoughts until I’ve knitted a completely different outfit altogether. It’s like a gray matter roller coaster, kids. Put your arms in the air, here comes another random segue!
I’m feeling loopy. I’m not drinking, I swear. Just tired.
Before I stop babbling, I must recommend some books.
I’m reading the Slash biography (by Slash with Anthony Bozza). It’s pretty good.
If he’s telling the truth, then Axl is a power-tripping control freak with an ego the size of the Sun. I will never support Guns & Roses because Axl owns the name and that’s all it means anymore. Just stupid Axl and his grody new “chubby old guy with cornrows” look. Not the awesome band that made one of my top five ever albums, Appetite for Destruction.
I’ve been in a band with a lead singer/guitar player/psychopath like that. Two drummers in a row “nicknamed” her Hitler. Yeesh. When I got away from her, it was like a black shroud of negativity fell off of me and I could see the sun again. Because of my own experience, I could really relate to the way Slash talks in the book about quitting the band he’s thrown his life and heart into, and watching some egotistical bastard destroy everything he helped create.
The process of acquiring band members and discussions of the relationships between them were also relatable to me after playing in bands for twelve years. A band is so much like a family. There is a crazy dynamic there that nobody outside of the band will ever see.
The hardest part of getting a band somewhere, once you have a decent musical set to offer the world, is simply trying to keep everyone together and happy.
If one person is off, everybody’s off. Your drummer’s coked up and can’t keep the rhythm, guess what? You ALL sound disjointed and off playing with him/her. Your guitar player just broke up with his girlfriend and is depressed, guess what? You are ALL going through that break-up. Your singer has the flu and can’t sing for shit, and you all sound like shit. You get it.
This factor is both the most irritating and most amazing part of playing in a band. You become one entity with a sound of its own. You change or remove one person and it can become a completely different thing. One of the coolest things about Appetite for Destruction is that it was lightning in a bottle. If you had changed one member of the band, or done one thing differently, there might not be a Slash book to read today. Everyone contributed something unique and absolutely perfect for what they were doing to that record.
That Appetite for Destruction cassette got me through my first year of college. I was barely seventeen, working a closing shift at the KFC at night and getting up at 4 a.m. to work in a donut shop across from campus. I’d run over to my classes from there, go home after classes for a quick nap, start over. On the off-days, I’d drink alcohol and have seventeen-year-old sex with my loser boyfriend. And listen to that damned cassette. I flipped it over and over until I wore it out. The cassette, I mean. Heh.
Okay, that’s enough of that sassy talk.
The other books I would like to recommend were written by my friend Richard Cox. He’s a great writer. He lives here in Tulsa and also writes for this website, manned by another favorite writer of mine, Brad Listi: http://www.thenervousbreakdown.com
The books I read are The God Particle and Rift, and I absolutely loved them both. I’m not going to talk about them because there is nothing that drives me crazier than a spoiler. But if you are looking for a good new book to read, try one. He’s awesome.
He has a new book coming out as well that I think is his best yet, so keep your eyes peeled for that as well. Here’s his website with the book buying information: http://www.richardcox.net
Hope all is great in your world, my friends.
This year, my parents offered us Spring Break plane tickets, so my son Miles and I jumped at the chance to fly out to Phoenix for a visit.
Okay, so that’s a lie. Actually, I agonized for a few months over whether or not I was emotionally ready to attempt a plane ride with a somewhat sheltered, not-quite-potty-trained three-year-old.
I finally told myself to stop being such a wimp and just do it. Nobody’s gonna die if my kid is the one pooping his pants and throwing a tantrum on the plane. The flight to Phoenix is less than three hours, after all. Three potentially horrifying, stressful, humiliating hours of my life in exchange for a really fun week visiting with my family. I decided the exchange was worth it and we committed to dates.
Turns out, I had nothing to worry about. Miles was a little dream on both flights. Not a single fit or grumpy moment.
Before we left, I tried to stress how easy it is to get lost in an airport as best I could, without scaring the living daylights out of the kid. He stayed by me in public and always held my hand, which is usually a major issue for my independent boy. I also had a bag full of preschool work books, new books to read, plastic toys and crayons that kept him occupied the whole time.
He didn’t poop his pants on the flight there or home, so I never had to figure out how to change a messy diaper in one of those tiny airplane restrooms. I hope I never do. That’s a skill set I’ll really be okay with never mastering.
I was worried the flight might scare him because I forgot that kids don’t over-think everything like we grown-ups sometimes do. I am personally a nervous flyer because I just can’t understand how the gigantic, heavy jet stays up in the sky. I usually spend the entire flight neurotically waiting for the airplane to suddenly figure out that it really shouldn’t be up there, and plummet to the ground.
Traveling with a child was different because I had to make being trapped miles from the ground in a metal tube seem fun and exciting, so I focused on how “amazing” it was that we were flying, how “cool” it was that we could go so much faster than cars, etc. While I was selling it to him, I ended up kind of selling it to myself and it really helped my nerves.
Not as much as the alcoholic beverage I usually order on a flight to calm myself down, mind you. But you know, Mommy can’t drink on the job, so “Ooooh, look at the clouds, sweetie!” will have to do. But I will admit that I glanced longingly at the Bloody Mary the nice man next to me was holding more than once.
Miles had two firsts on the airplane, strangely enough. The first “I want to do this when I grow up” statement he’s ever uttered, and he wrote his name all by himself for the first time, without any prompting from me or help.
I didn’t even know he was doing it. He was writing while I took pictures to document his first “aware of it” plane ride (he flew with me at two months when we left Los Angeles, where he was born). He said “I wrote my name, Mommy!” and held up the word “MILE” scribbled in crayon. Wow. Not bad for a kiddo who just turned three a few months ago, right? (I even got pictures, which you will see below.)
While we were discussing that a pilot was flying our airplane, Miles stated that he wants to be an airplane pilot when he grows up. He’s never said anything of the sort before. So there you have it. We’ll see, I guess. (I’m just hoping he doesn’t have to ask people if they’d like fries with that when he grows up, really. Pilot would be very much okay with me.)
Miles was excited to see his “Dramma and Drampa” and especially loved their swimming pool and novel new landscape. The desert looks like another planet compared to the green, humid place we call home, and he seemed fascinated by it. He helps me water plants in our backyard, so he became a little obsessed with watering his very patient Grampa’s beautifully landscaped desert plants with swimming pool water. We’re hoping this won’t have any adverse effects on the flora.
I was excited to see my parents and their new home. They just bought it and moved in a few months ago, but it was decorated so beautifully that you couldn’t tell. I was impressed. I fell in love with the high ceilings, open floor plan and bright, natural lighting. I am not a fan of rabbit-warren-divided, ranch-style homes and love an airy, happy house. I’d rather live in one really big room than the same amount of space walled off into tiny sections. It was perfect.
I’m going to post pictures from our vacation in little chunks, rather than all at once, because I have a ridiculous amount of them to share. Once home, I got them off my camera, but I haven’t yet cleaned up and rotated them all for public consumption. I’m doing this in the little bursts of Me Time that mommies get, as much as that kills this girl who can’t stand to walk away from something unfinished. (I’ve had to let that part of my personality go since giving birth. It has been one of my greatest challenges.)
Pictures from the plane ride and poolside:
More to come. Hope you are having a beautiful day, wherever you are, my friends.
I just walked a few miles around the neighborhood. My daily exercise. I have to either walk for 45 minutes or do my 45-minute-long DVD workout of abdominal exercises and light weight lifting for my chest and arms, every day.
Rare exceptions. I painted my kitchen recently, all by myself, for example. I let myself off the exercising hook that day. And I’m glad, because I still hurt from climbing up on the counters to reach the parts above the cabinets. Ouch, whined the old lady.
On the phone to my little sister recently, I was expressing my fervent desire to someday once again wear my all-time favorite pair of jeans, a little size 5/6 dream from Abercrombie & Fitch* I bought used at the Buffalo Exchange on La Brea in Los Angeles.
Perfect amount of wear. Low-waisted, but not so low I need a Brazilian wax to wear them in a non-obscene manner. Moderately boot-cut, without looking like they floated in on the bell-bottomed ass of a seventies time machine commuter. Best pair of jeans ever.
My sister told me that she uses stickers for exercise motivation. Like, if she works out, she gets to put a sticker on the calendar that day. I laughed at her. I asked her if she was eight years old. Mocked her shamelessly.
So she did what every younger sister who has been mocked does, she gave me the finger and mailed me a sheet of happy, sparkly flower stickers with a note that said, “Put one of these on your calendar whenever you work out!” Smiley face.
So I tried it. And I’ll be damned if it doesn’t work. I want my stupid little sticker every day. I want that calendar to look like a happy fucking garden full of flower stickers, the likes of which I’ve never seen. I want it to explode with the flowery sticker expression of my motivation; a cheerful, floral testament to my determination and moxie.
I want my daily sticker.
Damn it. She was right.
I even got my husband doing it.
I gave him some “Good job!” motivational-type stickers I bought for our son, and he puts one next to my flower sticker when he works out. His have different wild animals on them.
A couple that regresses back to childhood together stays together, isn’t that how the old saying goes? Ahem.
I listened to The Breeders old Pod album today as I walked. The perfect pop drums and incredible dynamics on that record still blow me away to this day.
I decided that it’s a good thing that I got pregnant and left Los Angeles, because I probably would have ended up as an orange, leathery, weird old lady you might see walking down Hollywood Boulevard, air drumming along with my iPod.
I can’t get used to the fact that nobody else can hear the music to which I’m listening. I want to share the music, the feeling it gives me, and I forget that I’m the only one feeling it. I want to dance and nod my head, but I would look bat-shit crazy.
We have a treadmill for inclement weather, but I prefer to walk outside if I can. I like to leave things behind. We do this our whole lives, if you really think about it, so it makes sense that it feels so natural.
You’ve left everything behind you thus far.
You heartless bastard.
I’m just kidding. That’s just how the concept of “past” works. We’re constantly moving ahead into the future. I don’t really think you’re a heartless bastard.
Unless I dated you at some point. Then I reserve the right. (Somebody’s gotta keep this cross warm, damn it.)
I have been playing online Scrabble lately. The program allows you to have a conversation during the game. It makes it even more fun.
I try to use the word I’m putting down in a sentence, just to see what pops out. My favorite Scrabble conversation has been with my friend Brittaney. She told me I could share, so… the Scrabble word that was played has been italicized for your pleasure:
Tawni F: Tawni held Brittaney’s silky hair back while she projectile vomited vodka into the bushes outside of the club.
Brittaney P: While she could care less about Brittaney’s clothes, she *did* want to keep that silky hair tidy.
Tawni F: The club’s bouncer called the police on the two dicey looking girls out front, puking in the bushes while talking about silky hair.
Brittaney P: “I’m as pretty as them!,” she slurred through vodka-induced tears. “I can be a cheerleader, too! I can be a pretty cheerleader! RAH!!”
Tawni F: Brittaney and Tawni spent the rest of the evening making cool CD mixes of their favorite songs while they made fun of cheerleaders, ate pizza and drank more vodka.
Brittaney P: The vodka was clearly a bad idea, as not an hour later, cries of “Don’t encage me!” were heard through the windows of Tawni’s dark attic.
Tawni F: Brittaney and Tawni had to bemoan their love of vodka as they surveyed the wrecked house and broken attic windows through which something large had escaped.
Brittaney P: That something was a robot. A *drunk* robot.
Tawni F: The drunk robot must have been very quiet as he escaped from the attic. Or maybe Brittaney and Tawni were just passed out from the vodka. Yeah, it was probably that.
Brittaney P: Or it was the pot. The girls had been taking hit after hit from the bong since 4:00 that day. A possible reason they missed the ado….
Tawni F: The girls decided to equip the cage in the attic with a security alarm so they wouldn’t doze through another robot escape.
Brittaney P: Brittaney had zero faith in their ability to construct said alarm in the state they were in.
Tawni F: Tawni said “Faith? Wait… what?” and began to doze. The robots win again.
Brittaney P: And with that, Brittaney put her favorite Slayer album in the tape deck!
Tawni F: The delightful sounds of Slayer woke Tawni up, so she and Brittaney began rocking on all fronts with the robot. Turns out, it was a ROCK robot!
Brittaney P: The vodka-induced hallucinations wore off. When Britt saw the ad for raspberry Stoli on tv she remarked to Tawn, “Aw hell no, I gots to wean myself off this shit!”
Tawni F: Tawni was vying for Britt’s attention as she drooled at the raspberry Stoli ad. “I am not holding up your silky hair while you puke this time if you leave me for raspberry-flavored vodka!” she shrilled at her friend Brittaney. Brittaney and the rock robot covered their ears and winced at Tawni.
Brittaney P: Turns out, Britt was wincing because the rock robot had accidentally pinched her labia trying out one of its new “rock moves.”
Tawni F: Tawni was no juror, so she tried not to judge Brittaney or the rock robot for the creepy “labia dance” they seemed to be performing for her entertainment.
Brittaney P: “Fava beans,” she exclaimed. “What are you, Silence of the Freaking Lambs, Rock Robot??”
Tawni F: It took all of Tawni’s guile to escape the liver-hungry Rock Robot.
********
See? Isn’t that so much more fun than normal Scrabble? You get a bizarre story to go with your Scrabble game. Sweet.
I hope you’re having a beautiful week, my friends.
* Also known as “Ambercroombie and Flitch” if you are cool enough: http://www.thenervousbreakdown.com/blisti/2009/03/youre-so-cool/#more-12593
