Starbucks. Can you do better?

Here’s a letter I just sent to Starbucks.  I really can’t believe that they are still not on board on this recycling/composting thing.  I have to admit, they will never hold a flame to Bittersweet or Paul’s in Louisville – because they have live music and a home-y vibe and gluten-free treats that Starbucks will never be able to master, but if you’re rushed, or you have a sleeping baby in your car, the Starbucks drive through is an actual requirement if you are to make it through this crazy/rushed/screaming/sleeping/road raged western world.  Yes.  I am exaggerating, but hey – we all have our addictions.  Normally I wouldn’t want someone to steal my text, but on this occasion, feel free to copy and paste this (or change it a bit to fit your town) and go to starbucks.com and send them a letter!  I wonder if it’s possible to inspire change in a company that once was that local small coffee shop.  I wonder if we can remind them of the importance of the world.  Let’s try.  It’s fun.  Pass this to EVERYONE!!  I love this planet, and I’ve contributed to its imminent environmental downfall in my own ways.  But now I’m older and wiser.  Having a baby reminds you of how tender all life is, including our earth.  Let’s give her a break, already!  Now, get out there and hug a tree, dammit!

Dear Starbucks,

I remember the day I first saw a Starbucks in Boulder. It moved into an old gas station next to C.U. Then one popped up next door, and across the street, and in the grocery story. It’s a powerful company, and having lived in WA for part of my life, I support the number of jobs this company has created. Starbucks is a goliath at this point, and yet I am consistently disappointed – not by the coffee or the service – but by your lack of respect for the environment. Not only have I never seen a recycling bin in your stores (for the multitude of teens who drink their frappucinos), I can not recycle your hot coffee cups even if I take them home. I have to fill land fills with your lids. This is such a bummer to me. I live in a community that I am so proud of because they provide curbside composting. It’s a small town that has received national attention time and again for being the number one place in our country to have a family. I have to admit, if I have the time, I chose a small coffee shop just down the street from you because they HAVE RECYCLING BINS, COMPOSTABLE CUPS, LIDS, and even the cozy that keeps your hands from getting burned (they also have local Bahkti Chai which is better than butter). I love these people because they obviously care about our community and the world. Starbucks has a business model that people strive for, and a record of incredible success. Why not at least set an example to the world, demonstrating that you can have a SUPER successful business AND care for the planet. I adore the fact that Starbucks is getting more ethical in its choices of coffee, but this could really push the company into new territory. Imagine not only providing jobs in an economy that truly stinks, but not further destroying our planet in the process. I want our small coffee shops to survive around here, and I will keep supporting them when I can. When I’m in a hurry, I’d love to hit the drive through at Starbucks. Make this a more appealing option for me, won’t you? Because right now I feel massive ethical environmental guilt by frequenting your stores. That’s such a drag. An unnecessary drag. Be bold, Starbucks, admit that you can learn from the little guys, and set an example for the others.

COMPOSTABLE cups, recycling bins: Welcome to 2012. Join us. We won’t bite.
- Louisville, Colorado

It’s my ship.

I love to sing, in my car, where no one can hear me.  I know it’s restrictive and repressive, but I have a strong feeling that I can’t carry a tune.  Perhaps it’s the expression on my dogs faces when I belt out Lady Gaga, or the embarrassment inspired by hearing my outgoing voice mail message.  You know that theory that the phone sex lady is really some swanky, rather overweight creature, chain smoking and eating pork rinds?  There’s a chance I just made that up.  And does anyone even do that phone sex thing anymore?  It’s probably been replaced by an app.  Well, I am the one with the phone lady’s actual voice, the one you would expect the woman to have if you were to see her and not hear her.  So therefore I am SUPER hot.  We’re just going to go with that.

So, I sing.

In places where I hope others don’t hear me.  Although, I have to admit, I have those overtired days in the grocery store where I sing a few bars with Bon Jovi, and unfortunately dance just a bit, in the coffee aisle, before I realize what I’ve done.

Places I refuse to sing include:

• birthday parties.  Unless I love you more than the sun.
• church services (mainly because I’ve only been a few times, and I don’t know any words.  Oh.  And my voice sounds like the phone sex lady’s voice SHOULD sound.  Oh.  And I find it entertaining to lip-synch.  You can hear other people’s terrible voices better that way.  Which will make you feel better about your own guttural noises that slip out at the grocery store.).

(where else do people sing in public?)

• weddings (do people sing at weddings?  They should.  Like a version of the birthday song.  But they should reference the upcoming night of overtired, been on your feet all day, intoxicated, bloated, yet obligatory sex.)
• Karaoke bars (there is not enough booze on the planet to make this happen.)
• at the dentist (just seems like a bad idea.  Unless they have nitrous.  Then, who cares?)

But if I were to somehow forget my inhibitions, which would be an ecstatic vacation of sorts from which I would like to never return from, I would sing the wrong lyrics.  This is not intentional, but I think my lyrics are often much better than the original.

For example, there was a good 6 months that I sang that hip-teen-angsty song “All the other kids with the lawn dart kits, better run better run, faster than my brother.”  I pondered this illogical ranting.  I sang it with my kiddo in the car.  I pictured rich frat boy types, playing games of lawn darts (which in my head were like croquette, only with darts), running faster than the singer’s brother.  It made me happy.  And then?  I learned the real words.  Much darker than my words.  My lyrics are better.  ”All the other kids with the pumped up kicks, better run better run, outrun my bullet.”  Really?  Well, that just sends an entirely different message than the one I was getting.  And I felt a little bad for playing it over and over to my seven-year old.

My best mix up to date (at least that I have discovered) is over 25 years in the making.  How am I supposed to relearn lyrics after 25 years?  C’mon.  My brain does not have that kind of capacity!  Men at Work.  Awesome, awe-inspiring deep sexy weird voice (what does that say about my phone-sex-voice theory?) singing, “Do you come from a land down under?”  My entire life I have belted out the words, “I said, ‘do you speak-a my language?’  He just smiled and gave me a bit of my sandwich.”  Yes.  Why would someone give you a bit of your own sandwich?  I don’t know, but I thought it seemed like a nice gesture.  And the other day I learned something earth shattering and memory collapsing.  I leaned that the tall man did not give him a bit of his sandwich, he gave him a “VEGEMITE sandwich.”  What the fuck is wrong with Australians?  Vegemite?  I love your accents, and your tropical fish, but I can’t think of anything grosser sounding to put on a sandwich.  And what the hell is Vegemite?  And why was this such a big hit in the U.S. if we don’t eat Vegemite?  (I have to admit, I’m not even sure they’re an Aussie band.  I am just assuming…)

And by the way, what are pumped up kicks?  C’mon hip lyricists.  Give me some friggin’ words I am familiar with for Pete’s sake!  What if I had actually belted that out at a wedding?  Everyone would have laughed and discovered that in my infinite hotness, not only can I not sing in tune, but I am incapable of comprehending, let along correctly repeating, lyrics!  Ah.  The shame.  Guess I’ll just keep singing to my dogs and my daughter.  Which reminds me, her favorite song when she was four was Gwen Stefanie’s “Hollaback Girl.”  I knew these lyrics.  It’s not hard to misunderstand a California girl singing “It’s my shit” over and over.  So, because my daughter’s ears have not marinated long enough in childhood to make this mom comfortable hearing her shout “shit” to all her little elementary school friends, I would sing REALLY loud to that song, and cover the word SHIT with the word SHIP.

Yep.  It’s my ship.

And, might I add, completely fooled her.

Score?  Mom : one

Does that make up for teaching her the word crap?

Moonwalking on the Nile

This weekend my daughter is going to a belly dancing party.  Yes, this is Boulder County where hosting belly dancing for kids is perfectly normal, and they will eat gluten-free, egg-free, sugar-free cupcakes and drink bubbly all natural fruit juice instead of pop.  I’m not complaining, although I am a big fan of sugary cupcakes and I don’t care what you say, gluten-free beer is not yummy.  At.  All.  Fortunately, they are little, so they’ll be sticking to juice.  And not Michael Jackson’s “Jesus Juice.”  Anyway, all this belly dancing got me thinking about my own belly dancing past.  It was short and sweet, and I made not a penny.

Because I grew up in a different country, where gas was 25 cents a gallon and was eagerly pumped for you while you remained in your air-conditioned luxury, I had some interesting vacations.  One of them was to Egypt.  Among other tourist adventures, we took a cruise on the Nile.  My grandparents came along on this trip.  The only country they had ever traveled to outside of the U.S. was Mexico.  This seemed like a good idea at the time.

After spending time traveling around ruins and pyramids, we eventually boarded a cruise ship.  In my likely skewed mind this was actually more like a Louisiana river boat than a Carnival cruise ship (which I now see as a huge blessing!).  There were little rooms and a friendly crew.  At night, the dining room turned into a dance club.  A tiny dance club, more like the common area in a dorm with a black light and some good tunes.  I was twelve.  To me, it was studio 54.  People were having fun, partying Nile-style.  We met a man who was chronically drunk and spoke incessantly of each cigarette he smoked as being yet another nail in his coffin.  He smoked the entire cruise.  I’m guessing he has enough nails by now. While talking with this man, our waiter stopped by to inform us of the next evenings festivities.  A costume party.  But we had no costumes!  Not to worry, the crew had a bunch of them.

I dug through a box of costumes in one of the crew members cabins.  Sparkles, sequence, disco, ooooh.  What’s this white shiny fabric?  Ah.  A belly dancing costume.  Fun!  I was encouraged by my new cruise-crew friends, who I liked talking to much more than the chain-smoking coffin builder.

We went to dinner in full regalia.  To be honest, I was so self-absorbed and into my costume, I can’t remember what anyone else was wearing.  This is the preteen mind.  No one else matters.  In case you have kids, if it is not affecting how they look, sound or smell, it does not matter!

After dinner the D.J. starting making his 80′s magic.  Not much of a challenge in the 80′s, really, I mean the music magic was just happening all around us.  (snort).  They played some cheesy pop music, and people danced.  It was not the dance number from the titanic by any means, but equal in beauty to this twelve-year-old.  The disco ball spun, reflecting rainbow light off of pirate patches and flapper dresses.  And then the D.J. suggested a special belly dance solo.  There was a wee spot light, like the one from a grade school production of Peter Pan, that fell on me.  My white belly dancing costume shimmered like a pearl.  I was terribly embarrassed, but somehow the D.J. knew just what to spin for me.  Some Michael Jackson.  I worshipped and planned on marrying Michael at this point in my life.  He was still at peace with his pigmentation.  He hadn’t changed color and personality yet.  Neverland ranch was still only a fantasy.  I stood up in that moment of inspiration and click-clacked my brass finger cymbals together, finding the rhythm to Beat It (not hard to do) and pretended to belly dance.  I even did my version of a moon-walk.  I channeled my inner Michael and mixed it Cocktail style with my memories of the Solid Gold dancers and did my thing.  Go white girl, GO!   A little blond belly dancer on the Nile.  My grandparents beamed with pride (and perhaps a fare dose of confusion)!

My moves surprisingly never progressed me into the realm of a professional dancer of any kind.  But all of the professional belly dancers who did make something of their lives could have learned some important knowledge  from me that night. Let go of your sexy, sultry wiggling for a minute and think of Pre-Neverland Ranch Michael.  Let him take over your ankles and knees and do some moon-walking.  You might get someone to stop smoking and talking about coffins just long enough to laugh.

Laugh, while secretly envying your moves.

The Remedial Patriot Strikes Again

My husband sat, watching a show on the military channel.  This was his life before we met.  Mine was more hippie-esque. No guns.  Just brownies.  He was really into this veteran show and being the asshole that I sometimes am, I asked my husband, “Aw, honey, are you tearing up?”  I mean, the “Aw” was dripping with sarcasm.  Why would I do that?  Because I’m a closet bitch.  And he never cries at the abused animal commercials that make me choke up.  As the question came out, I wanted to retract it or twist it into, “Aw, honey, are you hungry?”  or something equally non-provoking.  But I didn’t. It came out before I turned on my filter.  He said, “Seriously?” and walked out of the house.

Well, I never said that my mouth works as well as my hands.

After letting him rake the leaves for a while, as if he were raking my face, I went outside and apologized.  Sincerely.  Not sarcastically.  It wasn’t enough.  I could tell by the way he continued his vigorous leaf destruction.

Did I mention the fact that the following day was Veteran’s?

Yup.

He is a veteran. My intention was simply to mock him and be silly because he mocks me when I tear up during commercials.  How was I to know that my “never-been-to-war-but-really-enjoys-laughing” self was jabbing into a veteran wound?  He went to work on Veteran’s Day, something I notice most vets do.  It’s only teachers, students and postal workers who actually get the day off.  I decided that I would be a good citizen for once and hang a U.S. flag in honor of our veterans.  I don’t usually display my American pride because of my past of growing up in another country.  Sometimes it feels forced and awkward, but this time I decided to get over myself and thank the people who have fought for our freedom.  I knew there was a flag around my house somewhere.

Where was it?  I know it was here.  My mom sent it to me years ago… I think she ordered it from L.L. Bean.  Oh.  There it is. Poking out from that shelf up there.

Red, white and blue.

So nicely folded.  L.L. Bean must really be into presentation.  Wow.  And it’s huge.  I unfolded it, marveling at its size.  I hung it from our bedroom windows.

Sigh.  There I was.  The patriotic wife of a veteran.  I was kind of proud of myself.  This stuff does not come naturally to me. Maybe I’d whip up a casserole and clean the house.

Ahahahahahahaha…….

My husband was touched.  He came home and told me that it meant a lot to him and he couldn’t believe that I had done that.  I glowed in my new patriotic role.  I felt warm like apple pie.

And then he paused.  It was one of those “pregnant pauses” that you read about.  Big.  With a creature inside.  Ready to be birthed.

“Um.”

“You do know why it’s so large, don’t you?”

I defensively responded, “Well yes.  Of course I do.”  Thinking that it’s so large because it’s a flag, an L.L. Bean flag.  They do good work.  It’s supposed to make an impression, right?

I looked at him.  He smiled in a patronizing way, his eyes looking at me with simultaneous amusement and pity.  It was a smile that said, “was this woman raised in a barn?”

Remedial Me.

“The flag is so big because it was on a coffin.  This was my uncle’s flag.”

Yes.  I had just dishonored a flag.  A flag that was never to be unfolded.  I shook that puppy out and hung it from my window.  Gad.  I hope a bird didn’t poop on it.

Classy.

Maybe being patriotic is not my cup of tea.  Still, I think those veterans rock for putting their lives on the line, and my veteran rocks the most.  I’m glad that even if I am a remedial patriot and perhaps a remedial wife he enjoys my brownies. Sure, they don’t have anything but sugar in them, but they make us happy.

Warning: The ME Santa may smell of hops.

We look forward to winter break for so long, and yet winter break can do a person in. At least this person.   I know, poor me: time off of school, fewer work hours.  WAH!  But seriously, when you have a kid and one day you are consumed with running from important location number one to important location number two while drinking too much coffee and trying to remember to meditate (but not while you’re driving because you want to keep your child alive) because it is actually required in grad school (an obvious attempting to avert any “postal” grad-freak-outs) and trying to make it to a third even more important location before you run out of time to do any Christmas shopping.  It’s too fast.  And the sudden stop, followed by a whole lot of nothing to do can be more than a little disconcerting.  My daughter’s backpack was kicked into her closet not to be opened until January (too bad there was a snack left in it).  My school binders were tossed on the basement floor, only to be kicked into a corner to create space for the Christmas ornaments and other acceptable holiday clutter.  I stopped eating lentils for lunch and began to subsist on Christmas cookies (with the occasional beer to keep things regular).  My daughter followed my healthy example (other than the beer).  If you are curious about evidence of poor eating habits correlating with behavior issues, well let me just say, ask Santa.  The nice list is typically quite short. It fits on a post-it.  Parental types sit around, weaving tales of how a chubby old man can deliver millions of presents on one magical evening so that our children will believe that we are not the providers of the loot beneath the tree.  

Santa is real.

But he doesn’t bring our kids presents.

At least, not the families in my neighborhood.  Unfortunately, most children are on a month-long sugar binge when Christmas arrives, so Santa only needs only to maneuver his plus size booty and his reindeer driven sleigh to about 8 homes.  Those homes are all sugar-free.  Meanwhile, the rest of us heathens overcompensate while simultaneously fearing the mass devastation that might arrive if this day of potential lotto winnings were to miss our own children.  We go to Target.  We support China (who probably hosts the eight homes that are getting Santa’s cool hand-made toys). It’s a vicious cycle, and I must admit I totally and completely love it.  We are encouraged to lie to our children.  What fun!  Strange lesson, but what fun!

Once my own week of whiplash ended, of course, I got sick.  My daughter got sick.  This is one of our longest Christmas traditions.  So, now besides the outrageous amount of sugar and butter we were consuming (I mean outrageous!  I bought butter at Costco) we were adding countless hours of cartoon watching and internet surfing.  My daughter began speaking like that girl in the Exorcist. Well, she didn’t drop the F-bomb, but still, I was becoming ever more convinced that somehow she was possessed by a demon.  And yet, of course Santa still came. Not the real Santa.  He was still busy with his 8 homes in China.  The ME Santa.

The ME Santa is a serious sucker.

Christmas morning inevitably arrived.  My husband and I both heard the seven-year old demon child wake and go to the bathroom.  Partially out of fear for our lives and partially out of excitement that the ME Santa had arrived, we snuck into the living room to witness our daughter’s face when she saw the presents under the tree.  It was 5:15 a.m.  We heard her stumble back into her room.

An odd and mysterious silence overtook our home.

My husband and I looked at each other.  ”Seriously?  She went back to sleep?  No.  No way.”

My husband opened her bedroom door and softly called her name.

Nothing.

Christmas morning, 5:15 a.m. and the parents are awake. And the child is asleep.  He looked at me and rolled his eyes, trying to quietly close her door.  As the latch clicked, she screamed.  Hello Christmas, welcome to our home.  It was not a scream of joy.  It was a scream of sheer terror. Linda Blair would have been proud.

Once we calmed her down and assured her that it was just her dumb ass parents waking her up, she got excited.   Presents, breakfast, coffee, more presents, more sugar, and the whole event was finished by 7:30 a.m.

ME Santa was in need of a nap, but instead went sledding.  I bet the real Santa was busy getting a pedicure by this point, instead of faking Christmas energy.  Like I said:  ME Santa = SUCKER.  

Even if it was exhausting, it was a day filled with magic.  I know my daughter learned about the true meaning of Christmas because when we tucked her in last night (mid argument) she said, “You guys think I’m crappy.  You tell me in the morning I’m crappy.  You told me on Christmas I was crappy.”  My husband and I looked at each other quizzically, wondering if the demons had finally departed, leaving our child’s soul in a confused state of crappiness.

“Um.  Honey.  You may have heard us use that word recently (after all, it had been Christmas break.  That was the least toxic of the bad words she probably learned), but it is not a word for seven-year olds.  You can’t say ‘crappy.’”

She looked at me like I had just shot her dog.  Her face wrinkled up like she’d consumed a large glass of rancid milk and she emitted a cry that I thought was only possible from two-year old children lit on fire by their siblings.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!  I meant CRABBY.  I make mistakes sometimes, you know?  AAAAAAAWWWWAAAAAHHHH!“

That was a look away and try not to laugh moment.  And a good representation of our Christmas break.

I could already predict the conversation on her first day back to school.  ”Hey kiddo?  What’d you do over break?”

“I learned that crappy and crabby are sometimes interchangeable and when done so create surprising comic results.  Oh.  And that Santa will always bring you stuff.  Even if you’re crappy.“

Bad tree! You made me cry!

I have fallen off the blog boat, but I am going to try to make a brief attempt to raise my head above the waters of grad school to say “hello world.”  I started school in August.  It’s intense, and yet in class on Wednesday we “had” to go outside and color for 30 minutes.  I know.  It’s not brain surgery, but it is Art Therapy, so sometimes I feel about as drained as if it were brain surgery.

Brain surgery that I am performing on my own brain, without drugs!

Not that I’m complaining, I certainly have some goobers in my gray matter that could use removal, or hugs, or copious amounts of caffeine.  I’m trying all three to see what works best.  So far the caffeine is my favorite, although I equated my habit to that of a meth addict the other day.  I’m hoping it’s not going to make me look like those billboards of tweakers.  Good lord.  It’s just coffee.  But, man, I have had so much in the last month that I expect my teeth to start falling out at any moment.  I may wake up with a couple stuck in my hair, and I would not be surprised.  My dentist will.  But I’m sure he’ll be happy when I pay his bill with my student loan check.

So, why would I put my teeth and gray matter through such trauma, voluntarily? Perhaps because I am clinically insane. But, from what I’ve learned, insane ain’t so bad.  It’s depression that I’d like to avoid.  At least the insane make some fabulous art.  And you don’t need any friends to have a party, because there they are, all in your head, whenever the party mood strikes!  Wheeee!  Anyway, I’m not really insane (or my art would probably be much better) and so far I’m not depressed. That being said, you may disagree because I have enrolled as a full time grad student at a school where not only do I have 15 textbooks for one semester, but I am required to meditate (and read a hell of a lot about how to do so, if I only had the time, but since I have to read about it so much, I run out of time to practice it!), but I also have to make art (this is my version of heaven), and people around me actually, literally hug trees, sometimes while crying great big animalistic sobs.  This I have learned is another therapy program, Gestalt.  I’m quite happy that I don’t have to hug the trees in the art program.  At least not in front of people.  You all know I secretly hug them when no one’s looking.  But they only make me cry when they have wasp nests in them.  But yes, I am going to a unique school, and I love it.  After almost 6 weeks, I do not yet own patchouli oil, my leg hair is as randomly shaved as ever, and nothing new has been pierced.  I still have my given name (although I think Hot Wind has a nice ring to it).  I am still married (I think.  There’s a guy on the couch who kinda resembles some dude I used to know.  Hope it’s not the plumber.).  And I hope to still be funny  (I think that’s my sense of humor poking out from under my massive blue binder).

Oh silly blog.  How I have missed writing.  I promise to build up many stories to share over the winter break.  So, stay tuned.  I am still me!  I know this because today I had the opportunity to help someone who had been hit by a car.  I held her head while we waited for the ambulance.  I kept talking to her as she went in and out of consciousness.  As the fire engine appeared in front of us she said, “Why are the firemen here?”  I told her the reason, that they are typically the first responders to any scene, and then added a side note of, “Don’t worry.  There’s not a fire.”  She laughed, which gives me reason to believe that she will be okay.

A word of wisdom to those whose brains are worth something – the ones not overrun with boogers and meth: wear a helmet!  I don’t care if you are walking your dog.  Ok.  I’m kidding, although we’d probably all be safer.  I mean, when you ride your bike, wear your stinking helmet.  If you are more concerned about your hair than your brains, then you’re right.  You’re one of the lucky ones who does not need a helmet.  But I’m guessing that there may be a modicum of good inside that brain, so maybe protect it anyway.  If you’re doing meth AND concerned with your remaining hair, the helmet is just a joke at this point.  One political slam here, because it is connected to helmets, and hair.  One of our local politicians, Tom Tancredo, was pulled over last year while driving his motorcycle.  He was not wearing a helmet.  When asked about this, his reply was (and I should not quote because I don’t have the direct source, but my somewhat gooey over-caffienated-gray-matter remembers it as…)”I’m coming from a haircut.”  Yep.  Wouldn’t want to mess up the hair by protecting your brain.  That would be just silly.

A close friend of mine unfortunately did not wear her helmet to work one day, about 15 years ago.  I must give her credit, hardly any one did on a casual ride in those days.  She was hit by a car and suffered a terrible brain injury, followed by an infection that has left her in a state that most of us can’t even let ourselves imagine.  It’s too much.  Her parents have cared for her through all these years, and I have started a fundraiser for them because their resources are depleted.  They are good good people.  They deserve any help humanity can spare.  If you are interested in reading, please check the fundraiser site at www.giveforward.com/magicformoana. 

Protect those beans.  The tree hugging ones.  The insane ones.  The depressed ones.  Beans rule.

U.G.L.Y. You ain’t got no alibi!

You see the ugly.

I can see it too, if I look for it.  I am looking for the pretty instead.

You smell the ugly.

I have a sensitive sniffer.  I smell it too.  If I plug my nose I can’t smell it anymore.  It’s easy.  Or I smell something else.  Something that doesn’t stink.

You don’t taste anymore.  You don’t like sugar.  You won’t eat chocolate.  You think honey is too sweet.

Honey is too sweet?

I like honey.  I like sugar.  I like to taste.  I am a super taster.  I will keep tasting, thank you very much.

I see the honey bees.  I thank them.

You see the yellow jackets.  You curse them.

You see the fat.  You see the wrinkled.  You see the age spotted.  You see death around every corner.

Yes.  It’s there.

I can see it if I look, but I have to look past the happy, the joy, the life.  I’m not sure why I would want to do that.

I see moments.  There are good ones.  There are bad ones.  There are stinky ones.  I am selecting the ones that mean something to me, and I am trying to only select the good ones.  Sure, the bad ones have a place.  It is a place that I can set them out for the sun to cook the good back in.  It is a place where the fruit flies will come and eat them up.  It’s a place where maybe they can marinate into something good.

Some are stickier than others.  They cling to my memories like a sludge.  Sometimes I think I have successfully powerwashed them away, but it seems that I missed a little speck and they start to regrow, sending spores of negativity over my memories.  I have to rewash them.  Maybe with extra bubbles.  Perhaps a scrubbie brush.  Send them down the drain.

At least I am trying.

Do you want your sludge to be washed off?  It is growing and growing all over what once was a shiny, happy, good smelling exterior.  I remember the good because it made me happy.

You were good.

You still are.

Just start to look over and around and through the ugly once in a while.

There is beauty in there.

Even if you have to plug your nose.

Moonshine and Hickies

We were young.  He was not my first boyfriend, but he was the first (and last) to write me a song.  He was the first to be insanely silly.  We were innocent together, and I laughed more than I thought was even allowed in a teenage relationship. My regular group of friends didn’t understand my new relationship, he was not a part of that group.  Not that we were cooler, by any means.  We just thought that high school was a time for drama and end-of-world scenarios.  I needed a bright light.  They could see it.  He didn’t wallow.  He bounced.

Like Tigger.

We bounced through our time together, listening to music, telling stories, as I gradually corrupted his sweet soul by introducing him to the alcohol of my homeland.  Siddiqui.  Moonshine.  We got loopy together, and boy, if I thought he was silly sober, drunk was like stand-up comedy hour.  I was so crazy in love, having so much fun, that I smuggled booze OUT of Saudi Arabia for him to have the opportunity to taste a beverage that could make you blind and possibly tear an actual hole in your liver.  If you aren’t familiar with Saudi Arabia, it is a dry (Muslim) country and alcohol is highly illegal.

To bring into the country.

From outside the country.

I’m sure there’s not even a law about bringing it out of the country because that doesn’t  make sense.  Why would anyone be that stupid? You can buy the real stuff on the other side.  Stuff that will probably not eat the bottom out of your cup. Stuff that will only make you blind if you drink 8 bottles in a row.  But, I thought I was just so damn special, I wanted to share the often lethal crap I drank at home. The question was, how to smuggle it out.

In the 80′s we used some nasty liquid chemicals to clean our contact lenses. (Seriously.  We had to clean them.  They were so expensive that you made one pair last a year.) We had these little containers that they would sit in, and you’d pour some bubbly acid over them to allow them to marinate overnight, magically cleaning them and prepping them to be popped back into your eyes the next morning.  This was all entrusted to a teenage brain.  I don’t even know what AoSept was, but it was not a nice liquid.  Once, in a moment of sheer brilliance – while attempting to become a pot head (a career move that didn’t pan out) – I mistook AoSept as saline solution and squirted into my dry eyes.  This is the same developmental brain that is trusted with driving, often while texting, always while day dreaming.  Makes you want to stay home.  I screamed like someone had ripped my eye right out of my head, and shoved a cup full of salt in the raw open hole.  Still, it was probably not as bad as the moonshine we drank in Saudi, so logically I decided to smuggle it out in an empty AoSept bottle.  It was a plastic, squeezy thing, and I spent the better part of an evening gradually sucking the Siddiqui up from a glass and into the container. Fortunately, I was smart enough to empty it out first.  Like swapping poison with poison.

Somehow I made it all the way back to New Jersey with my AoSept-Moonshine.  I felt so mighty, above any school rules, displaying it with my other toiletries in my dorm room.  I felt I was truly “winning.”  (see Charlie Sheen?  ”winning” is often correlated with behaving like a stupid ass.)  My boyfriend was impressed.  Well, he was probably just drunk, but I translated that into impressed.  And then we got horny, as teenagers do.  I mean, that kind of horny that ONLY teenagers can manage.  Like being satisfied with a quick squeeze, or a brief grope, or a bare skin sighting.  That was all it took!  Confusing, and exciting, and confusing again. Weren’t the teenage years a blast?  Especially when a giant constellation of zits would pop up just from being groped one too many times in a particular area?  Or when a hickey appeared the next day, but you couldn’t remember receiving a hickey because you were drinking too much contact lens fluid?  That was fun. This was that boyfriend.  I never had so many hickies in my life (other than the ones I had given myself as a kid, as I practiced what I thought would later be considered “kissing”).  I’m not even sure why hickies are a part of the whole sex category.  I mean, you put your mouth in one spot and suck on it until you cause vascular damage?  Is that where spider veins come from?  Are all those damn hickies we got as teens waiting beneath the surface until our 30′s and 40′s to pop up in an even less flattering, and far more permanent form?

I cry, UNFAIR!!  Where’s the humanity?

I want my spider veins to be a result of Johnny Depp’s stubble irritating my skin too much.  Not that I have spider veins.  Or Johnny Depp.

We were teens.  Add some 180 proof alcohol.  Slap on some hickies.  Life was good.  We were at a boarding school, parents were not around.  Life was even better.  There was a school event taking place.  Everyone was there.  Except me and my hickey giver.  We snuck into my dorm room to do what we did best.

After rolling about and having the safest sex around (the kind with your clothes on) for nearly long enough to wear holes in those clothes, or at least create a friction fire, there came a sound.  No.  I didn’t fart.  I was more embarrassed of such things in those days.  There was a sound in the hallway.  Everyone was supposed to be at the event, everyone besides us and other random couples who were probably doing the same thing that we were.

Whatever.

Probably just the wind.  Or an ax murderer.

Back to business.  We don’t want this fire to burn out!

There it was a again.

Footsteps.

Voices.

We sat perfectly still.  I mean, layed.  My door was locked.  What were we afraid of?  We were afraid of being kicked out of school.  Of having our smoldering pants detected.  Of being caught being teens.

“It’s okay.  I locked the door.  We can relax.”

Relax?  Well, not exactly.  We continued trying to suck each other’s teeth out.

And then there was a new sound.  More voices, footsteps, and a jingle jangle that distinctly resembled keys on a key ring.

We froze.

Our hormones were having a hard time switching from sex thoughts to fight-or-flight thoughts.  There was a ridiculously long moment in which neither of us could even move.  This must be why the people having sex in horror movies always get killed.

And there it was:  the key in the door.

“What do I do?”  My hickey giver started running around the room in circles, looking for a place to hide.  Of course, there was nowhere.  I was such a slob that my closet was crammed full of dirty laundry.  I spun my head around.  There was a window.  Maybe I should push him out.  I looked out, and besides the fact that it was one story up, there were people outside.  People.  Tours.  Prospective students.  I guess a current student falling onto their heads might be a bit disheartening.

“Just sit there and act like nothing is happening,” I suggested, displaying impressive skills at thinking under pressure.  Yes, my instinct in the wild would be to play dead.  I’m that sort of person.

He did.  He sat on the bed.  Probably with a pillow on his lap.  I sat at my desk, trying to look normal, pretending that my hair wasn’t all over the place and my clothes weren’t smoking.

The door opened.

The student giving the tour looked at us in shock.  The family touring the school looked like they could smell the smoke of our friction fire.  No one commented on my hair.

“Um.  Oh.  I didn’t know anyone was in the dorms right now.  I’m sorry.”  Said the poor student, struggling to come up with a way to make this seem like a normal part of life at our school.  Like we had been studying.

“Hi!  Welcome to Blair!”  said my giver of many hickies.  Tigger.  Always personable.  Outgoing.  I was just happy he didn’t stand up to shake their hands.

“Uh.  Yeah.  Welcome.  We were just talking.  Where is everyone?  Are we missing some sort of event or something?” I wisely pretended.  I’m sure they were fooled by my 16 year old acting abilities.  This was a school where boys weren’t even allowed into the girl’s dorms.  If we had any functioning brain cells we would have just thrown a dress on him and pretended he was a chick.  Anyway, the family looked embarrassed and the student giving the tour looked embarrassed and we looked like we’d been caught with our pants down.  Our work there was done.

No one had noticed my AoSept.  Winning!

How to work your core through laughter and the occasional meat stick.

Every article that I read online – because I have a severely limited attention span and the actual, physical newspaper seems like a gigantic commitment – about aging states the importance of a social life.  My sister and I are obsessed with this, because we want to age happily, and not be terrible burdens on our children (and especially one another).  We are so serious about this that we have a pact to begin regular therapy when we turn 50, whether we need it or not.  If we don’t start therapy, we have given one another permission to “off” the other.  This will be in a loving manner, lots of booze and pills, and an Edward (Twilight) pillowcase as we are smothered.  She’s only 40, so we have a good ten years before this is really a problem.   I remind her daily of the fact that I am MUCH younger, so I can off her first.  Better start looking for therapists.  Robert Pattinson will probably be out of the closet by then, anyway, and we’ll have to change our pillowcases back to the old Johnny Depp standby.  But, will he still be hot in 10 years?  Oh, that’s just a silly question.

The articles are all rather similar in tone.  Exercise, have social groups, be happy, eat some blue berries and seaweed, live longer.  I guess it doesn’t really matter how long you live if you aren’t happy, I mean, what’s the point?  There are people in challenging situations in the world, who are just surviving.  I admire them for their survival drive, and I hope that I would have the same, but to be honest, if there was nothing making me happy I’d probably not survive.  Even the most dire survival is likely based on the crazy human desire to eventually get out of the current situation and to be happy again.  I have seen people who have survived some horrendous, incomprehensible life experiences, who are still living – but did they really survive?  I met a woman who had been strangled, raped, beaten and left for dead in the early 1970′s.  She “survived” but her attacker won. She was on every narcotic I had ever heard of.  She walked around like a stoned zombie.  Of course, zombies probably can’t technically get stoned.  I’ve seen other people who’ve been through even worse experiences who are actually HAPPY!  They rediscovered their mojo.  They appreciate every day that they get.  They are bright burning stars that you would never know had lived through such an ordeal. Not that it’s easy, I’m sure – but what is life if you can’t enjoy it?

Now I will step off of my soapbox, because even I have shit days that I wish didn’t happen.  But, I try to start fresh every time that great big sun comes up.  We’re all human and imperfect creatures.  Inspired to be better, healthier humans, my sister and I started a book club.

I think it’s like the Stitch-n-Bitch clubs of yesteryear.

My grandmother used to belong to one and I wouldn’t be surprised if those little old ladies never sewed a damn thing.  They were gossiping and talking about their husbands and telling ghost stories.  In similar fashion, I rarely even finish the book.  I think we spend an average of 8.5 minutes discussing what we read.  Last night we spent the other FIVE hours talking about breast size, meat sticks (and various other slang terms for male waggy sticks), horny dogs (not another term for meat stick, rather my pug who spent the entire evening getting his rocks off on my poor labrador), jiggly bellies, working out way too hard and watching the men around us just think about getting fit and seeing it happen in 48 hours, hairs growing in unfortunate locations, and the occasional booger that was ejected through fits of laughter.

Did we increase our knowledge of great literature?

Not really.

Did we eat too many cupcakes?

Could be part of the reason for the jiggle belly.

Did we drink too much wine, beer, and sweet tea infused vodka?

My head is saying “yes!”

We also burned those extra calories by laughing about the fact that my daughter exposed my lily white belly, which managed to already be jiggly – even before the cupcakes – to the only mom I know that actually could be a supermodel, if she was just 5 inches taller, and proceeded to squeeze it and say, “I love this belly.  See the donut?  Mommy.  I love your belly!”   I’d like to think that it was a nice reminder to supermodel mom that she should thank her lucky stars for her great genetic legacy.  And a nice reminder to me that my belly, in it’s infinite pasty jiggliness, is loved.

We realized the importance of not only a living will, but a hair removal will: should you ever be in a coma or otherwise incapable of plucking your own chin hairs, a friend is deemed your Tweezer Guardian and will magically appear prior to all other visitors to clean you up and have you looking less like a man.  I mean, you’ll be unconscious so you won’t care, but we decided that seeing all of those chin hairs may cause your husband to turn off the machines a bit prematurely.

Perhaps we also decreased our risk of dementia, paranoia, isolation, and other mental illnesses.  I think it was worth the effort.  You should start a book club, too.  No, you don’t have to know how to read.  You just have to know how to laugh. And, when you start your club, know this: if the people you invite can not laugh about the phrase “meat-stick” you are wasting your time.

Yep.  I love my bubble.  I could probably survive leaving, but why?  I’m happy.  I’m staying.  Dammit!

Karma and the overalls

My dancing career began when I was 6.  I was enrolled in ballet.  I hated ballet.  It made my feet hurt and the lady who taught it was an underfed, stringy haired, grumpy troll.  My passion for dance reared its graceful head when I was in front of the t.v. with my Solid Gold Dancers.  I would shake my booty harder than Beyoncé, I swear.  Now I dance around my house with only my daughter to witness my awesome-ness.  She gets embarrassed and pleads with me to stop. That’s how good I am (she’s obviously jealous).  My daughter doesn’t realize, but she’s even more talented than mom.  She will twist and flip her hair in time to Disney music videos.  We encourage her, telling her she’s amazing, better than those dancers on t.v. (we may be exaggerating).

When she busts those moves out at her high school prom, she’s gonna hate us forever.

In college I got to practice my funky moves at The Marquee.  The Marquee was a pathetic dance club.  There was never any one there.  I loved it more than dancing with my Solid Gold Dancers.  They played Goth and Pop-Goth (I’m making that genre up) pretty much every night.  I was an adult, and I could go every night if I chose.  I also could wear pajamas, because that’s what adults do.  They go dancing in their pj’s and sometimes straight from their printmaking class, donning their inked up overalls.  I was hot.  Extremely hot.  The gay boys flocked to me like flies to a rotting steak.  That probably wasn’t due to my hotness though, it was likely a result of my cute gay friend, who didn’t know he was gay yet.  Or at least, he hadn’t said it out loud.  In reality, there were no boys flocking to me, and oddly enough, that was just fine.  To me, dancing like a dead fish and getting my white-girl-overall-wearing groove on was joy on earth.  Like now, when I go to the gym.  I would fall over dead if someone hit on me.  I go there to sweat.  I go there to listen to J. Lo where no one will judge me for my decomposing musical taste because she’s singing in my ear buds.  I am a nasty work out lady, and I used to be a nasty dancing college girl.

Wow.  Totally doesn’t sound right.

The point is, I wasn’t there to meet boys.

And then, what should appear before me but a strange, cute, apparently straight, blonde boy, who reminded me of a short Woody Harrelson.  Maybe Woody Harrelson is short.  I don’t know.  He never returns my calls, so we haven’t actually ever met.

“What are you, from Nebraska or something?” was his opener.  This was not creative, it was because I was wearing my overalls.  Alas, I was intoxicated and didn’t remember wearing overalls (I had probably intended to change into my formal flannel pj’s), so I laughed like the mature adult I was.

“Tee hee! (nope. I don’t actually laugh like that. I guffaw like a drunken pirate. It’s not pretty.) What do  you mean?” I said, showing off my new and improved college girl brain cells.

“Why are you wearing overalls?  Are you a farmer or something?” He asked, innocently enough.  I mean, you do often see farmers getting their groove on to The Cure and Depeche Mode.  With their gay friends.  I see where he was coming from.

“Guffaw.  Snort.  No, I’m just dancing!  wheeeeeeeeeee…..” and off I went to shake my baggy saggy overall butt, like the retired Solid Gold Dancer that I was.

He approached me again, a bit later, and asked if I was “with” my gay friend, the one who didn’t know he was gay, or was choosing to keep it to himself, but – even had he been hetero – couldn’t be blamed for not being remotely attracted to me.

“No no.  We’re just friends.”

What happened next should have clued me in to how dense the boy was: he asked for my number.  Because sometimes I am also dense, I forgot that  you’re supposed to make one up, so I gave it to him.  I was constantly doing this.  I have a serious problem with lying.  I once had a creepy dude at the park ask for my number when I was babysitting, after he told me he was staying in a half-way house (I don’t think he was looking for a babysitter).  I gave it to him!  And then I freaked out and wouldn’t answer the phone for over a month (this was prior to the invention of caller i.d. – we lived on the edge in those days, baby!).  Darwin would be ashamed that I have survived.

The next day he called and asked me out (the boy from the club, not the possible sex offender from the park).  I forgot that there are rules to dating and you are supposed to play hard-to-get.  I brilliantly said, “sure” and we began to date.

I tried to play it cool and arranged our first encounter to be at a coffee shop so I wouldn’t get drunk and act like a flirty farmer.  Again.   Once we got there and chatted for about 30 seconds, we headed to a bar.  I don’t have a great deal of will power.  I’ve been meaning to go on a diet for 15 years.  Still hasn’t happened.

He told me that he worked in a gas station.  I instantly thought that was cool.  I can’t explain my thought process, but I had obviously been drinking too often, and there was a serious lack of ventilation in that printmaking room.  I was inhaling laquer thinner and mineral spirits almost daily.   There also was a Pearl Jam song out at the time about a gas station dude.  I blame you, Eddie Vedder (you and my shrinking college girl brain)!!  I had never dated a blue-collar kind-a guy.  I had been around trust funders and college kids and more than my share of well-bred gay boys, but no one that had EVER worked in a gas station.  It felt so dangerous and new.  Of course, it was really just because he was too damn lazy to stay in school.  But lazy when you are 23 looks a lot like rebellious. Especially when your mind is confused with thoughts of Woody Harrelson.  I think I  had Billy Joel’s Uptown Girl in my head for the better part of 3 months. (yes, I psychotically likened myself to Christie Brinkley.)

We had our fun, although I kept ignoring the fact that he was the stupidest mother fucker I had ever met in my life.  I liked having a boyfriend.  Until he dumped me one day.

I WAS SUPPOSED TO DUMP HIM!!!

I felt like poop.

I still wore my overalls, but I didn’t feel like the fun, goth dancing farmer anymore.  My sister was worried about me.  My friends were worried about me.  I called that boy over and over again, channeling my inner stalker.  But little did my concerned loved ones understand, I wasn’t broken-hearted, I was pissed.  He wasn’t good enough to dump me!  What had gone wrong here?

The confusion blinded me for weeks, or maybe it was the fumes from the printmaking studio.  My gay friend who didn’t know he was gay came out of the closet.  We started dancing again.  The club was even less happening than before my ill-fated Mr. Gas Station had wacked me upside the head with his Woody Harrelson good-looks and his dumb-stick.  We had loads of room to dance away our troubles, all seemingly related to boys.  And then I met my husband.  No, not dancing in the Marquee.  He was in my Anatomy class.  He was a college boy. And he was a tall college boy.  He worked in a Liquor Store.  Obviously, more worthy of my college girl brain cells.

We were together about a year when I ran into Mr. Gas Station.

Fortunately, I was with my super-hot-husband-to-be, Mr. Liquor Store.

Unfortunately, I was working out.

Fortunately, I was still young and didn’t look nearly like the sweaty basket case that I now do when I exercise.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t show my man off, or bend over and stick my toned butt in his face, or even say “hi.”  I was so angry, still, from being the dumpee instead of the dumper that I had to leave the gym before I threw a free-weight at his big forehead.

My heart rate was elevated.  I was shaking and ready to do battle.  My future husband came out to ask if I was okay.  I told him that Mr. Gas Station was in there, and pointed him out through the glass door.

“Wow, he’s a lot shorter than I would have imagined.”

That might be why I married my husband.  Well, and the fact that he never once has mocked my overalls.  Or my pajamas.  He does sometimes mock my unbrushed hair, but we’re working on that.  No marriage is perfect.