Every now and then, through the fog of sleepiness and in-flight movies, I remember what I’m doing. It catches me off guard and I can suddenly hear my heart pounding loudly, feel a thin sheen of sweat coat my hands.
“Holy fuck”, I think, “I’m going to England.”
I’m not really nervous about meeting these people, because I already know them. But knowing someone and living up close and personal with them are two totally different things. I’ve never technically been anyone’s “houseguest” before and I feel slightly overwhelmed over all the trouble they’re going to for me.
I’m not really nervous about flying, because I’ve flown a dozen times before. But sitting in a terminal alone, and sober I might add, is a slight shock to the system. I’ve always had my sister there to watch my bag while I go to the bathroom or to exchange raised eyebrows with over some crazy looking passenger. I missed her terribly, just for a moment, when I saw an Asian man that looked exactly like Wayne Newton. Until, of course, I realized she probably has no idea who Wayne Newton is.
I’m not really nervous about going to a foreign country, because seeing the world is one of the few things I’m truly passionate about. But having only been to Europe once, with a tour group, at the age of 15...I’m slightly anxious about going through customs alone. It looks rather intimidating in the movies and, try as I might, I can’t remember much about what it was like all those years ago.
When the captain announces our descent into London, I very nearly press my nose to the window. But I needn’t bother, there’s nothing to see but fog and my first glimpse of England consists of tarmac whizzing by under the plane as we land.
I already have my cell phone out, ready just as they announce I can use it again. I text my family and tell them I’ve landed safely and then I text Nathan. It’s a new method of communication for us and it surprises me how much I enjoy it. It seems silly, but it makes me feel less like the internet friend.
He’s picking me up from the airport alone and I’m glad. Not just because having everyone meet me all at once might be a bit overwhelming, but also because it feels like that’s the way it’s supposed to be. He was the first of the four that I connected with and has remained the one I relate to most, which often amuses me because you couldn’t find two paths more different than ours.
The queue for customs is long, winding and full of Americans traveling in groups. I’m still texting Nathan so it isn’t until I’m almost to the front of the line that I notice they’re all holding an important looking piece of paper that I don’t have.
“Excuse me”, I say to the couple behind me. “Everyone seems to have that little slip of paper and I’m wondering if I missed something.”
They explain that I’m supposed to have it filled out and ready to hand to the customs agent in the booth, along with my passport. There is, apparently, a stack of them on a table...way in the back of the line. Everyone in the row adjacent to ours, separated only by the rope barrier, has been listening to our exchange and I feel a stab of embarrassment mixed with panic. I shuffle my feet and wonder what to do.
“Stay right there”, says a smartly dressed blonde woman with an English accent. She starts dipping under the ropes, heading toward the table full of papers, but is apparently given one before she’s halfway there. It seems everyone, down to the last in line, is aware of my blunder. I thank her profusely when she returns and hands it over.
“It’s no problem”, she replies. “Wouldn’t want to hold up the queue.”
I quickly fill out the form and manage to have everything together just as I’m called up to a booth. The agent glances at my information and begins asking me a rapid series of questions, first about myself and then about the people I’m visiting.
“How long are you staying?”
“Nine days.”
“Whose address is this?”
“Nathan and Kelly’s.”
“How do you know them?”
“...Through a writing forum.”
She glances up from the papers and gives me an odd look. “You mean the internet? Have you ever met them before?”
“Not in person, no.” I feel dozens of eyes on my back and I’m beginning to panic again. I want to lie about it all, just so she stops looking at me like I’m a complete lunatic, but I’m too terrified of what might happen if I do.
“Are they meeting you here at the airport?”
“He is, yes.”
“What happens if you decide you don’t want to stay with them? What will you do?”
“Um, get a hotel?”
“What do you do for a living? How much money did you bring with you? When is your return flight? I’d like to see your bank account information and your itinerary.”
I’m completely flustered as I try to comply with all her requests. I’m prepared for all sorts of scenarios, but this isn’t one of them. I tell her what’s in my bank account, which, for me, is the equivalent to dropping my pants and pressing my bare ass to her little window. It’s absolutely unseemly.
I show her my itinerary and finally, finally, she stamps my passport and waves me on.
I gratefully follow the signs to baggage claim, walking quickly and texting Nathan that I’m nearly there. My giant suitcase is already sitting on the floor, to the left of the carousel, dwarfing all the others around it. I feel another wave of gratitude – one of my biggest fears was that they would lose it and I’d be without makeup for the entire trip. I wrestle the difficult handle up and begin dragging my belongings toward the exit.
As I walk through the open double doors, I immediately spot him standing behind a white rail to my right. He’s grinning and holding a small white sign that says “#bannisterfest”, which is a play on my last name and what the four of them have decided to call this holiday. I can’t stop the laugh that bursts out as I make my way past the rail; I hadn’t expected the sign.
We meet at the end of the barrier and hug. It’s lovely and surreal and I’m afraid my face may crack. He’s so tall and so exuberant that from the moment I walked through the doors, I didn’t notice anyone else. From his writing, you would think that Nathan blends in with a crowd, sitting amongst them and recording their movements, but that isn’t the case. He’s the sort of person people notice, the sort I think they’d want to write about.
I walk alongside him through the terminal, grinning and chatting as though it were continuation instead of first. He tells me Kelly was late to work this morning because she insisted I must have the sign. I feel a tiny burning behind my eyes and I have to will myself to keep the tears at bay.
It’s a bit embarrassing; being so happy you might cry, but it’s certainly better than the sort of embarrassment the customs agent stirred up. Which, I’m happy to say, disappeared the moment I finally hugged my friend and realized that, now, it definitely doesn’t matter what any of them think.
Showing posts with label friends. Show all posts
Showing posts with label friends. Show all posts
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Monday, May 14, 2012
Abroad
My life has been peppered with instances where I’ve felt out of place, even in the midst of my own family. It can be difficult, sharing a home with people that don’t completely understand me, that find the things I feel passionate about laughable or weird. Confiding in them is rare because I hate being mocked or used as a humorous anecdote for their friends – “Look at my daughter, the sensitive blogger, writing in her secret notebook!” It takes something out of me, each time I hedge around the truth to save being heckled or keep a piece of writing I’m proud of hidden because it would make me too vulnerable.
But with each passing year, seven to be precise, I’ve met more and more people that “get” me and I’ve formed a different sort of family. It’s the beauty, and the curse, of the Internet. It says, “Look, here are all these people that you can connect with on every level you’ve been missing! But, oh...they live 4,000 miles away, across an ocean.
You laugh, you write, you talk, you care, but you can’t hug or sit down at a table and look each other in the face. These are real people, flesh and blood and bone, but in most cases they’ll only ever be a friendly voice on the other end of a phone line or a “how are you” email.
In most cases, but no longer in mine. Because two weeks ago I boarded a plane to England and set out to meet, and stay with, four people I already knew but hadn’t set eyes on. Two weeks ago I traveled alone, to a country I’d never been to before, and had the sort of adventure most people will never get to experience.
But with each passing year, seven to be precise, I’ve met more and more people that “get” me and I’ve formed a different sort of family. It’s the beauty, and the curse, of the Internet. It says, “Look, here are all these people that you can connect with on every level you’ve been missing! But, oh...they live 4,000 miles away, across an ocean.
You laugh, you write, you talk, you care, but you can’t hug or sit down at a table and look each other in the face. These are real people, flesh and blood and bone, but in most cases they’ll only ever be a friendly voice on the other end of a phone line or a “how are you” email.
In most cases, but no longer in mine. Because two weeks ago I boarded a plane to England and set out to meet, and stay with, four people I already knew but hadn’t set eyes on. Two weeks ago I traveled alone, to a country I’d never been to before, and had the sort of adventure most people will never get to experience.
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Last day
“I think I’m going to buy some of those diet chips”, Diane says.
I prop my bare feet on the edge of her desk and cross my ankles. “Make sure you read the bag carefully. Some of those diet and sugar free foods can cause anal leakage.”
She throws back her head and laughs, the sound echoing down the corridor. I smile and shake my head as she launches into a story about a woman that had to have her asshole reconstructed, due to her penchant for taking the dirt road. I’m going to miss these daily dicking-off fests more than I originally thought. And I’m going to miss her.
I remember the first time I sat in this chair, in her horribly messy office, wearing a brightly striped sweater, black skirt and black old lady pumps. I was a nineteen year old kid with a month old baby at home and I had no idea what I was doing. Diane sat me down, explained the job, spent a half hour gossiping and then showed me around the suite.
I immediately wanted to work here, not even considering the corporation as a whole...just this little area where the work space rang with laughter and the halls smelled of coffee and someone’s breakfast burrito. It was my first “real” job.
But though the woman who hired me is my supervisor, she’s never been just a boss. From the day I interviewed until this moment, this last day we get to sit here together as employee and employer, she’s also been my friend, mother and psychiatrist.
She cosigned for my first loan to help me establish credit, she made cakes on my birthdays and sat drinking wine with me all night on her living room floor. Just recently, when I had to go to the doctor for what was apparently vertigo, she came, without asking, in sweats and tennis shoes on her day off. Just in case I needed someone to hold my hand and drive me home.
She’s lectured me, made me listen to the same stories over and over again, occasionally irritated me so much that I wanted to scream...but I love her. She gave me a job, she gave me a chance and she’s continuously put up with all of my tardiness, grouchiness and immaturity.
And now, after weeks of wondering and waiting, the day has finally come. The transition from old job to new will be complete tomorrow, when I pack up the last box and they cart it two blocks away. I’ve been excited about taking a step up the career ladder, about more money and more opportunities to grow and learn. I’ve been excited about my new chair and my new title, about rubbing elbows with presidents and COO’s. Excited and a little terrified, but not sad. Not until now. Not until it really hit me that in order to grow up and move up, I’ll have to give up a few things too.
This is the last time I’ll sit around with no makeup on and a frizzy ponytail, barefoot and relaxed in the privacy of an office that’s more like home. The last time I’ll dance on tiptoe around her door and primp in front of her mirror to make her laugh. The last time I’ll drink coffee and shoot the shit for an hour in the mornings. The last time I’ll wear flip flops and leggings, play games when no one is looking and close my door for an hour with a current bestseller.
And perhaps the saddest thing of all, right up there with saying good bye to her and other coworkers I’ve come to think of as family - this is the last time I’ll sit at this desk and write.
I prop my bare feet on the edge of her desk and cross my ankles. “Make sure you read the bag carefully. Some of those diet and sugar free foods can cause anal leakage.”
She throws back her head and laughs, the sound echoing down the corridor. I smile and shake my head as she launches into a story about a woman that had to have her asshole reconstructed, due to her penchant for taking the dirt road. I’m going to miss these daily dicking-off fests more than I originally thought. And I’m going to miss her.
I remember the first time I sat in this chair, in her horribly messy office, wearing a brightly striped sweater, black skirt and black old lady pumps. I was a nineteen year old kid with a month old baby at home and I had no idea what I was doing. Diane sat me down, explained the job, spent a half hour gossiping and then showed me around the suite.
I immediately wanted to work here, not even considering the corporation as a whole...just this little area where the work space rang with laughter and the halls smelled of coffee and someone’s breakfast burrito. It was my first “real” job.
But though the woman who hired me is my supervisor, she’s never been just a boss. From the day I interviewed until this moment, this last day we get to sit here together as employee and employer, she’s also been my friend, mother and psychiatrist.
She cosigned for my first loan to help me establish credit, she made cakes on my birthdays and sat drinking wine with me all night on her living room floor. Just recently, when I had to go to the doctor for what was apparently vertigo, she came, without asking, in sweats and tennis shoes on her day off. Just in case I needed someone to hold my hand and drive me home.
She’s lectured me, made me listen to the same stories over and over again, occasionally irritated me so much that I wanted to scream...but I love her. She gave me a job, she gave me a chance and she’s continuously put up with all of my tardiness, grouchiness and immaturity.
And now, after weeks of wondering and waiting, the day has finally come. The transition from old job to new will be complete tomorrow, when I pack up the last box and they cart it two blocks away. I’ve been excited about taking a step up the career ladder, about more money and more opportunities to grow and learn. I’ve been excited about my new chair and my new title, about rubbing elbows with presidents and COO’s. Excited and a little terrified, but not sad. Not until now. Not until it really hit me that in order to grow up and move up, I’ll have to give up a few things too.
This is the last time I’ll sit around with no makeup on and a frizzy ponytail, barefoot and relaxed in the privacy of an office that’s more like home. The last time I’ll dance on tiptoe around her door and primp in front of her mirror to make her laugh. The last time I’ll drink coffee and shoot the shit for an hour in the mornings. The last time I’ll wear flip flops and leggings, play games when no one is looking and close my door for an hour with a current bestseller.
And perhaps the saddest thing of all, right up there with saying good bye to her and other coworkers I’ve come to think of as family - this is the last time I’ll sit at this desk and write.
Thursday, July 28, 2011
MeetingZ - Part Two
I’ve become so used to expressing myself through written words, that I think my basic communication skills have changed somewhat.
I’ve never really been the best communicator to begin with – I’m easily frustrated with people and weighing my words before I say them is not something I’ve ever been in the habit of doing. I’ve always been rather impetuous, foot permanently wedged in my loud, open mouth, not really caring how I come across to others. But with writing it’s different. I’m deliberate - I think very hard about what I want to say, every word is placed just so, and then I go over it again.
You would think that my life would influence my writing, but in fact I believe it’s the other way around. I’ve become considerably calmer, more thoughtful – I’m not the same person that started this blog six-ish years ago. In fact, I’m not even the same person that was writing here two years ago. We could argue that I’m simply “growing up”, and I’m sure that plays a part in these personality changes, but I think writing is at the heart of it.
Mostly it’s a good thing, and I’m not saying it’s all that drastic (I’m still essentially the same person), but every now and then I’ll think it’s made me less fun and spontaneous...too controlled, especially when I meet new people. And, it seems that what I’m thinking translates better from my head to my fingers, than from my head to my mouth. I’ll be in the middle of a conversation and think, “I could have explained that better in writing” or “That would’ve made sense had I typed it”.
In the early hours of my road trip to Kansas City with Jerrod, I had those thoughts. I got nervous because the last thing I wanted was for him to think I was boring in person. And when I get nervous I do one of two things – make inappropriate jokes or say nothing at all. Being, at that moment, all up in my head, I went with the latter, which did nothing to help the situation and only served to make it seem more awkward. At least that’s what I was (overly) thinking.
“Why aren’t you talking”, he asked me, possibly more than once. I had no idea how to answer – first, because I wasn’t going to admit that I was having some sort of blogging induced social anxiety and second, because I honestly wasn’t sure what the fuck I was supposed to say. We’d spent years discussing every topic, having “favorite thing” battles, arguing points and giving advice – I was drawing a complete blank on something we hadn’t talked about yet. And so, in the periods of silence between tentative conversations...I sang. A lot.
We’d agreed to have a playlist battle of sorts before I arrived, but true to form, I left my iPod behind. I didn’t think our taste in music was remotely similar (he’s a Coldplay fanatic, I’m an Afroman aficionado), but he surprised me. With the exception of two or three songs, I knew them all.
There was a good bit of country music and when I sang along, it was his turn to be surprised.
“I thought you hated country music”, he said.
I smiled. “I never said that.”
He’d apparently stocked up on the country with the sole purpose of irritating me, but I forgave him because not only did he not succeed, he also added rap songs because he knew they were my favorite. And the one Ludo song I’d convinced him to listen to in a long ago conversation, after weeks of harassment.
I was thawing out, becoming more relaxed. I realized that a five hour drive was nothing; we’d talked on the phone that long plenty of times, everything was fine. He knew me already – he wouldn’t find me boring. And so what if we revisited a few topics? It would be like a refresher course since his memory is, remarkably, even more riddled with holes than my own. “I didn’t say that” or “I don’t remember” are two of his favorite phrases.
I insisted that he join me in car karaoke, but except for a few mumbled verses and some guitar noises he remained tight lipped. Until the song he thought to shock me with came on and I squealed, delighted, launching right into the lyrics.
“Man! You know this!?” Foiled again, he was.
It was the Tenacious D song “Fuck her gently” and my excitement must have been catching because he forgot about his previously adamant refusal to sing and shouted the good parts along with me.
The rest of the trip was easy – we talked about writing and about the night before with Jimmy...which I found I could laugh at a lot sooner than anticipated, simply because he was so nice about it. He made fun of my lunch order at the drive through and my excitement over the herds of cattle. But, in my defense, baby cows are cute. Plus there isn’t much in the way of scenery between OKC and KC, and he refused to play the “show me yours and I’ll show you mine” game, so I had to get my visual kicks where I could.
As we drove into Kansas City, over the little interstate bridges, I was glued to the view out my window. It was gorgeous. Our major cities back home aren’t very major at all, so when I see a skyline filled with tall buildings I’m always a little in awe.
We both immediately noticed our hotel, standing tall amongst the other buildings but set apart by the round dome at the very top – which I knew from prior research, was a revolving restaurant called Skies. I was excited about the whole weekend in general, but especially about the hotel.
We parked in the attached garage and made our way through the side entrance into the lobby. It was huge and open, busy but not overly crowded. My suitcase wheels squealed and clacked behind me as we approached the desk, seeming to announce to the entire room that, yes...I was a little out of place. Everything was marble, chrome, glass and plush furniture. Escalators led up to open balcony-like walkways filled with cafes and coffee shops. A mammoth piece of modern art hung from the center, hovering over an empty grand piano, not providing any light but still giving off the impression of a chandelier with varying lengths of silver wire tipped with silver balls.
Room keys in hand, we headed for the elevators. There were two sets – the first only going up to floor 28 and the second for floors 29 and up. I didn’t notice the difference at first and stood in front of the closest bank of elevators, which for some reason really amused Jerrod.
An older man, clearly another guest, was waiting at the second bank and as we approached he said, “These are only for the 29th floor and up.” I thought for a moment that I detected a note of snobbery in his voice, but I couldn’t really be sure and I was too happy to be rude. Besides, I was wearing a t-shirt proclaiming that “awkward mornings beat boring nights” – who was I to judge?
“Yes, I know. We’re staying on the 29th floor”, I replied with a smile. And, as it turned out, he was perfectly nice on the ride up.
There was a floor to ceiling window in the elevator bank of our level and the view was absolutely breathtaking. Not only have I never stayed in a hotel that nice, I’ve never been that high up in a building before either. There were some “wows” and then both of us reached for our phones, snapping pictures like dutiful tourists, before heading up the hallway.
The room was lovely, done in blue, green and beige, modern and comfortable but not extravagant, with dark wood and granite furniture. And it came complete with the same amazing view as the hallway, albeit from a slightly smaller window. More pictures were taken, Jerrod let Paige know we’d arrived and I called first dibs on the bathroom.
Poor Jerrod got a little crash course in just how high maintenance women can sometimes be but, being in a giving mood, I interrupted my (perhaps excessive) routine so he could have a quick 10 minutes to get ready.
I was nearly finished, halfway through applying mascara, when there was a knock on the door.
I wasn’t really sure what to expect from Paige. She and I had talked a good bit through Twitter, Facebook and email. We read each other’s blogs. I knew her basics, that she was friendly and fun to goof off with (she was, after all, my Twitter wife) and I wasn’t exactly nervous to meet her, but it’s rare that I get along with other moms. Inevitably, they go on and on about their children and, inevitably, I want to vomit all over their mom jeans.
I knew for a fact that Jerrod was going to be a quiet, dry humored guy that would probably need a bit of loosening up. But then, I’d already had years to figure him out. Paige was still part mystery.
And an attractive one at that. I opened the door to find a slightly edgier version of the Paige I’d seen in pictures – one sporting several tattoos, big hoop earrings and fantastic heels. She smiled and we both said hello with just a bit of a squeal, as girls are wont to do, and hugged. I stepped back and let her in, retreating to the bathroom for final touches as she marched into the room, calling to Jerrod.
When I joined them a few minutes later to decide where we’d be going for dinner, I saw that she’d casually draped herself across the foot of the bed and I couldn’t help but smile. There was no way you could be uncomfortable around a person like that, so obviously at ease with themselves.
She decided to take us to the Country Club Plaza so we could walk around and choose a place to eat. On the way there she played rap music and weaved through traffic like a demon. Her opinions on children, even her own, were scarily similar to mine and she definitely wasn't wearing mom jeans. I decided it might be love.
The plaza was beautiful – with a big fountain in the center, statues and flowers everywhere. Shops I was salivating to go into lined the streets and though Paige said we could, I said no so as not to subject poor, manly Jerrod to anymore feminine torture than was strictly necessary. I figured he was in for it anyway once we both started drinking.
It was sunny and breezy so we found a bar and grill with a patio, intending to have a few pre-cocktail cocktails and eat before moving on to somewhere more dynamic.
Jerrod had the nerve to make fun of me for ordering a BLT, then order fish tacos for himself. His plate may have been more aesthetically pleasing, but I had the last laugh because mine was better than his – as evidenced by the thickest, most heavenly seasoned bacon known to man.
It wasn’t quite six o’clock and we were done eating - Jerrod and I were tossing back double Jack and cokes, though I’m actually ashamed to admit he was a little more adept at it that I, and Paige was drinking whatever new concoction struck her fancy. Pretty soon our table was littered with glasses and we were making lesbianish remarks for the benefit of our rather thick (not in the good sense, I wouldn’t know) waiter, who most definitely wanted Paige’s vagina. I was also positive that, even in my rapidly advancing state of inebriation, he was looking at Jerrod with envy.
There was never a lull in conversation, never a dull moment, which is I suppose why we looked up hours later, realized night had fallen and that we wouldn’t be going anywhere else. The patio that had been relatively empty in the daylight was now packed full of girls in tight dresses and guys in button ups and Sperrys.
“Douchy”, Paige called it, and I had to agree. Nevertheless, it was fun – a veritable smorgasbord of hilarity.
Like the girl at a table, filled with people, that was kissing some guy. He got up suddenly, walked away and, not a moment later, she was puking silently onto the patio between her feet, her friends across the table taking no notice. Paige, adding to our amusement, wryly informed the waiter that there was a cleanup necessary in the corner.
Or...like the table full of lesbians behind us, their group growing larger as the night wore on. I’m still unclear about how we knew they were lesbians in the first place, though I’ve no doubt Jerrod, even with his notoriously spotty memory, could clear that one up. Especially since I think he’s the one that somehow discovered their eating habits in the first place.
Or...like the most amusing subject of our attention that evening, beating out even the silent vomiter: Tyler.
Tyler was a deep young man with a burning desire to connect with someone, anyone, so long as they didn’t document it on film.
He asked to join us, we of course said yes, and then he told us all about himself. He claimed to be 23 years old and the heir to a wealthy farming business. I highly suspected that he was chock full of bullshit, but it didn’t matter because he was rather nice to look at and Jerrod seemed to find him highly amusing. He was very...earnest, Tyler.
Unfortunately our time with him came to an abrupt halt when Paige pulled out her camera to take his picture. He may have said no, I don’t rightly remember, but one second he was there...and the next all we saw was his back disappearing into the crowd. We all stared after him openmouthed for a moment before the laughing started. Speculation began about why Tyler didn’t want his picture taken – most of it having to do with witness protection, the mob, or being an ex con. When a girl approached us a few minutes later and said he’d randomly sat down with too, I decided that he must have been working some kind of scam. It’s always the pretty ones.
We stumbled from the bar and out onto the sidewalk shortly after that, all in good spirits. Probably having made as lasting an impression on others there, most notably our waiter, as Tyler did with us.
The night hadn’t turned out at all how I’d expected it to – it was better. The nervousness I’d felt in the car on the way there hadn’t returned at all and, though I knew I’d likely be dealing with a wicked hangover the next morning, I couldn’t wait to do it again Saturday night.
I’ve never really been the best communicator to begin with – I’m easily frustrated with people and weighing my words before I say them is not something I’ve ever been in the habit of doing. I’ve always been rather impetuous, foot permanently wedged in my loud, open mouth, not really caring how I come across to others. But with writing it’s different. I’m deliberate - I think very hard about what I want to say, every word is placed just so, and then I go over it again.
You would think that my life would influence my writing, but in fact I believe it’s the other way around. I’ve become considerably calmer, more thoughtful – I’m not the same person that started this blog six-ish years ago. In fact, I’m not even the same person that was writing here two years ago. We could argue that I’m simply “growing up”, and I’m sure that plays a part in these personality changes, but I think writing is at the heart of it.
Mostly it’s a good thing, and I’m not saying it’s all that drastic (I’m still essentially the same person), but every now and then I’ll think it’s made me less fun and spontaneous...too controlled, especially when I meet new people. And, it seems that what I’m thinking translates better from my head to my fingers, than from my head to my mouth. I’ll be in the middle of a conversation and think, “I could have explained that better in writing” or “That would’ve made sense had I typed it”.
In the early hours of my road trip to Kansas City with Jerrod, I had those thoughts. I got nervous because the last thing I wanted was for him to think I was boring in person. And when I get nervous I do one of two things – make inappropriate jokes or say nothing at all. Being, at that moment, all up in my head, I went with the latter, which did nothing to help the situation and only served to make it seem more awkward. At least that’s what I was (overly) thinking.
“Why aren’t you talking”, he asked me, possibly more than once. I had no idea how to answer – first, because I wasn’t going to admit that I was having some sort of blogging induced social anxiety and second, because I honestly wasn’t sure what the fuck I was supposed to say. We’d spent years discussing every topic, having “favorite thing” battles, arguing points and giving advice – I was drawing a complete blank on something we hadn’t talked about yet. And so, in the periods of silence between tentative conversations...I sang. A lot.
We’d agreed to have a playlist battle of sorts before I arrived, but true to form, I left my iPod behind. I didn’t think our taste in music was remotely similar (he’s a Coldplay fanatic, I’m an Afroman aficionado), but he surprised me. With the exception of two or three songs, I knew them all.
There was a good bit of country music and when I sang along, it was his turn to be surprised.
“I thought you hated country music”, he said.
I smiled. “I never said that.”
He’d apparently stocked up on the country with the sole purpose of irritating me, but I forgave him because not only did he not succeed, he also added rap songs because he knew they were my favorite. And the one Ludo song I’d convinced him to listen to in a long ago conversation, after weeks of harassment.
I was thawing out, becoming more relaxed. I realized that a five hour drive was nothing; we’d talked on the phone that long plenty of times, everything was fine. He knew me already – he wouldn’t find me boring. And so what if we revisited a few topics? It would be like a refresher course since his memory is, remarkably, even more riddled with holes than my own. “I didn’t say that” or “I don’t remember” are two of his favorite phrases.
I insisted that he join me in car karaoke, but except for a few mumbled verses and some guitar noises he remained tight lipped. Until the song he thought to shock me with came on and I squealed, delighted, launching right into the lyrics.
“Man! You know this!?” Foiled again, he was.
It was the Tenacious D song “Fuck her gently” and my excitement must have been catching because he forgot about his previously adamant refusal to sing and shouted the good parts along with me.
The rest of the trip was easy – we talked about writing and about the night before with Jimmy...which I found I could laugh at a lot sooner than anticipated, simply because he was so nice about it. He made fun of my lunch order at the drive through and my excitement over the herds of cattle. But, in my defense, baby cows are cute. Plus there isn’t much in the way of scenery between OKC and KC, and he refused to play the “show me yours and I’ll show you mine” game, so I had to get my visual kicks where I could.
As we drove into Kansas City, over the little interstate bridges, I was glued to the view out my window. It was gorgeous. Our major cities back home aren’t very major at all, so when I see a skyline filled with tall buildings I’m always a little in awe.
We both immediately noticed our hotel, standing tall amongst the other buildings but set apart by the round dome at the very top – which I knew from prior research, was a revolving restaurant called Skies. I was excited about the whole weekend in general, but especially about the hotel.
We parked in the attached garage and made our way through the side entrance into the lobby. It was huge and open, busy but not overly crowded. My suitcase wheels squealed and clacked behind me as we approached the desk, seeming to announce to the entire room that, yes...I was a little out of place. Everything was marble, chrome, glass and plush furniture. Escalators led up to open balcony-like walkways filled with cafes and coffee shops. A mammoth piece of modern art hung from the center, hovering over an empty grand piano, not providing any light but still giving off the impression of a chandelier with varying lengths of silver wire tipped with silver balls.
Room keys in hand, we headed for the elevators. There were two sets – the first only going up to floor 28 and the second for floors 29 and up. I didn’t notice the difference at first and stood in front of the closest bank of elevators, which for some reason really amused Jerrod.
An older man, clearly another guest, was waiting at the second bank and as we approached he said, “These are only for the 29th floor and up.” I thought for a moment that I detected a note of snobbery in his voice, but I couldn’t really be sure and I was too happy to be rude. Besides, I was wearing a t-shirt proclaiming that “awkward mornings beat boring nights” – who was I to judge?
“Yes, I know. We’re staying on the 29th floor”, I replied with a smile. And, as it turned out, he was perfectly nice on the ride up.
There was a floor to ceiling window in the elevator bank of our level and the view was absolutely breathtaking. Not only have I never stayed in a hotel that nice, I’ve never been that high up in a building before either. There were some “wows” and then both of us reached for our phones, snapping pictures like dutiful tourists, before heading up the hallway.
The room was lovely, done in blue, green and beige, modern and comfortable but not extravagant, with dark wood and granite furniture. And it came complete with the same amazing view as the hallway, albeit from a slightly smaller window. More pictures were taken, Jerrod let Paige know we’d arrived and I called first dibs on the bathroom.
Poor Jerrod got a little crash course in just how high maintenance women can sometimes be but, being in a giving mood, I interrupted my (perhaps excessive) routine so he could have a quick 10 minutes to get ready.
I was nearly finished, halfway through applying mascara, when there was a knock on the door.
I wasn’t really sure what to expect from Paige. She and I had talked a good bit through Twitter, Facebook and email. We read each other’s blogs. I knew her basics, that she was friendly and fun to goof off with (she was, after all, my Twitter wife) and I wasn’t exactly nervous to meet her, but it’s rare that I get along with other moms. Inevitably, they go on and on about their children and, inevitably, I want to vomit all over their mom jeans.
I knew for a fact that Jerrod was going to be a quiet, dry humored guy that would probably need a bit of loosening up. But then, I’d already had years to figure him out. Paige was still part mystery.
And an attractive one at that. I opened the door to find a slightly edgier version of the Paige I’d seen in pictures – one sporting several tattoos, big hoop earrings and fantastic heels. She smiled and we both said hello with just a bit of a squeal, as girls are wont to do, and hugged. I stepped back and let her in, retreating to the bathroom for final touches as she marched into the room, calling to Jerrod.
When I joined them a few minutes later to decide where we’d be going for dinner, I saw that she’d casually draped herself across the foot of the bed and I couldn’t help but smile. There was no way you could be uncomfortable around a person like that, so obviously at ease with themselves.
She decided to take us to the Country Club Plaza so we could walk around and choose a place to eat. On the way there she played rap music and weaved through traffic like a demon. Her opinions on children, even her own, were scarily similar to mine and she definitely wasn't wearing mom jeans. I decided it might be love.
The plaza was beautiful – with a big fountain in the center, statues and flowers everywhere. Shops I was salivating to go into lined the streets and though Paige said we could, I said no so as not to subject poor, manly Jerrod to anymore feminine torture than was strictly necessary. I figured he was in for it anyway once we both started drinking.
It was sunny and breezy so we found a bar and grill with a patio, intending to have a few pre-cocktail cocktails and eat before moving on to somewhere more dynamic.
Jerrod had the nerve to make fun of me for ordering a BLT, then order fish tacos for himself. His plate may have been more aesthetically pleasing, but I had the last laugh because mine was better than his – as evidenced by the thickest, most heavenly seasoned bacon known to man.
It wasn’t quite six o’clock and we were done eating - Jerrod and I were tossing back double Jack and cokes, though I’m actually ashamed to admit he was a little more adept at it that I, and Paige was drinking whatever new concoction struck her fancy. Pretty soon our table was littered with glasses and we were making lesbianish remarks for the benefit of our rather thick (not in the good sense, I wouldn’t know) waiter, who most definitely wanted Paige’s vagina. I was also positive that, even in my rapidly advancing state of inebriation, he was looking at Jerrod with envy.
There was never a lull in conversation, never a dull moment, which is I suppose why we looked up hours later, realized night had fallen and that we wouldn’t be going anywhere else. The patio that had been relatively empty in the daylight was now packed full of girls in tight dresses and guys in button ups and Sperrys.
“Douchy”, Paige called it, and I had to agree. Nevertheless, it was fun – a veritable smorgasbord of hilarity.
Like the girl at a table, filled with people, that was kissing some guy. He got up suddenly, walked away and, not a moment later, she was puking silently onto the patio between her feet, her friends across the table taking no notice. Paige, adding to our amusement, wryly informed the waiter that there was a cleanup necessary in the corner.
Or...like the table full of lesbians behind us, their group growing larger as the night wore on. I’m still unclear about how we knew they were lesbians in the first place, though I’ve no doubt Jerrod, even with his notoriously spotty memory, could clear that one up. Especially since I think he’s the one that somehow discovered their eating habits in the first place.
Or...like the most amusing subject of our attention that evening, beating out even the silent vomiter: Tyler.
Tyler was a deep young man with a burning desire to connect with someone, anyone, so long as they didn’t document it on film.
He asked to join us, we of course said yes, and then he told us all about himself. He claimed to be 23 years old and the heir to a wealthy farming business. I highly suspected that he was chock full of bullshit, but it didn’t matter because he was rather nice to look at and Jerrod seemed to find him highly amusing. He was very...earnest, Tyler.
Unfortunately our time with him came to an abrupt halt when Paige pulled out her camera to take his picture. He may have said no, I don’t rightly remember, but one second he was there...and the next all we saw was his back disappearing into the crowd. We all stared after him openmouthed for a moment before the laughing started. Speculation began about why Tyler didn’t want his picture taken – most of it having to do with witness protection, the mob, or being an ex con. When a girl approached us a few minutes later and said he’d randomly sat down with too, I decided that he must have been working some kind of scam. It’s always the pretty ones.
We stumbled from the bar and out onto the sidewalk shortly after that, all in good spirits. Probably having made as lasting an impression on others there, most notably our waiter, as Tyler did with us.
The night hadn’t turned out at all how I’d expected it to – it was better. The nervousness I’d felt in the car on the way there hadn’t returned at all and, though I knew I’d likely be dealing with a wicked hangover the next morning, I couldn’t wait to do it again Saturday night.
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
MeetingZ - Part One
Explaining relationships formed through blogging, to people that don’t blog, can be touchy. Many don’t get it – they don’t understand how a complete stranger can become a dear friend.
Even with the boom in online dating and social networking sites, there’s still a stigma attached to internet-born relationships – especially, for some reason, in relation to blogs. It’s oddly more acceptable to jet off to meet a friend of a friend of a friend on Facebook, than it is to spend time with a person whose life you’ve been reading and commenting on for years. Blogging, for me, is far more personal than a daily status update and a handful of pouty faced photos.
I’ve trusted a few close friends, that I knew would understand or at least be accepting, with the truth about my online dealings. Some read my blog and some only know about it, but what they all have in common is that they realize the relationships I’ve made here are no less valid than ours. Different, but no less valid. The ones that read it see it first hand – in how comfortable I am being honest and in the way people respond in the comments: relating to my current situation, being compassionate whether they understand or not, laughing with me or simply letting me know they stopped by. The ones that don’t read it simply know that it makes me happy, and that’s good enough for them.
I’ve been writing here for over six years and I’ve made a lot of friends, but up until two weeks ago I’d never physically met any of them. I’d made plans on several occasions, but for one reason or another they always fell apart. This year I was determined to make it happen and with some long overdue luck, a no nonsense attitude and the help of my completely oblivious father’s yearly gift of a plane ticket...I met three amazing people.
The first was Jerrod, who writes the blog Breaking Awkward (some of you may be more familiar with his old blog title, The Yellow Factor).
We’ve been friends for a little over two and a half years now – talking so frequently that he became one of those people I contact immediately when something notably good or bad happens. I don’t remember who found who first, but we began good-naturedly insulting each other and the rest, as they say, is history.
Jerrod just so happens to live in Oklahoma a half hour away from my stepfamily, who I visit every summer. After weeks of planning it was decided that we’d not only hang out while I was in town, but we’d also take a weekend trip to Kansas City to visit another blogger, Paige.
However, just because the plans seemed to make themselves and everything was already arranged, from the hotel to the road trip play list, doesn’t mean the execution was entirely easy.
See, the only person that knew I hadn’t actually met Jerrod was my sister...and she was sworn to secrecy in order to avoid rioting. I knew that none of them, especially dad, would understand or approve. All they were told, before I got there, was that I’d be spending a weekend in Kansas City with friends and bumming around Oklahoma City with them too. And, before I got there, dad was completely fine with it. He didn’t press me for details.
We went straight to sleep when we arrived at their house around 1am Thursday morning. I was supposed to meet Jerrod Thursday night and had arranged for my stepsister to drop me off in the city. But that afternoon my dad suddenly decided that I was 12, not 26, and I wouldn’t be going off for the weekend with someone he didn’t know...especially a man.
We were sitting on the patio glaring and occasionally shouting at each other, neither of us willing to concede defeat, until he pointed out the obvious.
“I’ll be taking you into the city to meet this motherfucker and if you don’t like it, you can stay your ass here...where he’ll have to come get you and then I still meet him. Period.”
Poor Jerrod was going to meet the infamous Jimmy, whether either of us liked it or not.
I was terrified and, knowing Jerrod, I was positive he would be too. I’d long since gathered that he isn’t used to people like Jimmy.
I’ve only ever introduced three men to my dad, with embarrassing results, and though Jerrod wasn’t a boyfriend the scenario actually seemed worse to me because we’d never met before. I didn’t picture my first blogger meeting including my drunk, obnoxious father telling stories about his dick.
But that’s exactly how it went down.
He rushed me out the door that evening, interrupting my makeup routine every few minutes and making me furious in the process, because he had to drop off some air conditioners (don’t ask, I don’t know) at his “brother’s” house. I made my sister come along because she’s usually a calming influence, but he’d been hitting The Crown all afternoon and there was no controlling him.
He spent the ride to his “brother’s” deliberately scaring the shit out of me by telling me the horrible things he was going to ask Jerrod and by insisting that he wouldn’t meet him anywhere but at a biker bar called VictimZ. Yeah, Victims with a fucking Z.
“Tell him to get his ass in there and have me a beer waitin’.”
Of course I didn’t. It was bad enough I actually had to type out the name to that ridiculous biker bar and have Jerrod reply with, “I put VictimZ in and Google maps laughed at me.” I was mortified.
When we pulled up to drop off the stupid air conditioners, he made us get out of the truck to meet the guy. He was about seven feet tall, wearing overalls with no shirt and had a bandana wrapped around his long hair. After unloading the cargo, they immediately started laughing and punching each other in the sides like children.
“C’mon man”, dad said while jabbing at him repeatedly. “Ride with us! My daughter comes down here to visit me, then thinks she’s going to take the off to Kansas City with some motherfucker I haven’t met! Oh hell no. I told her to have him meet us at VictimZ.”
His brother stared at him for a moment and then, to my absolute horror, they both burst out laughing. “Oh shit”, the guy said, looking at me with a mix of pity and amusement.
“Aw, I’m not going to help embarrass your daughter, Jimbo”, he said.
But dad talked him into getting in the truck anyway. I sat in the backseat with my sister, silently panicking.
When we pulled into the parking lot fifteen minutes later, I saw Jerrod’s car across the street. Dad didn’t even look around – when I hopped out he locked my things in the car so I couldn’t leave until he allowed it, and they immediately disappeared around back into the “beer garden”.
I waved at Jerrod, who was still hiding in his car across the street (not that I blame him), and he drove over. I walked around to the driver’s side, he got out and that’s how we first set eyes on each other. In the parking lot of a rundown biker bar with my father waiting for him in a beer garden, which was actually nothing more than a dirt-packed backyard with big wooden spool tables and rusted chairs made of scrap metal.
He looked worried, but accepted my apology for the oddness of our first meeting and followed me around the corner. Dad’s brother had parked himself at a table a respectable distance away with my sister, who wasn’t allowed in the bar.
“Where’s dad”, I asked.
“He went in for beer.”
A moment later he came wandering out the door with an evil grin on his face, clutching a bucket of beer. I introduced them, watching as my 5’7 father looked up at Jerrod and shook his hand...and it was apparent by the flash of tendons that he was squeezing the shit out of him.
“Drink a beer with me”, he said, shoving one into his hands.
I reached for one myself, twisted off the top and turned it straight up.
Then other than a few “motherfuckers” (in reference to other people this time, not Jerrod), a few embarrassing remarks and a demand to know if Jerrod could “fight”, they proceeded to have a relatively normal conversation. They talked about what they did for a living and where they lived and how long they’d been there. But even so, I knew my dad and I was going to be keyed up until we got out of there.
Jerrod, who was apparently no longer worried, laughed at me for being so visibly nervous, sucking down the beer and lighting a cigarette when I’d planned on not smoking at all. “Relax”, he said.
And I’d just about managed it because we’d finished our beers and I felt as though escape was just around the corner.
But no – dad insisted that we weren’t going anywhere until we went inside and met his other “brothers”. Apparently they’re all in the same biker gang or something – they wear one spur on one boot or some such nonsense so they recognize that they’re “related”.
As we both trailed reluctantly behind dad Jerrod said, “I thought you said we didn’t have to go in...”
“Sorry”, I mumbled, “I didn’t think we would.”
The ceiling was completely covered in bras, except for a small square of removable tile where a stripper pole was shoved inexpertly through a jagged hole.
“I put the pole in”, dad told Jerrod proudly. I shook my head and sighed.
He tried to call over a long haired old man that was absorbed in some sort of game, but the guy was taking his time. There were a few tables of degenerates (mostly really ugly women) that were giving us the stink eye. I wasn’t sure if they were simply unfriendly or plotting to kill me and take off with my Coach bag.
While we waited for the old guy to grace us with his presence, dad decided to tell Jerrod a lovely little story.
“This is my hangout, man. One time I got so drunk that this woman drew a smiley face on the head of my dick and I didn’t even know it. She called my wife and told her she did it, so when I got home she said, ‘You’re not getting in this bed like that with a smiley face on your dick!’ I woke up the next morning and was like, shit, man!”
“Dad! That’s enough! Don’t ever talk about your dick in front of me again. Ever.”
They both laughed and I glared at Jerrod. “Don’t encourage him.”
The old guy chose that moment to make his way over and we were introduced, though I can’t remember his name, and he hugged me uninvited...as all dad’s weirdo friends seem to do.
“This is my daughter’s boyfriend”, dad said, launching into his complaint about me taking off for the weekend again.
“He’s not my boyfriend”, I interjected, feeling a fresh wave of embarrassment.
They all ignored me and dad launched into his dick story again for the benefit of our new companion. “Hey remember the time...”
“Yep”, old guy said, “it was my old lady that did it.”
I was close to hyperventilating at that point and, thankfully, none of dad’s other friends seemed to be there so he was ready to go. We were finally off the hook.
We said our goodbyes at the truck, with Leigha sitting unhappily in the driver’s seat ready to cart dad and his friend off to “church”, which is what his biker group calls sitting around drinking and talking about their penises.
As I climbed in the passenger side of Jerrod’s car, dad may have said something to him like “take care of my girl”, but I was so relieved to be getting away that I wasn’t really paying attention.
He got in a moment later, looked at me and smiled. “It’s ok”, I think he said. My nerves were still jangling a bit as we drove away, sure that any moment he would turn around and take me back, wondering what in the hell he was doing taking off with a relative stranger whose father was a drunken biker not above breaking his kneecaps just for lifting an eyebrow the wrong way.
Instead he seemed amused by how unsettled the whole thing had made me. “I think that helped make it less awkward, don’t you?”
I couldn’t help but laugh a little. “Yeah, I guess it did.”
I wasn’t entirely sure if I felt that way or not, but later, when I could laugh about it, I realized he was right. It had.
What I was sure about at that moment, though, was that there had never been a first blogger meeting even remotely similar to ours.
But maybe that was a good thing because, after all, our friendship began unconventionally. And there was absolutely nothing wrong with that.
Even with the boom in online dating and social networking sites, there’s still a stigma attached to internet-born relationships – especially, for some reason, in relation to blogs. It’s oddly more acceptable to jet off to meet a friend of a friend of a friend on Facebook, than it is to spend time with a person whose life you’ve been reading and commenting on for years. Blogging, for me, is far more personal than a daily status update and a handful of pouty faced photos.
I’ve trusted a few close friends, that I knew would understand or at least be accepting, with the truth about my online dealings. Some read my blog and some only know about it, but what they all have in common is that they realize the relationships I’ve made here are no less valid than ours. Different, but no less valid. The ones that read it see it first hand – in how comfortable I am being honest and in the way people respond in the comments: relating to my current situation, being compassionate whether they understand or not, laughing with me or simply letting me know they stopped by. The ones that don’t read it simply know that it makes me happy, and that’s good enough for them.
I’ve been writing here for over six years and I’ve made a lot of friends, but up until two weeks ago I’d never physically met any of them. I’d made plans on several occasions, but for one reason or another they always fell apart. This year I was determined to make it happen and with some long overdue luck, a no nonsense attitude and the help of my completely oblivious father’s yearly gift of a plane ticket...I met three amazing people.
The first was Jerrod, who writes the blog Breaking Awkward (some of you may be more familiar with his old blog title, The Yellow Factor).
We’ve been friends for a little over two and a half years now – talking so frequently that he became one of those people I contact immediately when something notably good or bad happens. I don’t remember who found who first, but we began good-naturedly insulting each other and the rest, as they say, is history.
Jerrod just so happens to live in Oklahoma a half hour away from my stepfamily, who I visit every summer. After weeks of planning it was decided that we’d not only hang out while I was in town, but we’d also take a weekend trip to Kansas City to visit another blogger, Paige.
However, just because the plans seemed to make themselves and everything was already arranged, from the hotel to the road trip play list, doesn’t mean the execution was entirely easy.
See, the only person that knew I hadn’t actually met Jerrod was my sister...and she was sworn to secrecy in order to avoid rioting. I knew that none of them, especially dad, would understand or approve. All they were told, before I got there, was that I’d be spending a weekend in Kansas City with friends and bumming around Oklahoma City with them too. And, before I got there, dad was completely fine with it. He didn’t press me for details.
We went straight to sleep when we arrived at their house around 1am Thursday morning. I was supposed to meet Jerrod Thursday night and had arranged for my stepsister to drop me off in the city. But that afternoon my dad suddenly decided that I was 12, not 26, and I wouldn’t be going off for the weekend with someone he didn’t know...especially a man.
We were sitting on the patio glaring and occasionally shouting at each other, neither of us willing to concede defeat, until he pointed out the obvious.
“I’ll be taking you into the city to meet this motherfucker and if you don’t like it, you can stay your ass here...where he’ll have to come get you and then I still meet him. Period.”
Poor Jerrod was going to meet the infamous Jimmy, whether either of us liked it or not.
I was terrified and, knowing Jerrod, I was positive he would be too. I’d long since gathered that he isn’t used to people like Jimmy.
I’ve only ever introduced three men to my dad, with embarrassing results, and though Jerrod wasn’t a boyfriend the scenario actually seemed worse to me because we’d never met before. I didn’t picture my first blogger meeting including my drunk, obnoxious father telling stories about his dick.
But that’s exactly how it went down.
He rushed me out the door that evening, interrupting my makeup routine every few minutes and making me furious in the process, because he had to drop off some air conditioners (don’t ask, I don’t know) at his “brother’s” house. I made my sister come along because she’s usually a calming influence, but he’d been hitting The Crown all afternoon and there was no controlling him.
He spent the ride to his “brother’s” deliberately scaring the shit out of me by telling me the horrible things he was going to ask Jerrod and by insisting that he wouldn’t meet him anywhere but at a biker bar called VictimZ. Yeah, Victims with a fucking Z.
“Tell him to get his ass in there and have me a beer waitin’.”
Of course I didn’t. It was bad enough I actually had to type out the name to that ridiculous biker bar and have Jerrod reply with, “I put VictimZ in and Google maps laughed at me.” I was mortified.
When we pulled up to drop off the stupid air conditioners, he made us get out of the truck to meet the guy. He was about seven feet tall, wearing overalls with no shirt and had a bandana wrapped around his long hair. After unloading the cargo, they immediately started laughing and punching each other in the sides like children.
“C’mon man”, dad said while jabbing at him repeatedly. “Ride with us! My daughter comes down here to visit me, then thinks she’s going to take the off to Kansas City with some motherfucker I haven’t met! Oh hell no. I told her to have him meet us at VictimZ.”
His brother stared at him for a moment and then, to my absolute horror, they both burst out laughing. “Oh shit”, the guy said, looking at me with a mix of pity and amusement.
“Aw, I’m not going to help embarrass your daughter, Jimbo”, he said.
But dad talked him into getting in the truck anyway. I sat in the backseat with my sister, silently panicking.
When we pulled into the parking lot fifteen minutes later, I saw Jerrod’s car across the street. Dad didn’t even look around – when I hopped out he locked my things in the car so I couldn’t leave until he allowed it, and they immediately disappeared around back into the “beer garden”.
I waved at Jerrod, who was still hiding in his car across the street (not that I blame him), and he drove over. I walked around to the driver’s side, he got out and that’s how we first set eyes on each other. In the parking lot of a rundown biker bar with my father waiting for him in a beer garden, which was actually nothing more than a dirt-packed backyard with big wooden spool tables and rusted chairs made of scrap metal.
He looked worried, but accepted my apology for the oddness of our first meeting and followed me around the corner. Dad’s brother had parked himself at a table a respectable distance away with my sister, who wasn’t allowed in the bar.
“Where’s dad”, I asked.
“He went in for beer.”
A moment later he came wandering out the door with an evil grin on his face, clutching a bucket of beer. I introduced them, watching as my 5’7 father looked up at Jerrod and shook his hand...and it was apparent by the flash of tendons that he was squeezing the shit out of him.
“Drink a beer with me”, he said, shoving one into his hands.
I reached for one myself, twisted off the top and turned it straight up.
Then other than a few “motherfuckers” (in reference to other people this time, not Jerrod), a few embarrassing remarks and a demand to know if Jerrod could “fight”, they proceeded to have a relatively normal conversation. They talked about what they did for a living and where they lived and how long they’d been there. But even so, I knew my dad and I was going to be keyed up until we got out of there.
Jerrod, who was apparently no longer worried, laughed at me for being so visibly nervous, sucking down the beer and lighting a cigarette when I’d planned on not smoking at all. “Relax”, he said.
And I’d just about managed it because we’d finished our beers and I felt as though escape was just around the corner.
But no – dad insisted that we weren’t going anywhere until we went inside and met his other “brothers”. Apparently they’re all in the same biker gang or something – they wear one spur on one boot or some such nonsense so they recognize that they’re “related”.
As we both trailed reluctantly behind dad Jerrod said, “I thought you said we didn’t have to go in...”
“Sorry”, I mumbled, “I didn’t think we would.”
The ceiling was completely covered in bras, except for a small square of removable tile where a stripper pole was shoved inexpertly through a jagged hole.
“I put the pole in”, dad told Jerrod proudly. I shook my head and sighed.
He tried to call over a long haired old man that was absorbed in some sort of game, but the guy was taking his time. There were a few tables of degenerates (mostly really ugly women) that were giving us the stink eye. I wasn’t sure if they were simply unfriendly or plotting to kill me and take off with my Coach bag.
While we waited for the old guy to grace us with his presence, dad decided to tell Jerrod a lovely little story.
“This is my hangout, man. One time I got so drunk that this woman drew a smiley face on the head of my dick and I didn’t even know it. She called my wife and told her she did it, so when I got home she said, ‘You’re not getting in this bed like that with a smiley face on your dick!’ I woke up the next morning and was like, shit, man!”
“Dad! That’s enough! Don’t ever talk about your dick in front of me again. Ever.”
They both laughed and I glared at Jerrod. “Don’t encourage him.”
The old guy chose that moment to make his way over and we were introduced, though I can’t remember his name, and he hugged me uninvited...as all dad’s weirdo friends seem to do.
“This is my daughter’s boyfriend”, dad said, launching into his complaint about me taking off for the weekend again.
“He’s not my boyfriend”, I interjected, feeling a fresh wave of embarrassment.
They all ignored me and dad launched into his dick story again for the benefit of our new companion. “Hey remember the time...”
“Yep”, old guy said, “it was my old lady that did it.”
I was close to hyperventilating at that point and, thankfully, none of dad’s other friends seemed to be there so he was ready to go. We were finally off the hook.
We said our goodbyes at the truck, with Leigha sitting unhappily in the driver’s seat ready to cart dad and his friend off to “church”, which is what his biker group calls sitting around drinking and talking about their penises.
As I climbed in the passenger side of Jerrod’s car, dad may have said something to him like “take care of my girl”, but I was so relieved to be getting away that I wasn’t really paying attention.
He got in a moment later, looked at me and smiled. “It’s ok”, I think he said. My nerves were still jangling a bit as we drove away, sure that any moment he would turn around and take me back, wondering what in the hell he was doing taking off with a relative stranger whose father was a drunken biker not above breaking his kneecaps just for lifting an eyebrow the wrong way.
Instead he seemed amused by how unsettled the whole thing had made me. “I think that helped make it less awkward, don’t you?”
I couldn’t help but laugh a little. “Yeah, I guess it did.”
I wasn’t entirely sure if I felt that way or not, but later, when I could laugh about it, I realized he was right. It had.
What I was sure about at that moment, though, was that there had never been a first blogger meeting even remotely similar to ours.
But maybe that was a good thing because, after all, our friendship began unconventionally. And there was absolutely nothing wrong with that.
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
ABC's of dating
The problem with change is that it’s often opposed by fear or force of habit. Wanting to be or do something different is easy, the execution...not so much.
For instance, it took me a long time to get over the fear of going back to school. Or at least to get over the fear enough to actually apply to one and make concrete plans to attend. I’m still terrified of being in a classroom again. I was stuck in a routine headed nowhere because it was safe and it was what I knew, but I wanted to go so badly that I finally said “enough” and grew a pair.
But my latest dilemma is a little more complicated than forcing myself to wade through paperwork and red tape. It’s not about just being afraid of change or being stuck in a rut. It’s also that I have no fucking clue what I’m doing.
Remember when I got tired of the single life, couldn’t seem to meet anyone new, and ended up dabbling in the online dating thing? And remember how, for my troubles, all I got was a few dinners, a few posts and a sore asshole? Yeah. And remember how I said I was done with that bullshit because it was time consuming, irritating and the majority of the guys are psychos?
Sigh. Well several months ago I inadvertently got drawn back into the snake pit. Seriously, it was not intentional.
I received an email one day from the dating site saying I had a new message. That was strange, seeing as how I hadn’t been on the account in months and, consequently, hadn’t had a message in months either. Apparently if you aren’t on there often, they don’t chat you up.
Being a curiosity killed the cat sort of woman I decided to see what it said and, as it turns out, it was from a guy I’d gone to high school with. I remembered him immediately – a tall, dark, bearded kid that wore big black tennis shoes and a trench coat all the time. In fact, he referenced his appearance himself in the email: “It’s me – Big creepy guy in the trench coat? I saw your profile and decided it’d be rude not to say “hi”.”
“No, no it wouldn’t be rude at all”, I thought, “Because we never spoke to begin with.”
What I said, however, was nice yet dismissive. Something along the lines of, “Yes, I remember you. Thanks for the message. See you’re still stuck in this godforsaken town too. Hope you’re doing well.” The subtext being, “Yep, we walked down the same halls. This is weird. You’re weird. High school sucked balls. Kthanksbye.”
What began then could best be described as a whirlwind of weirdness. I started to receive text messages and phone calls from exes that wanted to “hang out”, “catch up” and, my personal favorite, “go for a little swim...wink wink, nudge nudge”. And, I assume, because I’d logged onto my dating account, my inbox starting blowing up there as well. I went from no prospects to way too many in record time. It’s like they were all on the same period cycle or something.
I was chatting with guys again and trying to decide who, what, when, and where again. I’d forgotten how exhausting it could be and I quickly realized that one thing I am not good at is juggling men. I had a hard time talking to more than one of them at a time because I would mix up details and forget things.
Not only that, but I like to focus all my energy on one thing, which is basically the anti-thesis of online dating. It’s not a hard thing to do when you’re the queen of the one night stand, don’t call me I’ll definitely be blocking your number club. But that wasn’t me anymore...or I didn’t want it to be. I still craved sex, sure, but it was now more about wanting the (gag) connection.
And it’s tricky because I’m such an overtly sexual person. I often don’t realize until later that I was being suggestive in the first place. Or, sometimes I know I’m doing it but I still can’t seem to stop myself. It’s hard to make a deeper connection when I’ve always been so immersed in the physical side of things.
So, I decided that since I was apparently giving dating another shot, I should take steps to change all that about myself – to make a concentrated effort to A) keep my hands to myself, B) watch my dirty mouth, and C) (the most difficult) stop thinking that wanting to have a relationship made me a needy girl and being ashamed of the fact that I was tired of being single.
At first it seemed to be going well. I went on a date with a really nice guy and we started talking on the phone and texting quite a lot. Occasionally there was a bit of flirting, but it was harmless and not at all risqué. I was feeling good about it, really excited that I was not only keeping myself in check but that we had so many interesting conversations.
But apparently we’d reached the statute of limitations on harmless flirting and interesting conversation, because he decided to nudge me in the opposite direction. With his penis. Or rather, with a plethora of pictures...of his penis.
Let’s see, there was one that was clearly taken at an upward angle, but zoomed in to make things appear larger than I suspected they actually were. There was the one following that at a slightly different angle that validated my suspicions about the first. And then there was “the montage”.
Allow me to commentate:
Photo 1: “This is a picture of my crotch covered in jeans. See that there? That’s the tell-tale bulge of my things-may-appear-larger, side-mirror-penis. Now wait for it, don’t get excited!”
Photo 2: “Oh! Oh! Look! He’s coming out to play! He’s a little shy at first, I know. That’s why he’s only poking his head out of my natty boxer shorts.”
Photo 3: “SHAZAM! Here he is in all his glory. And see?! He brought two ugly, hairy friends to make him look better!”
The whole thing was hilarious, with each picture arriving mere seconds after the other, but at the same time extremely disappointing. First, because I’d gone to such lengths to try and behave myself and he had to cheapen the experience. And second, because it was ill timed, terrible photography.
After that guy there was another with nearly the same story – great conversations, funny, interesting. Then the invisible switch flipped and he was making random comments about my tits and the like.
He didn’t actually use the word “motorboat”, but it was implied. And though I find the concept funny, the reality is actually quite awkward and slightly uncomfortable. It’s like when you’re running and not wearing a sports bra so they’re bouncing all over the place, only imagine them going that fast sideways, back and forth, instead of up and down. Though, given a choice, I’d certainly rather be “motorboated” than run without a sports bra...or run at all, for that matter.
Where was I?
Ah, then there was the slip up.
The “I’m feeling sorry for myself because I can’t seem to meet anyone nice, so I’m going to agree to dinner with a guy friend that’s always liked me because, after all, we’ve been having lunch often and it’s been just fine.”
And even though I’d established ground rules about our friendship, mainly “you can compliment me all you want and we can be friends, but nothing else”, I ended up drinking way too much beer.
And even though we didn’t have sex, I did end up on my back.
Because he said, verbatim, that he’d been “dying to eat this pussy for years” and being under the influence I thought, “Self, how could you deny a dying man the treatment he needs?” I figured, why the fuck not?
I’d had sex with him years ago and that was horrific, so I wasn’t going there again. I’ve not had many good experiences in the oral sex department, and in fact I usually decline any offers, but I’d heard a rumor once from his ex girlfriend that he was excellent at it. So I shrugged and said, “As long as we don’t have to play Wheel of Fucking Fortune, go for it.” And he did.
I must say, though I was disappointed that I managed to break my ABCs of change rules, she was right. He was excellent. The only problem was, after two go rounds I was pretty sober and he refused to stop. I think it must have been some kind of ego thing, to see how many times he could make it happen. And no matter what some people may say, you can always have too much of a good thing. Especially if it comes with a nonstop commentary and demands to look at him, while he looks back with a creepy wet childish grin that screams “LOVE ME! I ALWAYS CLEAN MY PLATE!”
So, once again I said enough. No more online dating or hooking up with exes. “Self, you are unable to become involved with a guy, past the point of introductions, without getting penis pictures and offers to use your tits as bongos. Your vagina is not a frozen yogurt buffet for the needy and you just need to quit while you’re limping back in last place.”
Then I met someone – a friend of our new neighbors who has been hanging out on the lake with us nearly every weekend.
At first I didn’t even think of him that way. I simply liked hanging out with him, and everyone else, and thought he was funny. Then one afternoon we were floating together, cracking jokes and I realized, “Uh oh. I think I kind of like him.”
We’re both generally flirty people anyway, but it was when others started drawing attention to certain things that I really started to wonder if maybe he liked me too. Like when we all sat drinking one night on the dock and he lay down with his head in my lap, then held on to my hand when he finally got up to leave, releasing one finger at a time as if to hold on longer. Or how he somehow always ended up beside me or directly across from me on every boat ride and at every dinner. There were dozens of little signs that, had my confidence not been so wrecked by all my dating failures of the past, I probably would have jumped on, said “A Ha!” before suggesting, “Yo, let’s go make out behind the bleachers.” Or, you know, the classier, simpler version: “I like you.”
But maybe wasn’t good enough for me, I wanted to be sure. So I talked to his friends, our new neighbors, who’d quickly become my friends too. Basically I got the he’s always been a little flirty, but he’s actually quite shy speech. “I know he wants a serious relationship and he doesn’t just hop into bed with people”, she told me.
I decided then that my strategy would be to let him take his time and, if he was interested, he’d make a move when he was ready.
Unfortunately patience, shy men and subtlety are not on my list of specialties. So far I’ve gotten two kisses on the cheek, one “you’re so beautiful”, and a lot of disappearing acts. I’m not really sure any of those count as “moves”, except possibly the disappearing acts and that would be a move in the opposite direction. No bueno.
There’s apparently something fundamentally wrong with me, because it can’t be all these guys. I don’t know how to date AND I don’t know how to wait (patiently) for the sex.
My solution to this was to ask other people for advice, but unfortunately my friends and certain family members aren’t really qualified to give it.
Proof?
Claire: “Fuck him. He blew you off that one time. Ignore him. Wanna take a shot of this?”
Leigha (Yes, my 18 year old sister, Leigha.): “You should do what I do because it totally works. I don’t pay them any attention and they come running. Play really hard to get, mmk? They like it. Sigh. I love the game.”
Dave: “Put it on him. GET SOME, AL.”
Mom: “They all want one thing. Stop giving it to them. You did? Well, search me then!”
Grandma: “I’ve seen these commercials for products that help extend the penis. Does he own a house?”
Claire: “He’s probably gay anyway.”
Rachel: “You need to go out and get some strange.”
And we’re back to the beginning again, with virtually no improvement save for the realization that oral sex doesn’t always suck. The whole time. Back at the beginning with no idea what I’m doing, no current prospects (unless you count the one that’s “probably gay and wants you to be his beard”), and a cancelled dating profile.
The changing bullshit is hard.
For instance, it took me a long time to get over the fear of going back to school. Or at least to get over the fear enough to actually apply to one and make concrete plans to attend. I’m still terrified of being in a classroom again. I was stuck in a routine headed nowhere because it was safe and it was what I knew, but I wanted to go so badly that I finally said “enough” and grew a pair.
But my latest dilemma is a little more complicated than forcing myself to wade through paperwork and red tape. It’s not about just being afraid of change or being stuck in a rut. It’s also that I have no fucking clue what I’m doing.
Remember when I got tired of the single life, couldn’t seem to meet anyone new, and ended up dabbling in the online dating thing? And remember how, for my troubles, all I got was a few dinners, a few posts and a sore asshole? Yeah. And remember how I said I was done with that bullshit because it was time consuming, irritating and the majority of the guys are psychos?
Sigh. Well several months ago I inadvertently got drawn back into the snake pit. Seriously, it was not intentional.
I received an email one day from the dating site saying I had a new message. That was strange, seeing as how I hadn’t been on the account in months and, consequently, hadn’t had a message in months either. Apparently if you aren’t on there often, they don’t chat you up.
Being a curiosity killed the cat sort of woman I decided to see what it said and, as it turns out, it was from a guy I’d gone to high school with. I remembered him immediately – a tall, dark, bearded kid that wore big black tennis shoes and a trench coat all the time. In fact, he referenced his appearance himself in the email: “It’s me – Big creepy guy in the trench coat? I saw your profile and decided it’d be rude not to say “hi”.”
“No, no it wouldn’t be rude at all”, I thought, “Because we never spoke to begin with.”
What I said, however, was nice yet dismissive. Something along the lines of, “Yes, I remember you. Thanks for the message. See you’re still stuck in this godforsaken town too. Hope you’re doing well.” The subtext being, “Yep, we walked down the same halls. This is weird. You’re weird. High school sucked balls. Kthanksbye.”
What began then could best be described as a whirlwind of weirdness. I started to receive text messages and phone calls from exes that wanted to “hang out”, “catch up” and, my personal favorite, “go for a little swim...wink wink, nudge nudge”. And, I assume, because I’d logged onto my dating account, my inbox starting blowing up there as well. I went from no prospects to way too many in record time. It’s like they were all on the same period cycle or something.
I was chatting with guys again and trying to decide who, what, when, and where again. I’d forgotten how exhausting it could be and I quickly realized that one thing I am not good at is juggling men. I had a hard time talking to more than one of them at a time because I would mix up details and forget things.
Not only that, but I like to focus all my energy on one thing, which is basically the anti-thesis of online dating. It’s not a hard thing to do when you’re the queen of the one night stand, don’t call me I’ll definitely be blocking your number club. But that wasn’t me anymore...or I didn’t want it to be. I still craved sex, sure, but it was now more about wanting the (gag) connection.
And it’s tricky because I’m such an overtly sexual person. I often don’t realize until later that I was being suggestive in the first place. Or, sometimes I know I’m doing it but I still can’t seem to stop myself. It’s hard to make a deeper connection when I’ve always been so immersed in the physical side of things.
So, I decided that since I was apparently giving dating another shot, I should take steps to change all that about myself – to make a concentrated effort to A) keep my hands to myself, B) watch my dirty mouth, and C) (the most difficult) stop thinking that wanting to have a relationship made me a needy girl and being ashamed of the fact that I was tired of being single.
At first it seemed to be going well. I went on a date with a really nice guy and we started talking on the phone and texting quite a lot. Occasionally there was a bit of flirting, but it was harmless and not at all risqué. I was feeling good about it, really excited that I was not only keeping myself in check but that we had so many interesting conversations.
But apparently we’d reached the statute of limitations on harmless flirting and interesting conversation, because he decided to nudge me in the opposite direction. With his penis. Or rather, with a plethora of pictures...of his penis.
Let’s see, there was one that was clearly taken at an upward angle, but zoomed in to make things appear larger than I suspected they actually were. There was the one following that at a slightly different angle that validated my suspicions about the first. And then there was “the montage”.
Allow me to commentate:
Photo 1: “This is a picture of my crotch covered in jeans. See that there? That’s the tell-tale bulge of my things-may-appear-larger, side-mirror-penis. Now wait for it, don’t get excited!”
Photo 2: “Oh! Oh! Look! He’s coming out to play! He’s a little shy at first, I know. That’s why he’s only poking his head out of my natty boxer shorts.”
Photo 3: “SHAZAM! Here he is in all his glory. And see?! He brought two ugly, hairy friends to make him look better!”
The whole thing was hilarious, with each picture arriving mere seconds after the other, but at the same time extremely disappointing. First, because I’d gone to such lengths to try and behave myself and he had to cheapen the experience. And second, because it was ill timed, terrible photography.
After that guy there was another with nearly the same story – great conversations, funny, interesting. Then the invisible switch flipped and he was making random comments about my tits and the like.
He didn’t actually use the word “motorboat”, but it was implied. And though I find the concept funny, the reality is actually quite awkward and slightly uncomfortable. It’s like when you’re running and not wearing a sports bra so they’re bouncing all over the place, only imagine them going that fast sideways, back and forth, instead of up and down. Though, given a choice, I’d certainly rather be “motorboated” than run without a sports bra...or run at all, for that matter.
Where was I?
Ah, then there was the slip up.
The “I’m feeling sorry for myself because I can’t seem to meet anyone nice, so I’m going to agree to dinner with a guy friend that’s always liked me because, after all, we’ve been having lunch often and it’s been just fine.”
And even though I’d established ground rules about our friendship, mainly “you can compliment me all you want and we can be friends, but nothing else”, I ended up drinking way too much beer.
And even though we didn’t have sex, I did end up on my back.
Because he said, verbatim, that he’d been “dying to eat this pussy for years” and being under the influence I thought, “Self, how could you deny a dying man the treatment he needs?” I figured, why the fuck not?
I’d had sex with him years ago and that was horrific, so I wasn’t going there again. I’ve not had many good experiences in the oral sex department, and in fact I usually decline any offers, but I’d heard a rumor once from his ex girlfriend that he was excellent at it. So I shrugged and said, “As long as we don’t have to play Wheel of Fucking Fortune, go for it.” And he did.
I must say, though I was disappointed that I managed to break my ABCs of change rules, she was right. He was excellent. The only problem was, after two go rounds I was pretty sober and he refused to stop. I think it must have been some kind of ego thing, to see how many times he could make it happen. And no matter what some people may say, you can always have too much of a good thing. Especially if it comes with a nonstop commentary and demands to look at him, while he looks back with a creepy wet childish grin that screams “LOVE ME! I ALWAYS CLEAN MY PLATE!”
So, once again I said enough. No more online dating or hooking up with exes. “Self, you are unable to become involved with a guy, past the point of introductions, without getting penis pictures and offers to use your tits as bongos. Your vagina is not a frozen yogurt buffet for the needy and you just need to quit while you’re limping back in last place.”
Then I met someone – a friend of our new neighbors who has been hanging out on the lake with us nearly every weekend.
At first I didn’t even think of him that way. I simply liked hanging out with him, and everyone else, and thought he was funny. Then one afternoon we were floating together, cracking jokes and I realized, “Uh oh. I think I kind of like him.”
We’re both generally flirty people anyway, but it was when others started drawing attention to certain things that I really started to wonder if maybe he liked me too. Like when we all sat drinking one night on the dock and he lay down with his head in my lap, then held on to my hand when he finally got up to leave, releasing one finger at a time as if to hold on longer. Or how he somehow always ended up beside me or directly across from me on every boat ride and at every dinner. There were dozens of little signs that, had my confidence not been so wrecked by all my dating failures of the past, I probably would have jumped on, said “A Ha!” before suggesting, “Yo, let’s go make out behind the bleachers.” Or, you know, the classier, simpler version: “I like you.”
But maybe wasn’t good enough for me, I wanted to be sure. So I talked to his friends, our new neighbors, who’d quickly become my friends too. Basically I got the he’s always been a little flirty, but he’s actually quite shy speech. “I know he wants a serious relationship and he doesn’t just hop into bed with people”, she told me.
I decided then that my strategy would be to let him take his time and, if he was interested, he’d make a move when he was ready.
Unfortunately patience, shy men and subtlety are not on my list of specialties. So far I’ve gotten two kisses on the cheek, one “you’re so beautiful”, and a lot of disappearing acts. I’m not really sure any of those count as “moves”, except possibly the disappearing acts and that would be a move in the opposite direction. No bueno.
There’s apparently something fundamentally wrong with me, because it can’t be all these guys. I don’t know how to date AND I don’t know how to wait (patiently) for the sex.
My solution to this was to ask other people for advice, but unfortunately my friends and certain family members aren’t really qualified to give it.
Proof?
Claire: “Fuck him. He blew you off that one time. Ignore him. Wanna take a shot of this?”
Leigha (Yes, my 18 year old sister, Leigha.): “You should do what I do because it totally works. I don’t pay them any attention and they come running. Play really hard to get, mmk? They like it. Sigh. I love the game.”
Dave: “Put it on him. GET SOME, AL.”
Mom: “They all want one thing. Stop giving it to them. You did? Well, search me then!”
Grandma: “I’ve seen these commercials for products that help extend the penis. Does he own a house?”
Claire: “He’s probably gay anyway.”
Rachel: “You need to go out and get some strange.”
And we’re back to the beginning again, with virtually no improvement save for the realization that oral sex doesn’t always suck. The whole time. Back at the beginning with no idea what I’m doing, no current prospects (unless you count the one that’s “probably gay and wants you to be his beard”), and a cancelled dating profile.
The changing bullshit is hard.
Friday, May 06, 2011
All the world's a stage
I leave work early and stop at the gas station, hurrying inside to prepay. I have an appointment in half an hour and I cannot be late.
There are three people grouped behind the counter – two girls and a boy. They have the look about them that says they’ve just arrived at work and aren’t yet bored with their surroundings. It isn’t a look I wear much anymore, but then...I start my day at 5am.
When someone asks me what I do, not just my title but about my daily activities, I always struggle to explain. I don’t want to sound boring, but I don’t want to lie either. “I process patient and employee occurrences, organize that data into reports and send it out to important people that barely know my name. Something, something, trending...something, something. I also give out parking decals to new employees, process parking tickets and play an exorbitant amount of online mahjong.”
The response is usually a tiny nod followed by a short and uninterested “oh”. And I can’t fault them for it because, if someone delivered that spiel to me, I’d probably react the same way. I receive far better treatment simply by wearing my badge and saying nothing – the corporation I work for generally speaks for itself. “Oh, you work for them! Wow, that’s great.”
I’m wearing dark dress pants and a dark top – colorless but for the light blue photo badge hanging from my neck and the silver sandals on my feet. Dark sunglasses cover my face, masking dark circles. I haven’t worn makeup to work in over a week, nor have I fixed my hair.
“Hey, how’s it going”, asks one of the girls behind the counter.
“Fine, thanks.” I give her my trademark I’m not interested in communicating tight lipped smirk.
“Do you know what yesterday was?”
There’s a secretive sort of smile on her face, one that says she knows a joke that, if I’m lucky, she might just share. The other two edge closer to her, the same smile on their faces.
“4/20”, I say matter-of-factly, handing her my money.
“Yes, but what day was it”, she asks me again, searching.
I wonder if she wants me to say it was Wednesday or if she wants me to lower my sunglasses and prove that I’m one of their brethren. Maybe they’re conducting a survey or trying to find a new dealer.
“Um...”
“National smoke day”, the three of them chorus loudly before I can say anything else.
I can’t help but give them a real smile, simply because they’re so damn happy to be stoned, working in a gas station and conversing with random people. I was like that once. Well, a waitress...but still. I smoked a lot of pot.
“That’s what I said. 4/20.”
They laugh as I walk out the door, delighted. I imagine them making a mark under a tally labeled “Yes” before gearing up for the next customer and I have the sudden urge to actually smoke, to stroll into the dentist’s office with glazed eyes and a cheeky grin and say, “Do you know what yesterday was?” But of course I can’t.
I arrive at 4 o’clock on the dot and am greeted the minute my foot crosses the threshold by the elderly receptionists. It’s a case of they know me, but I don’t know them. Mom works at the pediatric office next door, sharing a parking lot and sometimes a lunch with the crew at the dentist’s. Southerners are a nosy, gossipy bunch so after spending a bit of time with a woman that likes nothing more than to complain about me, they treat me with more familiarity than another office would. And because I often have a “give them what they want and they’ll leave you alone” mentality, I play along, returning their greeting with an equally casual “What’s up ladies?”
“Are you ready”, the tech asks the second I close the door, popping up around the corner.
“Yes.”
“Come on back.”
There’s no check in process, no forms to sign, and I follow her down the hall. She takes her time, even pausing to straighten a frame.
I sit on the ugly brown lounger and cross my ankles while she lays out instruments on the connected table. Her white scrub top is too tight, but the blue bra matches her pants quite well. She’s about my age and relatively new, though I can tell they’ve told her who I am and what my connections are before I arrived. She keeps her head down and avoids making eye contact as she moves about the room, saying nothing. “That’s the slutty, ill tempered one”, I imagine them warning her...and I’m probably not far off.
She mumbles that the doctor will be with me in a minute and leaves, never once introducing herself.
I busy myself with looking around at the décor. I’m willing to bet that nothing has been updated in this office, other than the dental equipment, since the 70’s or 80’s. Hideous brown paneling still covers the walls, floor to ceiling, and the posters are so old they’ve turned color around the edges. The front room is even worse – with an enormously puffy, cream colored leather loveseat that looks like it once belonged to one of those larger wrap-around sectionals. My favorite part though is the shiny wooden clock that hangs by the desk. It’s shaped like a large plaque – the bottom dedicated to the gold numbers and ticking hands, the top dedicated to a glossy photo of a young, big-haired Reba McEntire. It’s completely kitschy, but it makes me smile.
“Well, look here!”
The dentist strolls through the open doorway, grinning. He’s gotten a bit round over the past few years and his thick, wayward hair has gone completely grey. He’s the original church going gossip – knows everyone, talks about them and doesn’t care who knows it. His best friend is Mike, a guy who also happens to have been friends with my parents since before I was born. And because he knows about this connection, Mike is his favorite person to talk about when I come for an appointment. He talks about Mike’s demon redheaded wife, Mike’s brief affair with the nanny (who also went to church with all of them), and most of all...Mike’s lifelong torch for my mom.
But today, before he launches into the Mike stories, he decides to grill me for information. I figure he must be getting low.
“So how old is your daughter now?”
“She just turned six.”
“God almighty”, he says, chuckling. “Haven’t had any more slip-ups have ya?”
I raise my eyebrows at him, more amused than offended. “Not yet. So far just the one.”
“Being more careful, eh”, he asks with a grin.
“I suppose you could say that.”
“Got yourself a boyfriend?”
“No.”
“Well why not?”
“I’m not very good at monogamy”, I reply with a straight face. I’m not exactly sure if that’s true anymore, since I haven’t tested it out in a long time, but it’s the sort of thing he expects me to say.
He throws his head back and roars with laughter. “Honesty! Ooh boy, at least she’s honest! I like that!”
He talks continuously while he x-rays my teeth, asking questions and laughing so hard the mute tech pokes her head around the doorframe. He finally gets to Mike when the cleaning begins.
“Poor Mikey Mike”, he says.
I simply blink and wait, since his fingers are in my mouth.
“I bet he’s real upset that your mom is getting married. Poor Mikey Mike. Is he coming to the wedding?”
“Uh hooo ooooh.”
“Yeah, that oughta be something. I wonder if he’s going to bring that redheaded wife. Oh, poor Mikey Mike!”
“Mmm hmm.”
I start to count how many times he uses the phrase “poor Mikey Mike” and by the time I rise from the chair, drained of my information and pumped back full of his, I’m at 18.
He walks me to the front desk, leans against it and crosses one leg over the other. “You take care now, you hear? Behave yourself...get you a nice young man.” He grins and slaps me gently on my back.
“Yeah maybe”, I say with a smile.
He shakes his head and clucks his tongue as he walks back down the hallway. “Poor Mikey Mike...”
Even though he’s nosy, I quite like him. I could go to another dentist, upgrade like a lot of people I know that got tired of the tacky old place and prying questions, but I won’t. When they ask why I stay, I tell them that he waves away payments if I need a cavity filled, simply because he likes me and thinks my mother is pretty. And he does.
But it’s also because, unlike most people, when he asks me how I’m doing I can tell that, all gossip aside, he genuinely wants to know. It’s in his eyes. Of course I’d never take him up on it, never show what he’s telling me it’s ok to show, but it’s nice to know I could.
I haven’t been home long when I get a text message from Claire:
“After midnight tonight, I can’t go back in the house anymore. I’d like to smoke one last cigarette on my porch and I’d love it if you’d join me...if you want.”
A week ago they were my family – Claire and her sister were closer to me than my blood sibling that sleeps right across the hall. But because of things that having nothing to do with me, or with those two really, a rift has opened that I’m not sure can be bridged.
I haven’t heard from her since the day her mother received the papers, when she sent me a message that seemed cloaked in anger and blame, then refused to respond to anything I said.
“Tell me when and I’ll be there”, I type back.
A little after ten o’clock my cousin and I slip on our shoes and walk quietly out the door. She’s just as anxious to see Claire as I am.
We walk briskly, shoulder to shoulder, down the gravel road. When we’re halfway there I see her, standing alone under a streetlight in front of the house she used to call home, with her favorite hippy purse draped across her chest and trailing down her side, platinum hair piled atop her head in a messy bun.
My mastiff, Tank, reaches her seconds before we do and she bends to pet him. I can’t help but think about her dog that’s buried only feet away in a yard she can’t visit anymore.
She straightens and we stare at each other.
“Hey”, she finally says.
“Hey”, we reply. She moves to hug my cousin first and I shouldn’t feel slighted, but I do. Our hug is brief, hesitant, and when we pull away she blows out a shaky breath.
“This is hard. Weird.”
I nod in agreement.
“C’mon.” She turns, walks toward the door and we follow, subdued. “It’s so...empty”, she finishes lamely.
She pushes the front door open, turns on the light and walks to the middle of the kitchen. She lifts her arms and holds then wide, dropping them almost instantly in a gesture of futility. I look past her to the living room, but there’s nothing to see. The house is stripped bare and of more than just furniture. There’s no future here, and the past is colored with doubt and fresh paint.
The three of us move to the screened in porch that overlooks the lake, sitting Indian style in a semi circle on the hard floor. The big cushioned swing is gone and as we each light a cigarette, I realize the tacky giant green ashtray is too.
We talk haltingly about what’s happened on either side of battle lines drawn without our consent. As much as we want to keep ourselves separate from the conflict, it’s clear there are things we simply can’t say to each other...and that speaks louder to me than anything we’re actually saying. No matter how close we’ve been for the past eleven years, the fact remains that our core loyalties lie elsewhere.
A few cigarettes and the bare minimum of small talk later, we rise to leave. Her family doesn’t know she’s here and she has to hurry back...and vice versa.
My cousin walks ahead, but Claire and I pause in the kitchen again, facing back into the house.
“This was my home."
I nod, not knowing what else to say. She sighs and walks away. I move to follow, but something catches my eye. On the glass and gold light fixture that used to hang over the kitchen table there’s something green. It’s one of those rubber bracelets, the kind that have words and symbols etched into them for causes and the like. I turn it over to see what it says.
“Happiness.”
Without even thinking about it, I slip it on my wrist as I walk out the door. It never occurs to me to offer it to Claire.
We say goodbye in the driveway, exchanging another round of short hugs, and promise to call each other soon. I don’t know if we will, but it seems like the thing to say.
My cousin and I walk silently back up the gravel road toward home and I can feel her still standing there, watching. My fingers absently pull on the bracelet, circling round the inside, and that’s when I feel the crack. Looking down I notice the smallest notch in the green rubber and I think to myself, “If you don’t pull on it anymore, maybe it’ll stay intact.”
There are three people grouped behind the counter – two girls and a boy. They have the look about them that says they’ve just arrived at work and aren’t yet bored with their surroundings. It isn’t a look I wear much anymore, but then...I start my day at 5am.
When someone asks me what I do, not just my title but about my daily activities, I always struggle to explain. I don’t want to sound boring, but I don’t want to lie either. “I process patient and employee occurrences, organize that data into reports and send it out to important people that barely know my name. Something, something, trending...something, something. I also give out parking decals to new employees, process parking tickets and play an exorbitant amount of online mahjong.”
The response is usually a tiny nod followed by a short and uninterested “oh”. And I can’t fault them for it because, if someone delivered that spiel to me, I’d probably react the same way. I receive far better treatment simply by wearing my badge and saying nothing – the corporation I work for generally speaks for itself. “Oh, you work for them! Wow, that’s great.”
I’m wearing dark dress pants and a dark top – colorless but for the light blue photo badge hanging from my neck and the silver sandals on my feet. Dark sunglasses cover my face, masking dark circles. I haven’t worn makeup to work in over a week, nor have I fixed my hair.
“Hey, how’s it going”, asks one of the girls behind the counter.
“Fine, thanks.” I give her my trademark I’m not interested in communicating tight lipped smirk.
“Do you know what yesterday was?”
There’s a secretive sort of smile on her face, one that says she knows a joke that, if I’m lucky, she might just share. The other two edge closer to her, the same smile on their faces.
“4/20”, I say matter-of-factly, handing her my money.
“Yes, but what day was it”, she asks me again, searching.
I wonder if she wants me to say it was Wednesday or if she wants me to lower my sunglasses and prove that I’m one of their brethren. Maybe they’re conducting a survey or trying to find a new dealer.
“Um...”
“National smoke day”, the three of them chorus loudly before I can say anything else.
I can’t help but give them a real smile, simply because they’re so damn happy to be stoned, working in a gas station and conversing with random people. I was like that once. Well, a waitress...but still. I smoked a lot of pot.
“That’s what I said. 4/20.”
They laugh as I walk out the door, delighted. I imagine them making a mark under a tally labeled “Yes” before gearing up for the next customer and I have the sudden urge to actually smoke, to stroll into the dentist’s office with glazed eyes and a cheeky grin and say, “Do you know what yesterday was?” But of course I can’t.
*****
I arrive at 4 o’clock on the dot and am greeted the minute my foot crosses the threshold by the elderly receptionists. It’s a case of they know me, but I don’t know them. Mom works at the pediatric office next door, sharing a parking lot and sometimes a lunch with the crew at the dentist’s. Southerners are a nosy, gossipy bunch so after spending a bit of time with a woman that likes nothing more than to complain about me, they treat me with more familiarity than another office would. And because I often have a “give them what they want and they’ll leave you alone” mentality, I play along, returning their greeting with an equally casual “What’s up ladies?”
“Are you ready”, the tech asks the second I close the door, popping up around the corner.
“Yes.”
“Come on back.”
There’s no check in process, no forms to sign, and I follow her down the hall. She takes her time, even pausing to straighten a frame.
I sit on the ugly brown lounger and cross my ankles while she lays out instruments on the connected table. Her white scrub top is too tight, but the blue bra matches her pants quite well. She’s about my age and relatively new, though I can tell they’ve told her who I am and what my connections are before I arrived. She keeps her head down and avoids making eye contact as she moves about the room, saying nothing. “That’s the slutty, ill tempered one”, I imagine them warning her...and I’m probably not far off.
She mumbles that the doctor will be with me in a minute and leaves, never once introducing herself.
I busy myself with looking around at the décor. I’m willing to bet that nothing has been updated in this office, other than the dental equipment, since the 70’s or 80’s. Hideous brown paneling still covers the walls, floor to ceiling, and the posters are so old they’ve turned color around the edges. The front room is even worse – with an enormously puffy, cream colored leather loveseat that looks like it once belonged to one of those larger wrap-around sectionals. My favorite part though is the shiny wooden clock that hangs by the desk. It’s shaped like a large plaque – the bottom dedicated to the gold numbers and ticking hands, the top dedicated to a glossy photo of a young, big-haired Reba McEntire. It’s completely kitschy, but it makes me smile.
“Well, look here!”
The dentist strolls through the open doorway, grinning. He’s gotten a bit round over the past few years and his thick, wayward hair has gone completely grey. He’s the original church going gossip – knows everyone, talks about them and doesn’t care who knows it. His best friend is Mike, a guy who also happens to have been friends with my parents since before I was born. And because he knows about this connection, Mike is his favorite person to talk about when I come for an appointment. He talks about Mike’s demon redheaded wife, Mike’s brief affair with the nanny (who also went to church with all of them), and most of all...Mike’s lifelong torch for my mom.
But today, before he launches into the Mike stories, he decides to grill me for information. I figure he must be getting low.
“So how old is your daughter now?”
“She just turned six.”
“God almighty”, he says, chuckling. “Haven’t had any more slip-ups have ya?”
I raise my eyebrows at him, more amused than offended. “Not yet. So far just the one.”
“Being more careful, eh”, he asks with a grin.
“I suppose you could say that.”
“Got yourself a boyfriend?”
“No.”
“Well why not?”
“I’m not very good at monogamy”, I reply with a straight face. I’m not exactly sure if that’s true anymore, since I haven’t tested it out in a long time, but it’s the sort of thing he expects me to say.
He throws his head back and roars with laughter. “Honesty! Ooh boy, at least she’s honest! I like that!”
He talks continuously while he x-rays my teeth, asking questions and laughing so hard the mute tech pokes her head around the doorframe. He finally gets to Mike when the cleaning begins.
“Poor Mikey Mike”, he says.
I simply blink and wait, since his fingers are in my mouth.
“I bet he’s real upset that your mom is getting married. Poor Mikey Mike. Is he coming to the wedding?”
“Uh hooo ooooh.”
“Yeah, that oughta be something. I wonder if he’s going to bring that redheaded wife. Oh, poor Mikey Mike!”
“Mmm hmm.”
I start to count how many times he uses the phrase “poor Mikey Mike” and by the time I rise from the chair, drained of my information and pumped back full of his, I’m at 18.
He walks me to the front desk, leans against it and crosses one leg over the other. “You take care now, you hear? Behave yourself...get you a nice young man.” He grins and slaps me gently on my back.
“Yeah maybe”, I say with a smile.
He shakes his head and clucks his tongue as he walks back down the hallway. “Poor Mikey Mike...”
Even though he’s nosy, I quite like him. I could go to another dentist, upgrade like a lot of people I know that got tired of the tacky old place and prying questions, but I won’t. When they ask why I stay, I tell them that he waves away payments if I need a cavity filled, simply because he likes me and thinks my mother is pretty. And he does.
But it’s also because, unlike most people, when he asks me how I’m doing I can tell that, all gossip aside, he genuinely wants to know. It’s in his eyes. Of course I’d never take him up on it, never show what he’s telling me it’s ok to show, but it’s nice to know I could.
*****
I haven’t been home long when I get a text message from Claire:
“After midnight tonight, I can’t go back in the house anymore. I’d like to smoke one last cigarette on my porch and I’d love it if you’d join me...if you want.”
A week ago they were my family – Claire and her sister were closer to me than my blood sibling that sleeps right across the hall. But because of things that having nothing to do with me, or with those two really, a rift has opened that I’m not sure can be bridged.
I haven’t heard from her since the day her mother received the papers, when she sent me a message that seemed cloaked in anger and blame, then refused to respond to anything I said.
“Tell me when and I’ll be there”, I type back.
A little after ten o’clock my cousin and I slip on our shoes and walk quietly out the door. She’s just as anxious to see Claire as I am.
We walk briskly, shoulder to shoulder, down the gravel road. When we’re halfway there I see her, standing alone under a streetlight in front of the house she used to call home, with her favorite hippy purse draped across her chest and trailing down her side, platinum hair piled atop her head in a messy bun.
My mastiff, Tank, reaches her seconds before we do and she bends to pet him. I can’t help but think about her dog that’s buried only feet away in a yard she can’t visit anymore.
She straightens and we stare at each other.
“Hey”, she finally says.
“Hey”, we reply. She moves to hug my cousin first and I shouldn’t feel slighted, but I do. Our hug is brief, hesitant, and when we pull away she blows out a shaky breath.
“This is hard. Weird.”
I nod in agreement.
“C’mon.” She turns, walks toward the door and we follow, subdued. “It’s so...empty”, she finishes lamely.
She pushes the front door open, turns on the light and walks to the middle of the kitchen. She lifts her arms and holds then wide, dropping them almost instantly in a gesture of futility. I look past her to the living room, but there’s nothing to see. The house is stripped bare and of more than just furniture. There’s no future here, and the past is colored with doubt and fresh paint.
The three of us move to the screened in porch that overlooks the lake, sitting Indian style in a semi circle on the hard floor. The big cushioned swing is gone and as we each light a cigarette, I realize the tacky giant green ashtray is too.
We talk haltingly about what’s happened on either side of battle lines drawn without our consent. As much as we want to keep ourselves separate from the conflict, it’s clear there are things we simply can’t say to each other...and that speaks louder to me than anything we’re actually saying. No matter how close we’ve been for the past eleven years, the fact remains that our core loyalties lie elsewhere.
A few cigarettes and the bare minimum of small talk later, we rise to leave. Her family doesn’t know she’s here and she has to hurry back...and vice versa.
My cousin walks ahead, but Claire and I pause in the kitchen again, facing back into the house.
“This was my home."
I nod, not knowing what else to say. She sighs and walks away. I move to follow, but something catches my eye. On the glass and gold light fixture that used to hang over the kitchen table there’s something green. It’s one of those rubber bracelets, the kind that have words and symbols etched into them for causes and the like. I turn it over to see what it says.
“Happiness.”
Without even thinking about it, I slip it on my wrist as I walk out the door. It never occurs to me to offer it to Claire.
We say goodbye in the driveway, exchanging another round of short hugs, and promise to call each other soon. I don’t know if we will, but it seems like the thing to say.
My cousin and I walk silently back up the gravel road toward home and I can feel her still standing there, watching. My fingers absently pull on the bracelet, circling round the inside, and that’s when I feel the crack. Looking down I notice the smallest notch in the green rubber and I think to myself, “If you don’t pull on it anymore, maybe it’ll stay intact.”
But I know better than that. I won’t be able to stop touching it, testing it, pulling on it. Maybe that’s why it was hanging there in the first place – maybe they knew they couldn’t stop themselves either.
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Cousins
As a small child I remember being baffled by her girly demeanor. Growing up next door to a house full of boys, I was a combination of awkward bookworm and tomboy so I imagine she was just as baffled by me too.
Her mother dressed her in fashionable dresses, leaving her waist length brown hair loose and lovely, while my mother stuffed me into overalls and cut my frizzy bangs at an awkward angle. When I went over to play there were tea parties instead of teepees made of sticks and dress up games instead of chase. She had shelf upon shelf of Barbies, all in their original boxes, and when I tried to play with them I was reprimanded. She was prissy and I was rough, as different as two little girls could possibly be, yet every time we had to be parted we cried and begged our parents for just a little more time.
At the age of twelve we got what we asked for, but in the worst possible way. Her parents were in a boating accident – her father killed on impact and her mother in a coma with severe brain trauma. She and her brother moved in with our Papa, right next door to me.
I remember fighting my way through the adults until they allowed me to sit next to her at her father’s funeral. I clutched her hand and looked straight ahead. And when the minister finished a monologue with “for all the Days of Our Lives”, we looked at each other, unable to stop the grins and tiny giggles that escaped simultaneously. It was our favorite soap opera, we watched it with our moms all the time, but we knew how much her father had hated it.
I was so excited when she started attending my school. We didn’t have any classes together, but we saw each other at lunch, recess and of course every day at home.
But it soon became apparent that our differences, however easy to work around when we hadn’t seen each other daily at home, weren’t so easy to ignore anymore. She became part of the popular crowd and I took a backseat, watching from the sidelines as she crooked her finger and got all the things most young girls are interested in – the good looking boyfriend, being a member of the cheerleading squad, and being invited to all the coolest events and parties.
I was jealous and resentful that she walked in and things seemed to fall into her lap, but I kept that to myself and I felt guilty for even feeling that way. Her father was gone and her mother was the child rather than the parent, living next door with a nurse maid. How could I possibly begrudge her the attention? She deserved to be happy and enjoy life as much as possible.
But my feelings of discontent grew as, little by little, she developed a habit of putting me down in front of other people. She would have her friends spend the night and I would be there, sitting on the edges, only included as an afterthought or a joke. I would go home crying, devastated about the way I was treated, but too afraid to stand up for myself for fear of losing the good parts of our relationship.
And there were a lot of good parts. When we were alone or just with family, we were the best of friends. We had sleepovers and inside jokes. She comforted me when my dad went on drunken rampages and I comforted her when she was depressed about her family. And the summers were the best – spending every day in our bathing suits with our other cousins, swimming and tubing, riding our bikes barefoot in the hot afternoons, picking handfuls of honeysuckle and exploring every inch of the woods around our houses. She played a major part in a lot of my fondest childhood memories.
Then, when we were 15 and 16, in the summer of 2001, our cousin Ben died in a Jet Ski accident. And we turned to each other first. I was home alone with my sister, doing chores as quickly as possible so we could go swimming, and she was just down the hill at her house, vegging and waiting on us to finish. We each got a call about the accident from someone different, but at the same time. After I hung up I took off running through the house and out the backdoor, across the porch and down the stairs, shouting her name...and she was doing the same. We met with a crash in the grass a few yards from my house and held on.
Later we prayed on our knees and I’ve never begged God for anything as hard, before or since, as I did that day in the hour after receiving the news of the crash, waiting to find out if he survived. And when he didn’t, I became something she was already well on her way to becoming – reckless.
The three of us had been born three months apart – her birthday was in March, mine in June, and Ben’s in October – and though he was the baby, I’d been the only one to really hold back on the partying, only occasionally indulging in smoking or drinking. But soon after his death I was sneaking out of the house with her, getting high most days and drunk every weekend.
She still treated me badly at school sometimes, and even at home if the neighbor girls were around, but the closest I ever got to confronting her then was a letter that she shrugged off. Because of Ben, my fear of confrontation had turned into my fear of losing her...and I was willing to be occasionally miserable in order to keep us close. I made every concession I could and when it sometimes became too much, I avoided her for a week or two to get my head on straight, always eventually giving in. After all, we’d been through so much together.
People began to notice how unbalanced our relationship had become, namely my mother, and started badgering me about standing up to her, about taking instead of always giving. Instead I continued to run when she called and I let all the resentment, all the hurt and anger continue to build up.
After we graduated and went our separate ways, it got a little easier. We still saw each other often, but not every day. In the past my attitude with her had been largely submissive, obviously, but because of the stuff I was going through, every little thing set me off. Combined with all those stored up years of fat jokes and nerd jokes, it turned me into almost as big a bitch as she was. She was thinner and had better hair, but I was witty and well read. I took every opportunity to make her look like an idiot, but with a smile on my face and more cunning than she’d ever managed to use when insulting me in public. And for a long time I was satisfied with that, with what I thought of as subtle retribution.
Over the next few years I still gave far more of myself than I thought was fair, but I’ve always been sort of a masochist. Then (I believe) the addition of being a parent stole the last shred of patience I had for the old games. I finally began to let her know that I thought she was ungrateful and took advantage of me (albeit often with my help), but instead of a reaction I expected (anger, sadness or denial), she practically laughed in my face. That, and an upsetting diatribe about what a shitty mother I was, ended it. I turned my back, ignored her calls, and went on my way.
In the long stretch of months that we didn’t speak, I had plenty of time to think about our situation. I admitted my areas of wrong doing (to myself, and later to her), but I still felt good about my decision to cut off contact. At first I felt healthier, and generally happier, without the added drama.
But soon I missed her to the point of nearly caving and calling. I missed the stories that only we shared, the laughter and all night gab sessions. She’d always been the first person I told everything to and though I knew I needed the space I’d created, it hurt.
It was nearly two years ago that, after months and months of silence, we had our first adult discussion about why things were the way they were. She was living with her then boyfriend and, for reasons that had nothing to do with me, was alienated from the majority of our family. I’d been the last one to cut off contact and the last one she’d expected it from. As I sat there on the couch I could literally see the toll it had taken on her and it shocked me. For the first time since I wrote her that letter in my childish, bubbly script, I told her how I really felt...about everything. And she listened without a trace of a smirk or hint of a laugh.
We were up all night and well into the morning, crying and confessing, hugging and promising. Underneath all the negativity that surrounded our relationship, we’d always loved each other.
And over the past year we’ve really worked at changing the way we interact. I’ve become more assertive and outspoken with her...and she’s curbed her temper, become more thoughtful. But it’s a process and, though she’ll always be my family and I’ll always love her, there’s a scar there. I knew we could never go back to being those two little girls, arguing over which game to play and nothing else, but I hoped we’d still fight tooth and nail to stay together, just like they did. I hoped we’d still go to each other first when shit went down.
I hoped, but until this past Monday, I really wasn’t sure.
I woke at 5:15 to the radio alarm playing Lady Gaga and the phone bleeping and flashing red. I switched off the music, reached for the phone and turned over on my back, squinting at the bright screen. Three missed calls, all within the last 10 minutes, were from her.
And then I saw the text message, sent a mere three minutes before: “He shot his self in the face beside me. Help.” I jumped up and fumbled for my glasses, putting them on to make sure I’d read it correctly. Unfortunately, I had.
I hit redial and she answered immediately, sobbing and managing to tell me that she was going to the hospital; he was still alive. “I’m on my way”, I said. “I’ll meet you there.” The moment we hung up I ran around my room tugging on clothes. I grabbed my purse, slipped my feet into flip flops, alerted my mom and ran out the door.
It takes an hour to get there in good weather, but it was freezing and pouring down rain that morning. And while I navigated the dark, wet roads at a pace I wouldn’t normally, I thought about what I’d say to her. Even without knowing all the details I was horrified. I wasn’t thinking about him at all – I didn’t wonder why or how. I liked him alright, but I’d only met him a few times and he was still just the boyfriend to me. All I could think was, “After everything she’s been through...dear god, I can’t even begin to imagine...I’ve got to get there.”
Arriving at the hospital, I parked and ran through the rain, cursing my flip flops and lack of umbrella. My glasses fogged as I sloshed through the lobby, wet pants legs clung to my ankles and dripping hair was plastered to my neck. I rode the elevator alone to the third floor, getting out in front of another, nearly empty, lobby.
We saw each other at the same time. She was sitting in a chair next to two women and as I moved toward her she stood up and took a step, clearly unable to do more. But we crashed into each other with the same force that we had on that summer day ten years ago.
I held her thin, shaking frame tightly, until her knees started to buckle. Then we sat and I held her over the armrest, noticing that the two women she’d been sitting beside were staring. The one closest to us introduced herself awkwardly over my cousin’s crying. It was his mother. “I’m glad you’re here for her”, she said.
After a few minutes I was able to let go and she began to tell me the story. The more she spoke, the sicker I felt. She’d told me before that he had anger and depression issues, had threatened to kill his self before, but the way she’d relayed it made it sound like it was all in the past. Apparently things were strained and he “flipped out” too often. She’d always been able to calm him and talk him down before, but not this time.
And still, after I knew the details, I couldn’t think about him and his issues. I didn’t think about how I’d laughed with him at the wedding the weekend before, how young he was or about what a blow it was for his family. All that would come later. What I couldn’t stop thinking about was how close she came to being killed, how horrific it must have been to witness such a thing and how maybe, if I’d been talking to her more often, she would have told me everything from the beginning and I could have helped her get out of the situation.
After speaking with his mother, it was decided that I would take her back to their neighborhood to get her dogs safely put away. She has two Great Danes that she loves more than anything and they were scared and alone. She immediately agreed and we left.
I didn’t think we were going into his house where it happened because the dogs were at his mother’s right around the corner, but she said she needed her keys. I was hesitant, but I couldn’t let her go alone so I followed her into the entryway. While she went to the bathroom immediately inside the front door, I stood in the foyer. I stared at a cell phone lying halfway open on the carpet, surrounded by broken glass and shredded items, and shuddered.
When she came out we decided to get some of her clothes so we wouldn’t have to come back, but that required us going through the master bath and into the closet, where he’d done it. I’ve always been an extremely squeamish person, covering my eyes during anything bloody on TV and occasionally vomiting when around bodily fluids, so she told me I didn’t have to go in there...that she’d already seen the worst. But again, I couldn’t let her do that alone.
I cannot go into detail, but it was the most grisly thing I’ve ever seen in my life. She was unable to go all the way in after all and I had to make my way around the closet, picking things that were clean and holding my breath. I steeled myself and thought of nothing but getting her out immediately. It wasn’t until she was settled back at the hospital that I made my way to the bathroom and was sick.
All day we sat and waited, alternately speaking to friends and family as they found out and called to check on her. She broke down every once in awhile, finally passing out from a pill and exhaustion for about half an hour.
He made it through surgery, but was still critical. His parents were able to see him for a moment late that afternoon and they allowed her to go in too. She wouldn’t leave the hospital until she’d seen him anyway, and when she came out she nearly collapsed. I said “enough”, and took her home with me.
These past few days have been exhausting, emotionally and physically. She’s getting a little better each day and truthfully, I’m in awe over her ability to keep going. He’s as stable as he can be at the moment and won’t be awake this week so she’s staying away from the hospital for now. Yesterday she saw a trauma therapist and it went well. She’s still staying at my house and between our family, his family, and their friends, there’s someone with her all the time. I’ve been managing the phone calls, the insurance information and anything else that crops up. Making sure she eats and rests.
I’ve been silently struggling a bit, trying to comfort her and keep things together. It’s a repetitive, draining task and I’ve never had to deal with anything quite this difficult before. But I love her and I’m going to keep helping her and listening, distracting her and making her laugh. And though I’d never wish this tragedy on anyone, ever, positive things have happened as a result. She’s getting therapy, which we’ve been trying to get her to do for a long time. Bridges are being mended. He’s going to get the help he needs.
Her mother dressed her in fashionable dresses, leaving her waist length brown hair loose and lovely, while my mother stuffed me into overalls and cut my frizzy bangs at an awkward angle. When I went over to play there were tea parties instead of teepees made of sticks and dress up games instead of chase. She had shelf upon shelf of Barbies, all in their original boxes, and when I tried to play with them I was reprimanded. She was prissy and I was rough, as different as two little girls could possibly be, yet every time we had to be parted we cried and begged our parents for just a little more time.
At the age of twelve we got what we asked for, but in the worst possible way. Her parents were in a boating accident – her father killed on impact and her mother in a coma with severe brain trauma. She and her brother moved in with our Papa, right next door to me.
I remember fighting my way through the adults until they allowed me to sit next to her at her father’s funeral. I clutched her hand and looked straight ahead. And when the minister finished a monologue with “for all the Days of Our Lives”, we looked at each other, unable to stop the grins and tiny giggles that escaped simultaneously. It was our favorite soap opera, we watched it with our moms all the time, but we knew how much her father had hated it.
I was so excited when she started attending my school. We didn’t have any classes together, but we saw each other at lunch, recess and of course every day at home.
But it soon became apparent that our differences, however easy to work around when we hadn’t seen each other daily at home, weren’t so easy to ignore anymore. She became part of the popular crowd and I took a backseat, watching from the sidelines as she crooked her finger and got all the things most young girls are interested in – the good looking boyfriend, being a member of the cheerleading squad, and being invited to all the coolest events and parties.
I was jealous and resentful that she walked in and things seemed to fall into her lap, but I kept that to myself and I felt guilty for even feeling that way. Her father was gone and her mother was the child rather than the parent, living next door with a nurse maid. How could I possibly begrudge her the attention? She deserved to be happy and enjoy life as much as possible.
But my feelings of discontent grew as, little by little, she developed a habit of putting me down in front of other people. She would have her friends spend the night and I would be there, sitting on the edges, only included as an afterthought or a joke. I would go home crying, devastated about the way I was treated, but too afraid to stand up for myself for fear of losing the good parts of our relationship.
And there were a lot of good parts. When we were alone or just with family, we were the best of friends. We had sleepovers and inside jokes. She comforted me when my dad went on drunken rampages and I comforted her when she was depressed about her family. And the summers were the best – spending every day in our bathing suits with our other cousins, swimming and tubing, riding our bikes barefoot in the hot afternoons, picking handfuls of honeysuckle and exploring every inch of the woods around our houses. She played a major part in a lot of my fondest childhood memories.
Then, when we were 15 and 16, in the summer of 2001, our cousin Ben died in a Jet Ski accident. And we turned to each other first. I was home alone with my sister, doing chores as quickly as possible so we could go swimming, and she was just down the hill at her house, vegging and waiting on us to finish. We each got a call about the accident from someone different, but at the same time. After I hung up I took off running through the house and out the backdoor, across the porch and down the stairs, shouting her name...and she was doing the same. We met with a crash in the grass a few yards from my house and held on.
Later we prayed on our knees and I’ve never begged God for anything as hard, before or since, as I did that day in the hour after receiving the news of the crash, waiting to find out if he survived. And when he didn’t, I became something she was already well on her way to becoming – reckless.
The three of us had been born three months apart – her birthday was in March, mine in June, and Ben’s in October – and though he was the baby, I’d been the only one to really hold back on the partying, only occasionally indulging in smoking or drinking. But soon after his death I was sneaking out of the house with her, getting high most days and drunk every weekend.
She still treated me badly at school sometimes, and even at home if the neighbor girls were around, but the closest I ever got to confronting her then was a letter that she shrugged off. Because of Ben, my fear of confrontation had turned into my fear of losing her...and I was willing to be occasionally miserable in order to keep us close. I made every concession I could and when it sometimes became too much, I avoided her for a week or two to get my head on straight, always eventually giving in. After all, we’d been through so much together.
People began to notice how unbalanced our relationship had become, namely my mother, and started badgering me about standing up to her, about taking instead of always giving. Instead I continued to run when she called and I let all the resentment, all the hurt and anger continue to build up.
After we graduated and went our separate ways, it got a little easier. We still saw each other often, but not every day. In the past my attitude with her had been largely submissive, obviously, but because of the stuff I was going through, every little thing set me off. Combined with all those stored up years of fat jokes and nerd jokes, it turned me into almost as big a bitch as she was. She was thinner and had better hair, but I was witty and well read. I took every opportunity to make her look like an idiot, but with a smile on my face and more cunning than she’d ever managed to use when insulting me in public. And for a long time I was satisfied with that, with what I thought of as subtle retribution.
Over the next few years I still gave far more of myself than I thought was fair, but I’ve always been sort of a masochist. Then (I believe) the addition of being a parent stole the last shred of patience I had for the old games. I finally began to let her know that I thought she was ungrateful and took advantage of me (albeit often with my help), but instead of a reaction I expected (anger, sadness or denial), she practically laughed in my face. That, and an upsetting diatribe about what a shitty mother I was, ended it. I turned my back, ignored her calls, and went on my way.
In the long stretch of months that we didn’t speak, I had plenty of time to think about our situation. I admitted my areas of wrong doing (to myself, and later to her), but I still felt good about my decision to cut off contact. At first I felt healthier, and generally happier, without the added drama.
But soon I missed her to the point of nearly caving and calling. I missed the stories that only we shared, the laughter and all night gab sessions. She’d always been the first person I told everything to and though I knew I needed the space I’d created, it hurt.
It was nearly two years ago that, after months and months of silence, we had our first adult discussion about why things were the way they were. She was living with her then boyfriend and, for reasons that had nothing to do with me, was alienated from the majority of our family. I’d been the last one to cut off contact and the last one she’d expected it from. As I sat there on the couch I could literally see the toll it had taken on her and it shocked me. For the first time since I wrote her that letter in my childish, bubbly script, I told her how I really felt...about everything. And she listened without a trace of a smirk or hint of a laugh.
We were up all night and well into the morning, crying and confessing, hugging and promising. Underneath all the negativity that surrounded our relationship, we’d always loved each other.
And over the past year we’ve really worked at changing the way we interact. I’ve become more assertive and outspoken with her...and she’s curbed her temper, become more thoughtful. But it’s a process and, though she’ll always be my family and I’ll always love her, there’s a scar there. I knew we could never go back to being those two little girls, arguing over which game to play and nothing else, but I hoped we’d still fight tooth and nail to stay together, just like they did. I hoped we’d still go to each other first when shit went down.
I hoped, but until this past Monday, I really wasn’t sure.
*****
I woke at 5:15 to the radio alarm playing Lady Gaga and the phone bleeping and flashing red. I switched off the music, reached for the phone and turned over on my back, squinting at the bright screen. Three missed calls, all within the last 10 minutes, were from her.
And then I saw the text message, sent a mere three minutes before: “He shot his self in the face beside me. Help.” I jumped up and fumbled for my glasses, putting them on to make sure I’d read it correctly. Unfortunately, I had.
I hit redial and she answered immediately, sobbing and managing to tell me that she was going to the hospital; he was still alive. “I’m on my way”, I said. “I’ll meet you there.” The moment we hung up I ran around my room tugging on clothes. I grabbed my purse, slipped my feet into flip flops, alerted my mom and ran out the door.
It takes an hour to get there in good weather, but it was freezing and pouring down rain that morning. And while I navigated the dark, wet roads at a pace I wouldn’t normally, I thought about what I’d say to her. Even without knowing all the details I was horrified. I wasn’t thinking about him at all – I didn’t wonder why or how. I liked him alright, but I’d only met him a few times and he was still just the boyfriend to me. All I could think was, “After everything she’s been through...dear god, I can’t even begin to imagine...I’ve got to get there.”
Arriving at the hospital, I parked and ran through the rain, cursing my flip flops and lack of umbrella. My glasses fogged as I sloshed through the lobby, wet pants legs clung to my ankles and dripping hair was plastered to my neck. I rode the elevator alone to the third floor, getting out in front of another, nearly empty, lobby.
We saw each other at the same time. She was sitting in a chair next to two women and as I moved toward her she stood up and took a step, clearly unable to do more. But we crashed into each other with the same force that we had on that summer day ten years ago.
I held her thin, shaking frame tightly, until her knees started to buckle. Then we sat and I held her over the armrest, noticing that the two women she’d been sitting beside were staring. The one closest to us introduced herself awkwardly over my cousin’s crying. It was his mother. “I’m glad you’re here for her”, she said.
After a few minutes I was able to let go and she began to tell me the story. The more she spoke, the sicker I felt. She’d told me before that he had anger and depression issues, had threatened to kill his self before, but the way she’d relayed it made it sound like it was all in the past. Apparently things were strained and he “flipped out” too often. She’d always been able to calm him and talk him down before, but not this time.
And still, after I knew the details, I couldn’t think about him and his issues. I didn’t think about how I’d laughed with him at the wedding the weekend before, how young he was or about what a blow it was for his family. All that would come later. What I couldn’t stop thinking about was how close she came to being killed, how horrific it must have been to witness such a thing and how maybe, if I’d been talking to her more often, she would have told me everything from the beginning and I could have helped her get out of the situation.
After speaking with his mother, it was decided that I would take her back to their neighborhood to get her dogs safely put away. She has two Great Danes that she loves more than anything and they were scared and alone. She immediately agreed and we left.
I didn’t think we were going into his house where it happened because the dogs were at his mother’s right around the corner, but she said she needed her keys. I was hesitant, but I couldn’t let her go alone so I followed her into the entryway. While she went to the bathroom immediately inside the front door, I stood in the foyer. I stared at a cell phone lying halfway open on the carpet, surrounded by broken glass and shredded items, and shuddered.
When she came out we decided to get some of her clothes so we wouldn’t have to come back, but that required us going through the master bath and into the closet, where he’d done it. I’ve always been an extremely squeamish person, covering my eyes during anything bloody on TV and occasionally vomiting when around bodily fluids, so she told me I didn’t have to go in there...that she’d already seen the worst. But again, I couldn’t let her do that alone.
I cannot go into detail, but it was the most grisly thing I’ve ever seen in my life. She was unable to go all the way in after all and I had to make my way around the closet, picking things that were clean and holding my breath. I steeled myself and thought of nothing but getting her out immediately. It wasn’t until she was settled back at the hospital that I made my way to the bathroom and was sick.
All day we sat and waited, alternately speaking to friends and family as they found out and called to check on her. She broke down every once in awhile, finally passing out from a pill and exhaustion for about half an hour.
He made it through surgery, but was still critical. His parents were able to see him for a moment late that afternoon and they allowed her to go in too. She wouldn’t leave the hospital until she’d seen him anyway, and when she came out she nearly collapsed. I said “enough”, and took her home with me.
*****
These past few days have been exhausting, emotionally and physically. She’s getting a little better each day and truthfully, I’m in awe over her ability to keep going. He’s as stable as he can be at the moment and won’t be awake this week so she’s staying away from the hospital for now. Yesterday she saw a trauma therapist and it went well. She’s still staying at my house and between our family, his family, and their friends, there’s someone with her all the time. I’ve been managing the phone calls, the insurance information and anything else that crops up. Making sure she eats and rests.
I’ve been silently struggling a bit, trying to comfort her and keep things together. It’s a repetitive, draining task and I’ve never had to deal with anything quite this difficult before. But I love her and I’m going to keep helping her and listening, distracting her and making her laugh. And though I’d never wish this tragedy on anyone, ever, positive things have happened as a result. She’s getting therapy, which we’ve been trying to get her to do for a long time. Bridges are being mended. He’s going to get the help he needs.
And I know now, without a shadow of a doubt, that we’re going to be ok. Because when everything fell apart she dialed my number...and I fought my way there, without hesitation, to hold her hand.
Thursday, November 18, 2010
I don't think, therefore I fuck up.
I rarely mull things over before taking action. Some call it spontaneity, some call it stupidity and some, like my father, get colorful and call it “getting a wild hair up your ass”.
The phrase “you don’t think” was shouted at me more times as a kid than I can count. It covered a wide range of misdemeanors, including but not limited to the time I – threw our poodle out the window, ran into the heating and air system with the four wheeler, wrote “I hate dad” (except I used his full name) 100 times instead of the allotted punishment of “I will think before opening my mouth”, coerced the neighbor’s children into eating chewy cat treats, and snuck out of my bedroom window with the family dachshund.
In my early 20’s I did appalling, dangerous things, mostly to do with sex and/or alcohol. Now I might not go home with a man covered in tattoos, including one shaped like a postage stamp that says “TRAMP”, named George that I said five words to at the bar (I believe they were, “your dick better be huge”) anymore. But I will, apparently, still do a lot of things without thinking about the end results first. The majority of them are just little things, but they serve the purpose of showing me that, even though I’m now mostly old and lame, I’m still essentially the same irresponsible person.
For instance – I decided last week that I was going to sell jewelry, host a book party and take orders to help out a friend that’s doing it on the side. (Selling jewelry I mean, not sex. Though if she were, I wouldn’t judge. This economy is a bitch.)
First of all, I’m terrible at sales. “You’d better buy something or I’ll karate chop you in the vagina” aren’t the words of a person that does well in retail situations. And if someone chooses not to purchase something even after that eloquent, empty threat of a sales pitch, the parting words aren’t much better – “I hate your face”.
Then I suddenly decided that instead of just getting book orders, I’d have an actual party. Ostensibly this was because I would get more orders that way, but once I started moving forward with the plans I thought, “Why the fuck did I say I’d do that?” It had completely slipped my mind when I said, “I’ll have a jewelry party”, that I’d actually have to, you know, go through with it. I’d have to send out invitations, make phone calls, make food, clean the house more so than usual, and sit in a room full of old ladies.
I don’t like old ladies and I don’t like cleaning. Actually, one of the most common questions I’m asked by family and friends is, “What do you like?” Or they simply state, “You don’t like anything.” I have a reputation for being rather cranky. I digress.
I couldn’t back out because I already had two book orders and my friend really needed the show. So Monday night I sent out my “invitations” – also known as a mass text message basically saying, “please come, there will be food”. Once they show up, I figure I can manipulate them into buying some damn earrings or something. However, the people that I know are attending are such a diverse group that I’ll likely be running interference the entire time. All I need is for my boss to walk up on a conversation like this: “You know she’s always talking to her about her vagina.”
“No!”
“Yes! And she said that sometimes she doesn’t make it to the bath...Oh...hello...”
Another good example is how I ended up agreeing to sing in a Christmas program at a church I don’t attend. I was standing in a group of people, minding my own business, when a doctor that works with my mother (who also happens to be my daughter’s pediatrician and a lovely woman) asked me about my years in the high school chorus.
“Your mother told me you used to sing with Ms. G, is that right?”
“Yes”, I replied with a smile.
“Well we’re having a Christmas Cantata and we’d love to have you be a part of it! You’re a soprano right? First or second?”
Gone was the real smile and in its place the panicked fake, a cross between wild eyed hysteria and a sudden stomach pain that means its deuce time. “Erm...yeah. First...or I used to be. It’s been a long time.”
“Oh, but you never forget those competitions! They were so much fun! There are a lot of us that took Chorus in school so we just love being in choir, gives us that old feeling.”
“Uh huh....” People don’t forget! .....
“So we meet every Wednesday night at 7 and some Sunday nights...”
“Sounds like fun”, I said too loudly.
“I can’t wait to see you there! Bring your mother.”
“Ooook! I’ll be there!” Wait...what? Tourettes! Tourettes!
And that’s how my mother ended up bringing home a CD sent by the Doc for me to practice with before the first rehearsal.
That was the first week in November. I haven’t made it to one practice yet, nor have I even attempted to listen to the CD. If I would have actually taken a moment to think about my answers before croaking out some bullshit, I wouldn’t be put in the position of looking like an asshole for not turning up. Or looking like an asshole when I eventually cave, listen to the CD, stand in front of a church full of people, and squeal in a choir robe, reeking of Saturday night’s beer blitz.
However, everyone has their limit. I can’t go on being irresponsible forever, can I? And after last weekend’s incident, thinking before I act, or agree to things, may just become my new favorite pastime.
My mom and her boyfriend left to go to the mountains and I immediately said to myself, “I’m going to have a party!” Then I enlisted my friend and neighbor, Claire, to help me invite the usual crowd.
I’d forgotten a couple of key elements when I decided to throw a party at my house that Saturday night:
1. Both Carolina and Clemson were playing and both games were critical.
2. Claire is overzealous when it comes to football. This is an understatement.
3. People get drunk at parties.
4. The usual crowd is quite large. My house is not.
At 6:30 Rachel, my sister and I arrived back at the house with a handle of Jim Beam, two cases of beer, and an extra pack of cigarettes. Claire came walking in a few minutes later with her insanely hyper Weimaraner in tow, decked out in her Clemson finest, and immediately flipped the TV to football.
Things started out fine – a few more people showed up within the next hour and we were all just hanging out and drinking a few beers. We made plans to play a game of Things when more people arrived.
Then it all started to go downhill rather quickly – Claire broke out the liquor, Claire took shots of liquor, more people showed up, Claire took more shots of liquor, Rachel hid, my sister curled up on the couch with some boy I thought was a deaf/mute, Claire coerced other people into taking shots, still more people showed up, someone kept making really loud jokes about “snatch”, and I...I was close to having an anxiety attack.
Before Clemson even made it to half time, I couldn’t hear myself think it was so loud in there. Rachel had forced herself into a tiny ball in the corner of one couch, one girl was puking in the bathroom, Claire had the remote shoved down her pants so no one could flip to the Carolina game to check the score, and someone had smoked all my cigarettes.
I’d only had two beers and I made myself drink those. I was too anxious to have fun at my own party. I stood on the perimeter, observing like an outsider for quite awhile. It was surreal watching them all interact without me at the center.
It wasn’t until I saw how much of the liquor bottle Claire and those had drunk that I moved into action. One of two things was going to happen – I was going to force myself to get drunk in order to deal, or I was going to scream at them all to get the fuck out.
So I drank. I shoved my way through the tangle of them and I poured a row of shots, downing them one after the other. A guy standing next to me clapped me on the back and said, “I hear ya”.
I walked around mopping up spills, picking up trash and throwing away beer cans. I approached my cousin Dave and said, “Go. Go now and get the fire barrel.”
“Ugh, I don’t want to. I’m hanging out.”
“Go get it now or die. These people have got to clear out some.”
About an hour later the majority of them were playing cornhole under a spotlight in the driveway and standing around a fire barrel gossiping. I’d managed to exert a bit of control, but while I was doing it, I was also killing the bottle of Jim. It was preferable to killing Claire, who was the only person who couldn’t be managed. She banged on the windows when Clemson scored, she banged on the counter when the other team scored, she screamed “break his fucking neck” at the top of her lungs in five minute increments, and by the time the game was over she was stumbling around in a huff...still with the remote in the front of her pants.
Several people left and I was able to really start enjoying myself. We stood around and talked outside, I found my spare pack of cigarettes, and we played cornhole and Things. I wish I would’ve saved the slips of paper from the Things game because they were the best part of the night. Well, that and when Dave was going to give me a piggyback ride and instead of jumping up from the ground like a normal person, I ran up the stairs of the patio and launched myself at him from the top like a spider monkey – sending us both plummeting to the ground. Poor Dave.
At 3am, when the only two people left were Claire and a guy friend of hers, I was rather drunk and ready for my pajamas. Rachel played bad cop and sent them home while I crawled into bed.
I woke up at 9:30 the next morning with a marching band in my head. My very first thought was, of course, “Why the fuck did I say I’d have a party?”
The damage to the house was minimal – just a sink full of dishes, a dirty floor, a few scattered beer cans (I’d picked up the majority as they were sat down because apparently I’m OCD about that), and a bit of a mess on the patio. Rachel, my sister and I cleaned up pretty quickly.
The main damage that was done wasn’t to the house, it was to me. Though I managed to have a decent time by the end of the night, I’m pretty sure the beginning scarred me for life. I can confidently say that I will never have another party again – never. From now on, I’ll stick with having a few bottles of wine on the porch with three or four people.
And if the memory from the night before wasn’t enough to make my resolution stick, Claire made it iron clad. She came walking in when we were about finished straightening up, smiling and completely hangover free, though she’d been by far the drunkest person there. I was still a bit put out with her behavior, but nothing a day or so wouldn’t fix. After all, I’ve certainly been the obnoxious drunk before.
Then she asked, “What’s wrong with you?”
I told her about how anxious I’d been, about how the spilling and the screaming and the general mayhem had almost sent me over the edge. Without actually pointing any fingers, I tried to gently imply that she’d been the one at the helm of that shipwreck.
She nodded earnestly and leaned toward me. I stared mutely back, waiting on the apology that was my due.
Looking me straight in the eyes and laying her hand atop mine, she said, “I know, girl! I could never have a party at my house. All those people! I don’t know what you were thinking!”
The phrase “you don’t think” was shouted at me more times as a kid than I can count. It covered a wide range of misdemeanors, including but not limited to the time I – threw our poodle out the window, ran into the heating and air system with the four wheeler, wrote “I hate dad” (except I used his full name) 100 times instead of the allotted punishment of “I will think before opening my mouth”, coerced the neighbor’s children into eating chewy cat treats, and snuck out of my bedroom window with the family dachshund.
In my early 20’s I did appalling, dangerous things, mostly to do with sex and/or alcohol. Now I might not go home with a man covered in tattoos, including one shaped like a postage stamp that says “TRAMP”, named George that I said five words to at the bar (I believe they were, “your dick better be huge”) anymore. But I will, apparently, still do a lot of things without thinking about the end results first. The majority of them are just little things, but they serve the purpose of showing me that, even though I’m now mostly old and lame, I’m still essentially the same irresponsible person.
For instance – I decided last week that I was going to sell jewelry, host a book party and take orders to help out a friend that’s doing it on the side. (Selling jewelry I mean, not sex. Though if she were, I wouldn’t judge. This economy is a bitch.)
First of all, I’m terrible at sales. “You’d better buy something or I’ll karate chop you in the vagina” aren’t the words of a person that does well in retail situations. And if someone chooses not to purchase something even after that eloquent, empty threat of a sales pitch, the parting words aren’t much better – “I hate your face”.
Then I suddenly decided that instead of just getting book orders, I’d have an actual party. Ostensibly this was because I would get more orders that way, but once I started moving forward with the plans I thought, “Why the fuck did I say I’d do that?” It had completely slipped my mind when I said, “I’ll have a jewelry party”, that I’d actually have to, you know, go through with it. I’d have to send out invitations, make phone calls, make food, clean the house more so than usual, and sit in a room full of old ladies.
I don’t like old ladies and I don’t like cleaning. Actually, one of the most common questions I’m asked by family and friends is, “What do you like?” Or they simply state, “You don’t like anything.” I have a reputation for being rather cranky. I digress.
I couldn’t back out because I already had two book orders and my friend really needed the show. So Monday night I sent out my “invitations” – also known as a mass text message basically saying, “please come, there will be food”. Once they show up, I figure I can manipulate them into buying some damn earrings or something. However, the people that I know are attending are such a diverse group that I’ll likely be running interference the entire time. All I need is for my boss to walk up on a conversation like this: “You know she’s always talking to her about her vagina.”
“No!”
“Yes! And she said that sometimes she doesn’t make it to the bath...Oh...hello...”
Another good example is how I ended up agreeing to sing in a Christmas program at a church I don’t attend. I was standing in a group of people, minding my own business, when a doctor that works with my mother (who also happens to be my daughter’s pediatrician and a lovely woman) asked me about my years in the high school chorus.
“Your mother told me you used to sing with Ms. G, is that right?”
“Yes”, I replied with a smile.
“Well we’re having a Christmas Cantata and we’d love to have you be a part of it! You’re a soprano right? First or second?”
Gone was the real smile and in its place the panicked fake, a cross between wild eyed hysteria and a sudden stomach pain that means its deuce time. “Erm...yeah. First...or I used to be. It’s been a long time.”
“Oh, but you never forget those competitions! They were so much fun! There are a lot of us that took Chorus in school so we just love being in choir, gives us that old feeling.”
“Uh huh....” People don’t forget! .....
“So we meet every Wednesday night at 7 and some Sunday nights...”
“Sounds like fun”, I said too loudly.
“I can’t wait to see you there! Bring your mother.”
“Ooook! I’ll be there!” Wait...what? Tourettes! Tourettes!
And that’s how my mother ended up bringing home a CD sent by the Doc for me to practice with before the first rehearsal.
That was the first week in November. I haven’t made it to one practice yet, nor have I even attempted to listen to the CD. If I would have actually taken a moment to think about my answers before croaking out some bullshit, I wouldn’t be put in the position of looking like an asshole for not turning up. Or looking like an asshole when I eventually cave, listen to the CD, stand in front of a church full of people, and squeal in a choir robe, reeking of Saturday night’s beer blitz.
However, everyone has their limit. I can’t go on being irresponsible forever, can I? And after last weekend’s incident, thinking before I act, or agree to things, may just become my new favorite pastime.
My mom and her boyfriend left to go to the mountains and I immediately said to myself, “I’m going to have a party!” Then I enlisted my friend and neighbor, Claire, to help me invite the usual crowd.
I’d forgotten a couple of key elements when I decided to throw a party at my house that Saturday night:
1. Both Carolina and Clemson were playing and both games were critical.
2. Claire is overzealous when it comes to football. This is an understatement.
3. People get drunk at parties.
4. The usual crowd is quite large. My house is not.
At 6:30 Rachel, my sister and I arrived back at the house with a handle of Jim Beam, two cases of beer, and an extra pack of cigarettes. Claire came walking in a few minutes later with her insanely hyper Weimaraner in tow, decked out in her Clemson finest, and immediately flipped the TV to football.
Things started out fine – a few more people showed up within the next hour and we were all just hanging out and drinking a few beers. We made plans to play a game of Things when more people arrived.
Then it all started to go downhill rather quickly – Claire broke out the liquor, Claire took shots of liquor, more people showed up, Claire took more shots of liquor, Rachel hid, my sister curled up on the couch with some boy I thought was a deaf/mute, Claire coerced other people into taking shots, still more people showed up, someone kept making really loud jokes about “snatch”, and I...I was close to having an anxiety attack.
Before Clemson even made it to half time, I couldn’t hear myself think it was so loud in there. Rachel had forced herself into a tiny ball in the corner of one couch, one girl was puking in the bathroom, Claire had the remote shoved down her pants so no one could flip to the Carolina game to check the score, and someone had smoked all my cigarettes.
I’d only had two beers and I made myself drink those. I was too anxious to have fun at my own party. I stood on the perimeter, observing like an outsider for quite awhile. It was surreal watching them all interact without me at the center.
It wasn’t until I saw how much of the liquor bottle Claire and those had drunk that I moved into action. One of two things was going to happen – I was going to force myself to get drunk in order to deal, or I was going to scream at them all to get the fuck out.
So I drank. I shoved my way through the tangle of them and I poured a row of shots, downing them one after the other. A guy standing next to me clapped me on the back and said, “I hear ya”.
I walked around mopping up spills, picking up trash and throwing away beer cans. I approached my cousin Dave and said, “Go. Go now and get the fire barrel.”
“Ugh, I don’t want to. I’m hanging out.”
“Go get it now or die. These people have got to clear out some.”
About an hour later the majority of them were playing cornhole under a spotlight in the driveway and standing around a fire barrel gossiping. I’d managed to exert a bit of control, but while I was doing it, I was also killing the bottle of Jim. It was preferable to killing Claire, who was the only person who couldn’t be managed. She banged on the windows when Clemson scored, she banged on the counter when the other team scored, she screamed “break his fucking neck” at the top of her lungs in five minute increments, and by the time the game was over she was stumbling around in a huff...still with the remote in the front of her pants.
Several people left and I was able to really start enjoying myself. We stood around and talked outside, I found my spare pack of cigarettes, and we played cornhole and Things. I wish I would’ve saved the slips of paper from the Things game because they were the best part of the night. Well, that and when Dave was going to give me a piggyback ride and instead of jumping up from the ground like a normal person, I ran up the stairs of the patio and launched myself at him from the top like a spider monkey – sending us both plummeting to the ground. Poor Dave.
At 3am, when the only two people left were Claire and a guy friend of hers, I was rather drunk and ready for my pajamas. Rachel played bad cop and sent them home while I crawled into bed.
I woke up at 9:30 the next morning with a marching band in my head. My very first thought was, of course, “Why the fuck did I say I’d have a party?”
The damage to the house was minimal – just a sink full of dishes, a dirty floor, a few scattered beer cans (I’d picked up the majority as they were sat down because apparently I’m OCD about that), and a bit of a mess on the patio. Rachel, my sister and I cleaned up pretty quickly.
The main damage that was done wasn’t to the house, it was to me. Though I managed to have a decent time by the end of the night, I’m pretty sure the beginning scarred me for life. I can confidently say that I will never have another party again – never. From now on, I’ll stick with having a few bottles of wine on the porch with three or four people.
And if the memory from the night before wasn’t enough to make my resolution stick, Claire made it iron clad. She came walking in when we were about finished straightening up, smiling and completely hangover free, though she’d been by far the drunkest person there. I was still a bit put out with her behavior, but nothing a day or so wouldn’t fix. After all, I’ve certainly been the obnoxious drunk before.
Then she asked, “What’s wrong with you?”
I told her about how anxious I’d been, about how the spilling and the screaming and the general mayhem had almost sent me over the edge. Without actually pointing any fingers, I tried to gently imply that she’d been the one at the helm of that shipwreck.
She nodded earnestly and leaned toward me. I stared mutely back, waiting on the apology that was my due.
Looking me straight in the eyes and laying her hand atop mine, she said, “I know, girl! I could never have a party at my house. All those people! I don’t know what you were thinking!”
Wednesday, September 08, 2010
Love is blind. Friendship tries not to notice.
There are all sorts of friendships. And, though it’s safe to say that some are preferable to others, I believe that the way we communicate (IE: email, text, video chats, etc) in this day and age has changed the way we rate their importance.
It’s so very rare, I think, to have a friendship that stands the test of time, but what about distance? Are friendships like romantic relationships in that respect – near to impossible to keep going when you aren’t sure when you’ll see that person next? What about if you’ve never even met that person?
My best friend in elementary school was my cousin Ben. He was three months younger than me and, consequently, in the same classrooms until about the age of 10, when they suddenly realized that separating us would not only benefit our learning abilities, but the sanity of our teachers. Unfortunately for our parents this was not an option at home as we happened to be next door neighbors.
We spent many an afternoon discussing the merits of karate vs. street fighting or seeing who could spit the farthest. I was pro street fighting, Ben was pro karate and, though I’ve often had reason to believe he cheated, he always spit the farthest. He would pull me, blinking and irritable, away from my latest paperback and out into the sunshine. We were the last of the Mohicans running through the woods, he in his bare feet and I in my navy Keds, only discarded when I was a safe distance from my prissy mother and her entirely rational fear of snakes and poisonous spiders. We raced bikes, played horrendous games of basketball, and made solemn promises with sticky handshakes.
Over the years our friendship changed, adapting, like so many boy-girl relationships, to make way for the things puberty claimed we needed. He became my protector rather than my sparring partner, and I became his sounding board for all things female – an idea as preposterous now as it was back then.
Though we remained close through the few teenage years we were allowed, and though I continued to call him my best friend, we branched off and found people that met with our often changing qualifications and fads. While I dabbled in a particularly heinous Goth phase, he was trying his hand at the All-American jock. While I practiced the art of the hanger-on, he took up afternoons with the fishing club. However, by the age of 15, we seemed to be moving within the same circle once more. The common circle, collector of teenagers everywhere – trouble.
I was only just discovering the feeling of constantly having him around again, of being on the same wavelength. Afternoons were spent using every curse word we knew, playing video games, burning rap CD’s that would make our mothers faint, and smoking cigarettes on the sly. My favorite pastimes were riding in the car with him next to me, singing Afroman at the top of our lungs, and lying in his bedroom at night giggling over things that only made sense if you were stoned. I’d barely begun to appreciate our new relationship when he was killed suddenly in a jet ski accident.
Losing my very first best friend – my brother – my blood – in such a terrible way, crushed me. But after the anger had run its course, after the hurt dulled to a controllable throb – he managed, in death, to give me something. He pulled me out of my shell again.
In the years that followed Ben’s death, I made friends with an ease I’d never had before. I still disappeared behind my books from time to time, but I wasn’t the same withdrawn child being coaxed to come out and play. Interacting with all those different people was necessary.
When I think over all the friends I’ve had since, there are only a few that even bear mentioning and I’m glad - glad that I had so many imposters, so many which passed through quickly. It’s made it much easier to recognize the real thing.
Rachel, whom I’ve written about before, was the next person to make a big impact in my life – helping me move into adulthood with honesty (I had a significant problem with that.) and much needed hilarity. And though she’s still my best friend, things seem to be at another turning point. I’ve changed yet again, and I suppose when that happens, you need new people in your life to reflect that change.
I’ve recently (over the past year) developed some unexpected, unconventional friendships. At times, especially in the beginning, I couldn’t think of them as anything special because it would just be too weird. But I’ve since readjusted my thinking.
I’m talking about my friendships with you guys.
This whole online dating fiasco I entered into recently? I’ve been pretty embarrassed about it, depending on who I’m talking to and what day it is. But in all honesty, it’s not that different from blogger. Sure I don’t have any romantic intentions as far as the lot of you are concerned, but I’ve formed some pretty close attachments despite myself – without even being aware of it happening at first.
Every comment and every reader has a special place in my heart. I love all of you guys for giving me the validation I wasn’t aware I needed until I started this blog. The support I’ve received here, through some of the most difficult times, has occasionally been the push I needed. Your comments are always encouraging, more often than not hilarious, and usually better than any anxiety pill. See, even having a great group of “in-person” friends, I just don’t get much encouragement on the writing front. I needed that, and you all gave it freely – so thank you.
But as with any large group, there are always a few standouts – a few people I’ve gotten to know a little better than the rest. A few people who started as encouraging strangers, and ended up becoming close personal friends.
Mr. London Street, whose real name I wish I could use here, if only to make myself sound more plausible, has been, in a manner of speaking, the driving force behind almost everything you’ve read on this blog since spring of last year.
I’ve always been an ok writer and I knew it was something I desperately wanted to do, but it wasn’t until I read his site that I realized just what possibilities really lay behind blogging. I was using my site to vent and occasionally tell a funny story or fill out a meme. And here was this man, writing so beautifully about everything from humorous bus expeditions to painful childhood memories. It was a wakeup call.
He gave me the courage to write in a way even I had no idea I was capable of and encouraged me to push boundaries. And I will be forever grateful, because one of the best feelings in the world is seeing something you’ve written and thinking, “I can be proud of that.” It might be “just a blog”, but it’s also a record of just how much I’ve improved. I’m a long way from reaching my full potential, but I have a feeling I’d be even farther away if we hadn’t become friends.
And I do consider him a friend...a real one. A mentor of sorts, obviously, but a friend first. Not a week goes by without an email or a twitter message that makes me laugh, think, or roll my eyes in amused exasperation. We have quite a bit in common for all our surface and cultural differences and, of course, our geographic distance. I plan on remedying the latter sometime in the first months of the new year, if only for a brief visit, and I can’t tell you how excited I am at the prospect of meeting him in person.
There’s another blogger that I’ve become close with, though I prefer not to name them as they’re quite funny about their privacy. Suffice it to say that if a few days go by and we haven’t spoken, I wonder what’s going on. They make me laugh constantly and even, on occasion, irritate me to the point of insanity, as friends are wont to do. Our phone conversations often leave me in stitches, but even when they turn serious, I’d be hard-pressed to find someone I enjoy talking to more. I genuinely hope that this is one friendship that will prove the distance theory wrong. (Note to person in question: Just because I’m being nice does not give you license to torment me about it later. I will retaliate, as you well know.)
There are others that I have occasional correspondence with and would love to get to know more. I believe there’s a wealth of possibilities here. A great big world of people that share the same sense of humor and aren’t afraid to say what they think. People that are open-minded and intelligent. People that when you finally meet them for the first time, it feels like the twentieth. And people that, even if you never get the chance to meet, change your life for the better.
Every now and then a commenter has said, “You should stop giving this stuff away for free.” And in the beginning I felt inclined to agree. But as you can clearly tell, if you’ve been paying any attention, I’ve been getting a lot more in return than meets the eye.
I have no idea how long I’ll continue to blog. I suppose as long as it continues to be something that makes me feel good, that makes me feel like I belong to something bigger. And, of course, as long as it continues to introduce me to some truly wonderful people.
It’s so very rare, I think, to have a friendship that stands the test of time, but what about distance? Are friendships like romantic relationships in that respect – near to impossible to keep going when you aren’t sure when you’ll see that person next? What about if you’ve never even met that person?
My best friend in elementary school was my cousin Ben. He was three months younger than me and, consequently, in the same classrooms until about the age of 10, when they suddenly realized that separating us would not only benefit our learning abilities, but the sanity of our teachers. Unfortunately for our parents this was not an option at home as we happened to be next door neighbors.
We spent many an afternoon discussing the merits of karate vs. street fighting or seeing who could spit the farthest. I was pro street fighting, Ben was pro karate and, though I’ve often had reason to believe he cheated, he always spit the farthest. He would pull me, blinking and irritable, away from my latest paperback and out into the sunshine. We were the last of the Mohicans running through the woods, he in his bare feet and I in my navy Keds, only discarded when I was a safe distance from my prissy mother and her entirely rational fear of snakes and poisonous spiders. We raced bikes, played horrendous games of basketball, and made solemn promises with sticky handshakes.
Over the years our friendship changed, adapting, like so many boy-girl relationships, to make way for the things puberty claimed we needed. He became my protector rather than my sparring partner, and I became his sounding board for all things female – an idea as preposterous now as it was back then.
Though we remained close through the few teenage years we were allowed, and though I continued to call him my best friend, we branched off and found people that met with our often changing qualifications and fads. While I dabbled in a particularly heinous Goth phase, he was trying his hand at the All-American jock. While I practiced the art of the hanger-on, he took up afternoons with the fishing club. However, by the age of 15, we seemed to be moving within the same circle once more. The common circle, collector of teenagers everywhere – trouble.
I was only just discovering the feeling of constantly having him around again, of being on the same wavelength. Afternoons were spent using every curse word we knew, playing video games, burning rap CD’s that would make our mothers faint, and smoking cigarettes on the sly. My favorite pastimes were riding in the car with him next to me, singing Afroman at the top of our lungs, and lying in his bedroom at night giggling over things that only made sense if you were stoned. I’d barely begun to appreciate our new relationship when he was killed suddenly in a jet ski accident.
Losing my very first best friend – my brother – my blood – in such a terrible way, crushed me. But after the anger had run its course, after the hurt dulled to a controllable throb – he managed, in death, to give me something. He pulled me out of my shell again.
In the years that followed Ben’s death, I made friends with an ease I’d never had before. I still disappeared behind my books from time to time, but I wasn’t the same withdrawn child being coaxed to come out and play. Interacting with all those different people was necessary.
When I think over all the friends I’ve had since, there are only a few that even bear mentioning and I’m glad - glad that I had so many imposters, so many which passed through quickly. It’s made it much easier to recognize the real thing.
Rachel, whom I’ve written about before, was the next person to make a big impact in my life – helping me move into adulthood with honesty (I had a significant problem with that.) and much needed hilarity. And though she’s still my best friend, things seem to be at another turning point. I’ve changed yet again, and I suppose when that happens, you need new people in your life to reflect that change.
I’ve recently (over the past year) developed some unexpected, unconventional friendships. At times, especially in the beginning, I couldn’t think of them as anything special because it would just be too weird. But I’ve since readjusted my thinking.
I’m talking about my friendships with you guys.
This whole online dating fiasco I entered into recently? I’ve been pretty embarrassed about it, depending on who I’m talking to and what day it is. But in all honesty, it’s not that different from blogger. Sure I don’t have any romantic intentions as far as the lot of you are concerned, but I’ve formed some pretty close attachments despite myself – without even being aware of it happening at first.
Every comment and every reader has a special place in my heart. I love all of you guys for giving me the validation I wasn’t aware I needed until I started this blog. The support I’ve received here, through some of the most difficult times, has occasionally been the push I needed. Your comments are always encouraging, more often than not hilarious, and usually better than any anxiety pill. See, even having a great group of “in-person” friends, I just don’t get much encouragement on the writing front. I needed that, and you all gave it freely – so thank you.
But as with any large group, there are always a few standouts – a few people I’ve gotten to know a little better than the rest. A few people who started as encouraging strangers, and ended up becoming close personal friends.
Mr. London Street, whose real name I wish I could use here, if only to make myself sound more plausible, has been, in a manner of speaking, the driving force behind almost everything you’ve read on this blog since spring of last year.
I’ve always been an ok writer and I knew it was something I desperately wanted to do, but it wasn’t until I read his site that I realized just what possibilities really lay behind blogging. I was using my site to vent and occasionally tell a funny story or fill out a meme. And here was this man, writing so beautifully about everything from humorous bus expeditions to painful childhood memories. It was a wakeup call.
He gave me the courage to write in a way even I had no idea I was capable of and encouraged me to push boundaries. And I will be forever grateful, because one of the best feelings in the world is seeing something you’ve written and thinking, “I can be proud of that.” It might be “just a blog”, but it’s also a record of just how much I’ve improved. I’m a long way from reaching my full potential, but I have a feeling I’d be even farther away if we hadn’t become friends.
And I do consider him a friend...a real one. A mentor of sorts, obviously, but a friend first. Not a week goes by without an email or a twitter message that makes me laugh, think, or roll my eyes in amused exasperation. We have quite a bit in common for all our surface and cultural differences and, of course, our geographic distance. I plan on remedying the latter sometime in the first months of the new year, if only for a brief visit, and I can’t tell you how excited I am at the prospect of meeting him in person.
There’s another blogger that I’ve become close with, though I prefer not to name them as they’re quite funny about their privacy. Suffice it to say that if a few days go by and we haven’t spoken, I wonder what’s going on. They make me laugh constantly and even, on occasion, irritate me to the point of insanity, as friends are wont to do. Our phone conversations often leave me in stitches, but even when they turn serious, I’d be hard-pressed to find someone I enjoy talking to more. I genuinely hope that this is one friendship that will prove the distance theory wrong. (Note to person in question: Just because I’m being nice does not give you license to torment me about it later. I will retaliate, as you well know.)
There are others that I have occasional correspondence with and would love to get to know more. I believe there’s a wealth of possibilities here. A great big world of people that share the same sense of humor and aren’t afraid to say what they think. People that are open-minded and intelligent. People that when you finally meet them for the first time, it feels like the twentieth. And people that, even if you never get the chance to meet, change your life for the better.
Every now and then a commenter has said, “You should stop giving this stuff away for free.” And in the beginning I felt inclined to agree. But as you can clearly tell, if you’ve been paying any attention, I’ve been getting a lot more in return than meets the eye.
I have no idea how long I’ll continue to blog. I suppose as long as it continues to be something that makes me feel good, that makes me feel like I belong to something bigger. And, of course, as long as it continues to introduce me to some truly wonderful people.
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