Things have gotten better. Considerably better. I haven't had any more days where I've just wanted to stay in bed listening to The Band, armed only with a carton of ice cream and a bucket of vodka. My real life has started. School is in session. I have people to talk to. I have work to do. I have things that tell me this will all start to feel normal very, very shortly.
There are moments when I catch myself thinking that all of this--the move, the new job, the whole idea of getting what I want--seems strange but wonderful. There were times over the past year where I thought this life was impossible, that I was doomed to live in my bedroom in my father's house for the rest of my life. There were times I was terrified that I wouldn't be able to heave myself out of the adjunct world, that my friends would all go on to bigger and better things without me, that I would be left behind as the one who didn't do so well for herself.
But it's okay now. And even though I might have held on to a secret terror that I might be living in my father's house for a few more years, I know now (just as I knew then, but was in too cranky a state most of the time to admit out loud) that the last year was very important for me. Not only did it knock me down a couple of pegs from my grad school high, but it also grounded me, reminded me what was important, put me back in my family circle.
Last year was like a free pass. I had no rent, very few bills, and the ability to run around with my oldest friends, with my family. It was time for me to take stock, to remember what is most important in life. It was like a spa visit: I rested, I rejuvenated, I filled myself with all the best that Buffalo has to offer.
I think I was given last year just so I will never forget where I come from and how important the place and people were (and are) to making me who I am.
My year at home gave me a new kind of steadiness. When I came back to New York in August of '06, nothing about my insides was solid. I was a wobbling mess of emotions. I didn't know where I was going, how I was going to get there, and what I was going to do without all the people I left behind in the Midwest. But I learned. I had time to come down, to take several deep breaths, to realize it's all going to be okay.
I understand now. I understand why that year was important, and I am here to admit once and for all that, even though I complained and whined and moaned, living in my old room for a year wasn't that bad. At times it was even fun. Being in the house in the middle of the country, where the crickets and frogs sang their songs at midnight, was the best little vacation I could've asked for. There isn't any other place that smells as green and lush and beautiful as my home, and I often caught myself standing out on the porch as the sun set and breathing deep, deep, deeper than I ever had before.
But it's time for my new life now, and I'm ready. I'm in the place I've been dreaming about for years. And because I'm in a new place, and because I've got a new home, I've made a new blog so this one can stand on its own, so I can page through it remember the year that set my head on straight, that got me ready for everything that's coming next.
From now on, you can find me here, at Vacationland.
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Friday, September 07, 2007
Friday, August 17, 2007
Foul Boy, Bad Liar
Last night was another going away party for me, this one hosted by my mother. She had pizza and spinach bread and a bucket of fifty wings. She had my aunt and uncle and grandfather and his girlfriend and some cousins and my friends and the BFW and, and, and, of course, my brother.
Adam left the party early. He had an agenda. He had a party. He had to get there fast.
Still, as my party was breaking up, my brother strolled back in the door. We were all standing in a group near the door, so when he walked in we asked him what he was doing home when there he could be drinking, snacking, and making out with vaguely skanky underage girls.
"Well," he said, brushing past us, "I forgot something."
"What did you forget?" I asked. It would have to be something really important to make him leave a party where there was free beer.
My mother's boyfriend mumbled something under his breath. "Condoms," he coughed out. "Condoms!"
That started a chain reaction of exclamations: Eeew! Gross! Foul! Blecch! that only stopped when my brother reappeared in the room.
"So," we asked again, "what DID you forget?"
My brother raised his left hand. In it was clutched the belt clip for his phone. "My cell phone holster," he said. He kind of just stood there. We stared at him. "Well," he said, "I guess I should go."
When the door swung shut, the guys started laughing. "Cell phone holster," they said. "Yeah, sure. Right, kid."
I had to admit--the boy hadn't planned that excuse very well. He hadn't given the lie enough thought, enough time to breathe and seem realistic. To come home from a party with thumping music and hoochies and bottles of cheap tequila just waiting to be guzzled--to come home from that for a cell phone holster seemed not only improbable but really, really stupid. But, of course, forgetting to take condoms to a situation like that was also really, really stupid. Not running to the corner gas station for a three-pack and instead opting to come home where you knew your annoying relatives would be clustered nearby, just ready to grill you about your suspicious arrival home was also really, really stupid. But that's my brother.
We walked people out to their cars then, and that's when we found out my brother hadn't yet left. His car was up a ways, obscured by a pine tree, but we could hear him talking. We thought he was on the phone. We thought maybe he was orchestrating some general sluttiness, a hookup with a girl, the getting-it-on with some little blond whippet.
We ignored Adam and said our goodbyes. Some of the family started packing up the trucks and Becky went off to her car, which was parked up somewhere near Adam's, and we thought that was it for the night.
Oh, but it wasn't. When I got back inside, I realized my phone was ringing. It was Becky.
I answered. "What's up?" I asked.
"Just so you know," she said, "your brother isn't alone in that car. He's got a girl in there."
"Oh my God," I said. "I may vomit."
Of course I got off the phone right then and there and told the rest of my family that not only had he sneaked back home to get his condoms so he would be prepared for whatever the night would bring, but he also brought the girl along with him. If I were that girl, I'd be wondering why he was driving all the way home to get his condoms and why he wasn't just popping into the closest Kwik Fill, why he was dragging me along and telling me please, for the love of God, just stay in the car so I wouldn't run into any of the people who were at the house at that moment. If I were that girl, I probably would've handed him a ten dollar bill and told him to go to the Rite Aid and stop being a big lame cheapo.
Adam left the party early. He had an agenda. He had a party. He had to get there fast.
Still, as my party was breaking up, my brother strolled back in the door. We were all standing in a group near the door, so when he walked in we asked him what he was doing home when there he could be drinking, snacking, and making out with vaguely skanky underage girls.
"Well," he said, brushing past us, "I forgot something."
"What did you forget?" I asked. It would have to be something really important to make him leave a party where there was free beer.
My mother's boyfriend mumbled something under his breath. "Condoms," he coughed out. "Condoms!"
That started a chain reaction of exclamations: Eeew! Gross! Foul! Blecch! that only stopped when my brother reappeared in the room.
"So," we asked again, "what DID you forget?"
My brother raised his left hand. In it was clutched the belt clip for his phone. "My cell phone holster," he said. He kind of just stood there. We stared at him. "Well," he said, "I guess I should go."
When the door swung shut, the guys started laughing. "Cell phone holster," they said. "Yeah, sure. Right, kid."
I had to admit--the boy hadn't planned that excuse very well. He hadn't given the lie enough thought, enough time to breathe and seem realistic. To come home from a party with thumping music and hoochies and bottles of cheap tequila just waiting to be guzzled--to come home from that for a cell phone holster seemed not only improbable but really, really stupid. But, of course, forgetting to take condoms to a situation like that was also really, really stupid. Not running to the corner gas station for a three-pack and instead opting to come home where you knew your annoying relatives would be clustered nearby, just ready to grill you about your suspicious arrival home was also really, really stupid. But that's my brother.
We walked people out to their cars then, and that's when we found out my brother hadn't yet left. His car was up a ways, obscured by a pine tree, but we could hear him talking. We thought he was on the phone. We thought maybe he was orchestrating some general sluttiness, a hookup with a girl, the getting-it-on with some little blond whippet.
We ignored Adam and said our goodbyes. Some of the family started packing up the trucks and Becky went off to her car, which was parked up somewhere near Adam's, and we thought that was it for the night.
Oh, but it wasn't. When I got back inside, I realized my phone was ringing. It was Becky.
I answered. "What's up?" I asked.
"Just so you know," she said, "your brother isn't alone in that car. He's got a girl in there."
"Oh my God," I said. "I may vomit."
Of course I got off the phone right then and there and told the rest of my family that not only had he sneaked back home to get his condoms so he would be prepared for whatever the night would bring, but he also brought the girl along with him. If I were that girl, I'd be wondering why he was driving all the way home to get his condoms and why he wasn't just popping into the closest Kwik Fill, why he was dragging me along and telling me please, for the love of God, just stay in the car so I wouldn't run into any of the people who were at the house at that moment. If I were that girl, I probably would've handed him a ten dollar bill and told him to go to the Rite Aid and stop being a big lame cheapo.
Thursday, August 16, 2007
The Words "Grandma" and "Twat" Should Never Go Together
Last night my father had a going-away party for me. There was pot roast and corn, several bottles of wine from my favorite winery. My father's fiancee came over, and so did her extremely hot son and his very skinny, very tan, very perky girlfriend. My grandmother came, and her husband--the farmer she married after my grandfather died--came late because he'd been delivering bales of hay all day.
We ate, we passed out dessert and coffee, we chatted. Then my grandmother announced she wanted a copy of my book about Russia. I went to dig one up in my room, which, because of my scattered way of packing, looks like a tornado or some other weather disaster whipped through it. I found a copy, but when I brought it out, my father was showing off his copy and--to my dismay--a literary magazine that one of my stories recently appeared in. The story in this particular literary magazine is one of the Wily Republican stories. It's the one that features the cardboard cut-out of the George W. Bush that lived in the Wily's room. It's the one that required me to use one of my least favorite words--twat (eew)--in a list two of the characters were making. There's two sex scenes in the story, there's all sorts of swearing, there's all sorts of stuff that a grandmother does not need to read.
Not too long ago I wrote a post in which I appeared all brave and ready for my family members to read my work. My logic was if I could survive my mother's reading of my thesis--including a story which was loosely based on our relationship post-my parents' divorce--then I could survive anything. Back when I wrote that post I was working on a story that was inspired by Christmas parties at my grandmother's house, and I said I wouldn't even mind if she read it. I was ready. Bring it on! I thought. I was sure I could handle it.
I was wrong, wrong, wrong.
I am a pussy.
If I cringed when my father forked over a story that used the word twat and had sex scenes that featured the ever-popular hoist method, I'm pretty sure that means I won't be ready for grandma to read a story that features a grandmother and three close-in-age granddaughters who might resemble my own grandmother and her three close-in-age granddaughters.
I don't know what happened to me in that moment when my father slid the magazine toward my grandmother. I lost it. I froze. My entire insides turned cold. In my head, I saw the word TWAT!!! in giant letters on the page. I couldn't get over the fact that my grandmother was sitting across from me and undergoing a revelation that I am a foul, sicko pervert who cusses like a sailor. Then I remembered the rest of the story: the sex, the expletives, the blatant mocking of a political party that my grandmother and her husband no doubt associate with.
I glared at my father. I tried to send him a Look. I tried to say, Rip that from her hands! I tried to say, Are you crazy? I tried to say, Do you want to be written out of the will because the fruit of your loins writes pornography?
He finally got the hint. "I think," he said, "Jess might be nervous about what you're reading."
Yeah, that helped.
I stood up. "I'm going to go into my room for a second and try not to throw up," I said.
My father followed me into my bedroom. "What?" he said. "Come on. Who are you kidding? Your grandmother loves this."
I wanted to tell him no, my grandmother wouldn't love that. I'd put money on the fact that she'd love me to write little stories that could someday be made into Hallmark Channel movies. I'd bet a lot of my savings that she wouldn't be psyched that her granddaughter was writing lines about it feeling pretty good to be slammed up against a wall during sex. I was pretty sure my father wouldn't like it either, but he hasn't really finished anything I've written. He tries hard, sure, but he is easily distracted and often has to put the book down before he's made it to the real offensive stuff. He's been trying to read the Wily-based story since last August when I came home.
"Dad!" I said. "I use the word twat in that story! TWAT! And there's sex in it!"
"Your grandmother is a woman," he said, as if that made it somehow okay.
"She's seventy-eight!" I said. In my experience, seventy-eight year olds are fans of the Chicken Soup books or Anne Geddes, not the f-bomb and out-of-wedlock lovemaking.
Eventually I went back out to the kitchen, and my grandmother was still there, busily reading my story. She was even laughing. I wasn't exactly sure what she might be laughing at, so I wracked my brain to think if there were non-disgusting funny parts in that story. But I didn't have to think about it long because my grandmother explained what she was laughing at.
"This is funny," she said. She giggled. "She puts her bra on the cardboard cut-out of the president. Ha!"
"Oh," I said, "yeah. The main character certainly does do that, doesn't she?"
Well, really, the main character puts her underthings on the cardboard George W. whenever she is having sex with her boyfriend--she doesn't like the way George's eyes follow her if left uncovered.
And my grandmother read that. It made me want to poke my eyes out with a stick. Of course, she thought it was funny, and funny enough to mention out loud, and funny enough to make her giggle as she was sitting next to her almost-deaf, hay-baling husband who would punctuate the silence every few minutes by talking about corn, manure, or the air conditioning unit in his tractor.
So maybe it wasn't quite the disaster it could have been, and maybe I was being overly sensitive while I worried over my grandmother's reading of that story, but I think I've learned a very important lesson: I'm not exactly ready for some stories to make the family rounds. A nonfiction book about Russia is one thing. I'll gladly autograph it, and I'll gladly discuss reading and sifting through the research so I could write that book, but I don't think I'm quite ready to sit in front of my family members as they leaf through my collection of stories and come across dirty words and dirty scenes. I'll get on a stage and read those things out loud to strangers--hey, that's no problem--but I don't want to sit in a very small kitchen and watch my grandmother's eyes scan the page, drinking it all in. There wasn't enough wine in the room to prepare me for that. Not even close.
We ate, we passed out dessert and coffee, we chatted. Then my grandmother announced she wanted a copy of my book about Russia. I went to dig one up in my room, which, because of my scattered way of packing, looks like a tornado or some other weather disaster whipped through it. I found a copy, but when I brought it out, my father was showing off his copy and--to my dismay--a literary magazine that one of my stories recently appeared in. The story in this particular literary magazine is one of the Wily Republican stories. It's the one that features the cardboard cut-out of the George W. Bush that lived in the Wily's room. It's the one that required me to use one of my least favorite words--twat (eew)--in a list two of the characters were making. There's two sex scenes in the story, there's all sorts of swearing, there's all sorts of stuff that a grandmother does not need to read.
Not too long ago I wrote a post in which I appeared all brave and ready for my family members to read my work. My logic was if I could survive my mother's reading of my thesis--including a story which was loosely based on our relationship post-my parents' divorce--then I could survive anything. Back when I wrote that post I was working on a story that was inspired by Christmas parties at my grandmother's house, and I said I wouldn't even mind if she read it. I was ready. Bring it on! I thought. I was sure I could handle it.
I was wrong, wrong, wrong.
I am a pussy.
If I cringed when my father forked over a story that used the word twat and had sex scenes that featured the ever-popular hoist method, I'm pretty sure that means I won't be ready for grandma to read a story that features a grandmother and three close-in-age granddaughters who might resemble my own grandmother and her three close-in-age granddaughters.
I don't know what happened to me in that moment when my father slid the magazine toward my grandmother. I lost it. I froze. My entire insides turned cold. In my head, I saw the word TWAT!!! in giant letters on the page. I couldn't get over the fact that my grandmother was sitting across from me and undergoing a revelation that I am a foul, sicko pervert who cusses like a sailor. Then I remembered the rest of the story: the sex, the expletives, the blatant mocking of a political party that my grandmother and her husband no doubt associate with.
I glared at my father. I tried to send him a Look. I tried to say, Rip that from her hands! I tried to say, Are you crazy? I tried to say, Do you want to be written out of the will because the fruit of your loins writes pornography?
He finally got the hint. "I think," he said, "Jess might be nervous about what you're reading."
Yeah, that helped.
I stood up. "I'm going to go into my room for a second and try not to throw up," I said.
My father followed me into my bedroom. "What?" he said. "Come on. Who are you kidding? Your grandmother loves this."
I wanted to tell him no, my grandmother wouldn't love that. I'd put money on the fact that she'd love me to write little stories that could someday be made into Hallmark Channel movies. I'd bet a lot of my savings that she wouldn't be psyched that her granddaughter was writing lines about it feeling pretty good to be slammed up against a wall during sex. I was pretty sure my father wouldn't like it either, but he hasn't really finished anything I've written. He tries hard, sure, but he is easily distracted and often has to put the book down before he's made it to the real offensive stuff. He's been trying to read the Wily-based story since last August when I came home.
"Dad!" I said. "I use the word twat in that story! TWAT! And there's sex in it!"
"Your grandmother is a woman," he said, as if that made it somehow okay.
"She's seventy-eight!" I said. In my experience, seventy-eight year olds are fans of the Chicken Soup books or Anne Geddes, not the f-bomb and out-of-wedlock lovemaking.
Eventually I went back out to the kitchen, and my grandmother was still there, busily reading my story. She was even laughing. I wasn't exactly sure what she might be laughing at, so I wracked my brain to think if there were non-disgusting funny parts in that story. But I didn't have to think about it long because my grandmother explained what she was laughing at.
"This is funny," she said. She giggled. "She puts her bra on the cardboard cut-out of the president. Ha!"
"Oh," I said, "yeah. The main character certainly does do that, doesn't she?"
Well, really, the main character puts her underthings on the cardboard George W. whenever she is having sex with her boyfriend--she doesn't like the way George's eyes follow her if left uncovered.
And my grandmother read that. It made me want to poke my eyes out with a stick. Of course, she thought it was funny, and funny enough to mention out loud, and funny enough to make her giggle as she was sitting next to her almost-deaf, hay-baling husband who would punctuate the silence every few minutes by talking about corn, manure, or the air conditioning unit in his tractor.
So maybe it wasn't quite the disaster it could have been, and maybe I was being overly sensitive while I worried over my grandmother's reading of that story, but I think I've learned a very important lesson: I'm not exactly ready for some stories to make the family rounds. A nonfiction book about Russia is one thing. I'll gladly autograph it, and I'll gladly discuss reading and sifting through the research so I could write that book, but I don't think I'm quite ready to sit in front of my family members as they leaf through my collection of stories and come across dirty words and dirty scenes. I'll get on a stage and read those things out loud to strangers--hey, that's no problem--but I don't want to sit in a very small kitchen and watch my grandmother's eyes scan the page, drinking it all in. There wasn't enough wine in the room to prepare me for that. Not even close.
Sunday, June 03, 2007
Evidence of Our Cuteness
After his stroke, my grandfather had an extended stay at a rehab facility whose temperature was consistently set to BOILING. He wasn't its biggest fan, especially considering he couldn't sleep for the heat, hated the hours of rehab (pinning clothespins to a clothesline, setting a table, matching cut-out shapes to their corresponding openings in a box), or his roommate, who had, what my grandfather assumed from the smell, gangrene.
When Adam and I went to visit him shortly before he was sprung from the facility, we found him in the common room, dozing in front of a television that was blaring soaps. "This is no way to live," he told us. "No way at all."
Right after my grandfather entered rehab, I was put in charge of looking after his cat. Each time I opened the door to walk into the house, that cat jingled down the hallway, but as soon as she saw it was me she skidded to a stop and--I swear--looked disappointed. My grandfather might have a cruel streak, and many of my memories of him interacting with my grandmother might include him screaming at her, but he sure is good and nice and sweet to that cat.
He got the cat after my grandmother died almost four years ago. He needed something to fill the space, the quiet. And he became obsessed with the cat. He let it have the run of the house. Simultaneously, he let the house go to shit. It is entirely possible my grandfather hasn't cleaned since my grandmother's death, and I figured that out the first day I went over to take care of the cat.
I hadn't been to the house in a long time. I'd avoided like the plague, actually. Being in there made me sad and quiet and a little sick to my stomach. After my grandmother's funeral, my grandfather took to talking to the urn of my grandmother's ashes. I sure you miss you, old girl, he would say, nodding in the direction of the curio cabinet where grandma was now stored.
I hated when he did that. I hated it so much. I wanted to tell him it must be nice to get all sappy and sentimental now, now that grandma was dead and no longer around to clean the bathroom and make him sandwiches. I wanted to tell him he should have been nicer to her when she was alive, that he should have spent less time telling her she was being ridiculous and stupid. And then, when he built an enclosed mudroom at the front of the house--something my grandmother had wanted for years, something my grandfather grumbled about and put off--and told everyone he did it for grandma, that was the last straw. I wanted to hit the old man. I wanted to ask him what good it did now. I wanted to ask him why he couldn't given her one little thing she'd wanted for years when she was actually around to use it.
It made me sick to think about it. It made me sick to be there. So I generally avoided visiting the house until I had to, which happened when I needed to take care of the cat. When I walked in that first day, I waded through years' worth of filth: a scattering of old pill bottles thrown casually on the floor, paperwork that had been read and abandoned in the middle of the carpet, piles of age-old cat puke, stacks of magazines my grandfather had clearly gotten scammed into buying: Latino!, Cat Fancy, US Weekly, Star, OK!, Wired, Blender.
It was clear that there was going to have to be some intensive intervention before he was able to come home and live on his own again. There was going to be a day where we all went over and cleaned out the house and garage. Thankfully, my uncle's wife did most of the house cleaning--she turned a miracle, actually--and my uncle and mother plodded through the garage, which was still full of a lot of my grandmother's things. After her death, my mother had gone over and sorted through closets and the attic, but she has yet to make a serious dent in grandma's things. It's overwhelming what a pack-rat that woman was, really. During the cleaning session, we found giant boxes stuffed with old pantyhose, damaged Tupperware, and headless figurines. Not to mention moldy books, recipes, and pictures.
Those pictures, though, were really something else. My grandmother kept large envelopes for each of her children and grandchildren, and she sorted each season's pictures into the envelopes accordingly. My grandfather had shoved those pictures onto a low shelf, one that was attacked and flooded for years. But we were able to pull out some really precious photos--hundreds and hundreds that are worth saving, that make me excited because I'm about to make the world's cutest collage of pictures that will hang in my room. Here are some that are likely to be featured:
Here is my mother. Tell me she is not the fattest, cutest baby girl you have ever seen in your life. Grandma should've entered her in contests because she would've won, no problem. Not convinced?
How about now? I'm not sure whose back that is--it doesn't look like my grandfather; it could be one of my grandmother's brothers--but it's possibly the best photo in the history of photos.
My grandmother loved to cut my mother's bangs really, really short, so in any picture you see of her before she was a teenager, my mother is showing an awful lot of forehead.
Here's where I admit something strange. My brother was a much cuter baby than I was. For one thing, he was chubbier, and chubby babies equal cute babies. Second, he looked sort of angelic. Which didn't last long.
Doesn't he look serious and earnest? Doesn't he look like a future pilot, and not someone who will fail out of college so badly in his first semester that he won't even be afforded a second chance on academic probation?
I blame this photograph of me on my grandfather. Who else would've made me pose with a bottle of Jack? It should also be noted that this was during what I refer to as my Vaguely Chinese Period. Between birth and the age of four, I went through a phase where there's something a bit different about my face and eyes, where I look very much like I don't belong to my mother and father.
I was groomed from an early age to be a domestic goddess. Thank you, Fisher Price.
Here I am being photographed with my favorite toy, a pink and white Fisher Price bunny (are we sensing a trend? Can you tell my father worked for FP for twenty years?). I called him Merlin, and he never left my side.
My mother was sort of a badass maker of Halloween costumes. I won an award at the town Halloween party this year because I was the best Indian princess they had ever seen. And how cute is my brother? My goodness, this collage is going to be brilliant.
When Adam and I went to visit him shortly before he was sprung from the facility, we found him in the common room, dozing in front of a television that was blaring soaps. "This is no way to live," he told us. "No way at all."
Right after my grandfather entered rehab, I was put in charge of looking after his cat. Each time I opened the door to walk into the house, that cat jingled down the hallway, but as soon as she saw it was me she skidded to a stop and--I swear--looked disappointed. My grandfather might have a cruel streak, and many of my memories of him interacting with my grandmother might include him screaming at her, but he sure is good and nice and sweet to that cat.
He got the cat after my grandmother died almost four years ago. He needed something to fill the space, the quiet. And he became obsessed with the cat. He let it have the run of the house. Simultaneously, he let the house go to shit. It is entirely possible my grandfather hasn't cleaned since my grandmother's death, and I figured that out the first day I went over to take care of the cat.
I hadn't been to the house in a long time. I'd avoided like the plague, actually. Being in there made me sad and quiet and a little sick to my stomach. After my grandmother's funeral, my grandfather took to talking to the urn of my grandmother's ashes. I sure you miss you, old girl, he would say, nodding in the direction of the curio cabinet where grandma was now stored.
I hated when he did that. I hated it so much. I wanted to tell him it must be nice to get all sappy and sentimental now, now that grandma was dead and no longer around to clean the bathroom and make him sandwiches. I wanted to tell him he should have been nicer to her when she was alive, that he should have spent less time telling her she was being ridiculous and stupid. And then, when he built an enclosed mudroom at the front of the house--something my grandmother had wanted for years, something my grandfather grumbled about and put off--and told everyone he did it for grandma, that was the last straw. I wanted to hit the old man. I wanted to ask him what good it did now. I wanted to ask him why he couldn't given her one little thing she'd wanted for years when she was actually around to use it.
It made me sick to think about it. It made me sick to be there. So I generally avoided visiting the house until I had to, which happened when I needed to take care of the cat. When I walked in that first day, I waded through years' worth of filth: a scattering of old pill bottles thrown casually on the floor, paperwork that had been read and abandoned in the middle of the carpet, piles of age-old cat puke, stacks of magazines my grandfather had clearly gotten scammed into buying: Latino!, Cat Fancy, US Weekly, Star, OK!, Wired, Blender.
It was clear that there was going to have to be some intensive intervention before he was able to come home and live on his own again. There was going to be a day where we all went over and cleaned out the house and garage. Thankfully, my uncle's wife did most of the house cleaning--she turned a miracle, actually--and my uncle and mother plodded through the garage, which was still full of a lot of my grandmother's things. After her death, my mother had gone over and sorted through closets and the attic, but she has yet to make a serious dent in grandma's things. It's overwhelming what a pack-rat that woman was, really. During the cleaning session, we found giant boxes stuffed with old pantyhose, damaged Tupperware, and headless figurines. Not to mention moldy books, recipes, and pictures.
Those pictures, though, were really something else. My grandmother kept large envelopes for each of her children and grandchildren, and she sorted each season's pictures into the envelopes accordingly. My grandfather had shoved those pictures onto a low shelf, one that was attacked and flooded for years. But we were able to pull out some really precious photos--hundreds and hundreds that are worth saving, that make me excited because I'm about to make the world's cutest collage of pictures that will hang in my room. Here are some that are likely to be featured:
Here is my mother. Tell me she is not the fattest, cutest baby girl you have ever seen in your life. Grandma should've entered her in contests because she would've won, no problem. Not convinced?
How about now? I'm not sure whose back that is--it doesn't look like my grandfather; it could be one of my grandmother's brothers--but it's possibly the best photo in the history of photos.
My grandmother loved to cut my mother's bangs really, really short, so in any picture you see of her before she was a teenager, my mother is showing an awful lot of forehead.
Here's where I admit something strange. My brother was a much cuter baby than I was. For one thing, he was chubbier, and chubby babies equal cute babies. Second, he looked sort of angelic. Which didn't last long.
Doesn't he look serious and earnest? Doesn't he look like a future pilot, and not someone who will fail out of college so badly in his first semester that he won't even be afforded a second chance on academic probation?
I blame this photograph of me on my grandfather. Who else would've made me pose with a bottle of Jack? It should also be noted that this was during what I refer to as my Vaguely Chinese Period. Between birth and the age of four, I went through a phase where there's something a bit different about my face and eyes, where I look very much like I don't belong to my mother and father.
I was groomed from an early age to be a domestic goddess. Thank you, Fisher Price.
Here I am being photographed with my favorite toy, a pink and white Fisher Price bunny (are we sensing a trend? Can you tell my father worked for FP for twenty years?). I called him Merlin, and he never left my side.
My mother was sort of a badass maker of Halloween costumes. I won an award at the town Halloween party this year because I was the best Indian princess they had ever seen. And how cute is my brother? My goodness, this collage is going to be brilliant.
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
One of the Ugliest Things I Can Tell You
I'll tell you this about yesterday: I was awake only six hours.
I'll tell you this about Monday: I spent ten hours in the hospital.
It wasn't for me. I wasn't the one wearing the flower-patterned gown. I wasn't the one gagging into a metal pan. I wasn't the one airlifted from one hospital to the next. I wasn't the one who had a stroke, the one who had blood pooling in the back of my skull, the one whose eyes clouded over, smogged, grew filmy.
That was my grandfather.
My mother called around 8PM Monday night, told me my grandfather had been taken to the hospital, that they thought he had a stroke. I told her I'd be right there. I hung up the phone, changed my clothes, shrugged into a sweatshirt, put on some shoes, walked out to my car. I waited and waited and waited. I thought it might take a few minutes, that I might feel one way or another about the news. After all, my grandfather was in the hospital. That kind of news would make a normal person feel something, react in some way. What I reacted to was my mother. I didn't think, Oh my God, my grandfather! I thought, I should go be with Mom.
I drove the empty back roads of the country town where I grew up. My highbeams bounced off the creek bed, the pine trees, the wet pavement. I kept waiting. Nothing was coming. No sadness, no fear, no regret, no nothing. I was just a girl driving a car on a dark street.
The only thing I could really think about was what I'd heard on the radio during my drive home from work. One of the local stations had a woman on--a woman who was attending the funerals of the Virginia Tech students who died last week. She wasn't a relative, a friend, or a sympathizer. She was a member of a group who was preaching what they believed to be the truth behind the Virginia Tech shootings: that those students deserved to die. She said they were wicked and evil. She said they were shot for a reason, that God had found them to be lacking and undeserving and so he devised a way to eliminate them.
The DJs yelled and fussed. They called her crazy. They called her a heartless bitch. She told them they were going straight to Hell. Then she said most of America was, too. Most of the people listening to the radio right now, listening to their silly little show and their silly little antics, all those people were on an express train to Hell. You're evil! she shouted. All of you! Just evil!
I flicked the radio off then, but I couldn't keep myself from thinking about that lady and her thoughts about those students who died, her thoughts about all of us. I wanted to find her and hold her down, tell her that's not how the world or God works, but the more I thought about it the more I thought, What if she's right? What if we are all evil?
Several hours later, I wasn't feeling all that good about myself. I was pulling into the cratered driveway of the hospital and wondering if deep, deep down I wasn't a very good person. I was wondering if I had an evil bent to me, if something inside had gone wrong, had twisted until it was skewed and defective and not good. I figured maybe this thing with my grandfather was punishment for past wrongs I'd committed against him and my family.
For a long time my grandfather and I didn't speak. We didn't speak because of what happened on Christmas Eve in 2002. My family was gathered around the table my grandmother had prepared. My uncle was there, my mother was there. My brother and my boyfriend were also there. So was a strange pale Midwesterner--someone my uncle met at his job, a boy who hailed from Minnesota, a boy who hadn't met any of us before. His family was 1,000 miles away, and my uncle didn't want him to be alone for the holiday, so he asked him to join us.
Shortly after we sat down to dinner, my grandfather started in on his normal holiday routine: he talked about how much he hated black people. In the span of two minutes, he'd used the n-word five times. On Christmas.
This wasn't new. Not at all. My usual policy during these holiday rants was to make long ruts in my mashed potatoes, to busy myself by directing rivers of gravy through these ruts, to try to keep myself from hating my grandfather. But this time I was sitting next to my boyfriend, and I was burning with shame because my my grandfather was saying these things--awful, awful things--in front of him and a complete stranger. It was one thing for him to try to weigh us down with his politics, but to do it in front of strangers was too much. And I was sick of him.
My grandmother said his name once, a reprimand--George!--but that only made him angrier. He continued. He said worse things. My boyfriend had stopped eating his turkey. He had a hand on my knee.
And I knew this was him trying to tell me it was okay, that I shouldn't make a fuss, that I should just keep on eating my potatoes. But I was filled with a sudden rage. Just who did my grandfather think he was? I didn't want to have to sit and listen to him one more second.
So I made my voice steady and calm. I said, "Grandpa? It's Christmas. Please."
The whole table stopped moving. There was silence. Nobody breathed.
My grandfather looked at me as if he'd never seen me before. He stared at me for maybe four seconds, but it felt like eternity. Then he told me he didn't give a damn if it was Christmas. This was his house, I was eating his food, and he was going to say whatever he pleased.
I looked back down at my plate, at my mountain of potatoes, and started eating again. Around the table, breaths expelled. I swallowed gravy and the urge to cry.
An hour later we were gathered in the living room for gift opening. My grandmother's tree burned brightly in the corner. Flutes of champagne glittered in the blush of the multicolored lights. I'd steadily made my way through a pile of gifts I'd gotten: waffle maker, crock pot, DVD player.
I felt a little better, but I should've known it wouldn't last for long. The gift opening continued. Each person had a turn, and we kept circling the living room that way. When the next turn fell on my uncle, he bent to select a gift from his pile. His pants rode up with the bend. His ankles were suddenly visible, and they were outfitted with a bright holiday sock--a sock that was most likely worn to please my grandmother, who hoarded and handed out holiday-themed socks with unparalleled glee.
My grandfather, upon seeing those socks, gasped. "Did you steal those socks off a dead nigger?" he asked. As he said that last word he turned to look directly at me. See? his look said. See? I can say whatever I want, and I don't care what you think about it.
I said nothing. His look was already too smug, and I didn't want to give him more occasion to look that way. I turned to say something to my boyfriend. I leaned up against his knee. I rested there and tried to ignore my grandfather.
This didn't work. The gift opening had passed to my uncle's wife, and she was ripping paper to reveal a set of ivory combs my uncle had gotten for her.
My grandfather raised his voice and stared right at me. "You know what kind of hair that comb wouldn't work with?" he asked. "Nigger hair."
What happened next was ugly. I don't know what happened inside my brain--I don't know what fired or burst into action--but I do know what I felt was something snap. Something unraveled and I lost all control. I was on my feet. "I can't believe you!" I was yelling. "How could you do this? And in front of strangers! My boyfriend! A guest in your home! I asked you nicely! Politely! I said please! It's Christmas!"
That's when my grandfather started thrashing in his armchair. Wrapping paper flew into the air. The chair rocked noisily on its hinges as he struggled to get the footrest down. I thought for a second maybe he was going to come after me. He thrust a finger at me. "You!" he howled. "You are nothing but a spoiled brat! A little know-it-all! Well, you don't know anything! You don't know shit from shit! I am seventy years old, and no little bitch is going to come into my house and tell me what I can and cannot say! Not you, not anyone! I could care less who is visiting! Do you hear me?"
I heard him. I heard him loud and clear, which is surprising because I was crying by that point. It was a hard crying--loud and jagged. He kept yelling, kept saying what an awful girl I was, so spoiled and so inconsiderate, so stupid. But I couldn't hear it all anymore. I was out of the room, running down the hall, running into a bedroom and throwing myself on a pile of coats. I cried in that nest of down and zippers for a few minutes until my boyfriend came after me, told me to put on my coat. He said he wasn't going to sit in a house where people treated people like this. He said, "Come on, we'll go home."
And I was putting on my coat and asking him why my grandfather would do something like that, say those things, treat me that way. I was ready to walk out. But my grandmother appeared in the doorway. My mother, too. They made me sit down. My grandmother told me I had to go back out there and apologize. She said, "He'll never change, Jess. He'll never change, and you have to accept that."
But even back then I knew there was a difference between asking someone to change and asking someone to respect you. If he wanted to go on thinking that way and saying awful things, he could go right ahead and do so. But to deliberately make everyone around him uncomfortable because he thought that was power--and that's what he loved more than anything--that wasn't right. And I wouldn't apologize for asking him to stop. I would never apologize for that.
But my grandmother pleaded. She said I had to, I just had to apologize. I had to be the one to make it right. She wrote me regular letters up until her death, letters that kept begging for an apology from me. He's family, she argued. I wondered what I was. What made me less worthy of receiving an apology?
I didn't apologize. I didn't the night it happened, and I haven't since. My grandfather and I didn't speak until after my grandmother died, and those first few conversations were fueled by guilt. Every conversation after that was fueled by another type of guilt--this one not by death but by my mother. I don't want her to have to deal with it anymore.
And so that is what I was thinking about when I sat in the room with my grandfather, who had started losing his eyesight at noon but hadn't thought to call anyone about it. By the time his girlfriend called for an afternoon chat, he was several hours into a stroke and the doctors couldn't do anything but wait and wait and wait.
I was thinking what a shitty person I was. Here was a man--my own grandfather--who was almost in tears because he couldn't see anything or anyone, and he was saying, "What am I going to do? Oh Jesus Christ, what a thing to have happen. What a thing. How will I live?" And I didn't feel much of anything. I did what everyone did--I put on the good front. I did schtick with my family to take his mind off of it, I told stories, I nodded and said yes, yes, yes when people would say, "It could be worse. It could be worse." I drove to the next hospital after they airlifted him to Buffalo. I stayed late into the night. I went back and forth from his curtain in the emergency room to the waiting room, where my mother and uncle were sleeping. I stayed up with his girlfriend. I waited with him until he went for his MRI. Then I went back to the waiting room and tried to fall asleep, which I couldn't. I stayed at that hospital until 6:00 AM, and then I followed everyone into the parking lot so we could go eat some food, take a shower, get some sleep.
And I did sleep. I slept a lot. I went to bed at 7:30 AM and didn't wake up again until 4:00 PM. I spent the rest of the day wandering through the house like I wasn't quite sure where I was or what had happened or how to feel. I bumped through the next few hours before falling asleep again at 11:00. Sometimes, I guess, it's just easier to sleep than it is to think about things.
I'll tell you this about Monday: I spent ten hours in the hospital.
It wasn't for me. I wasn't the one wearing the flower-patterned gown. I wasn't the one gagging into a metal pan. I wasn't the one airlifted from one hospital to the next. I wasn't the one who had a stroke, the one who had blood pooling in the back of my skull, the one whose eyes clouded over, smogged, grew filmy.
That was my grandfather.
My mother called around 8PM Monday night, told me my grandfather had been taken to the hospital, that they thought he had a stroke. I told her I'd be right there. I hung up the phone, changed my clothes, shrugged into a sweatshirt, put on some shoes, walked out to my car. I waited and waited and waited. I thought it might take a few minutes, that I might feel one way or another about the news. After all, my grandfather was in the hospital. That kind of news would make a normal person feel something, react in some way. What I reacted to was my mother. I didn't think, Oh my God, my grandfather! I thought, I should go be with Mom.
I drove the empty back roads of the country town where I grew up. My highbeams bounced off the creek bed, the pine trees, the wet pavement. I kept waiting. Nothing was coming. No sadness, no fear, no regret, no nothing. I was just a girl driving a car on a dark street.
The only thing I could really think about was what I'd heard on the radio during my drive home from work. One of the local stations had a woman on--a woman who was attending the funerals of the Virginia Tech students who died last week. She wasn't a relative, a friend, or a sympathizer. She was a member of a group who was preaching what they believed to be the truth behind the Virginia Tech shootings: that those students deserved to die. She said they were wicked and evil. She said they were shot for a reason, that God had found them to be lacking and undeserving and so he devised a way to eliminate them.
The DJs yelled and fussed. They called her crazy. They called her a heartless bitch. She told them they were going straight to Hell. Then she said most of America was, too. Most of the people listening to the radio right now, listening to their silly little show and their silly little antics, all those people were on an express train to Hell. You're evil! she shouted. All of you! Just evil!
I flicked the radio off then, but I couldn't keep myself from thinking about that lady and her thoughts about those students who died, her thoughts about all of us. I wanted to find her and hold her down, tell her that's not how the world or God works, but the more I thought about it the more I thought, What if she's right? What if we are all evil?
Several hours later, I wasn't feeling all that good about myself. I was pulling into the cratered driveway of the hospital and wondering if deep, deep down I wasn't a very good person. I was wondering if I had an evil bent to me, if something inside had gone wrong, had twisted until it was skewed and defective and not good. I figured maybe this thing with my grandfather was punishment for past wrongs I'd committed against him and my family.
For a long time my grandfather and I didn't speak. We didn't speak because of what happened on Christmas Eve in 2002. My family was gathered around the table my grandmother had prepared. My uncle was there, my mother was there. My brother and my boyfriend were also there. So was a strange pale Midwesterner--someone my uncle met at his job, a boy who hailed from Minnesota, a boy who hadn't met any of us before. His family was 1,000 miles away, and my uncle didn't want him to be alone for the holiday, so he asked him to join us.
Shortly after we sat down to dinner, my grandfather started in on his normal holiday routine: he talked about how much he hated black people. In the span of two minutes, he'd used the n-word five times. On Christmas.
This wasn't new. Not at all. My usual policy during these holiday rants was to make long ruts in my mashed potatoes, to busy myself by directing rivers of gravy through these ruts, to try to keep myself from hating my grandfather. But this time I was sitting next to my boyfriend, and I was burning with shame because my my grandfather was saying these things--awful, awful things--in front of him and a complete stranger. It was one thing for him to try to weigh us down with his politics, but to do it in front of strangers was too much. And I was sick of him.
My grandmother said his name once, a reprimand--George!--but that only made him angrier. He continued. He said worse things. My boyfriend had stopped eating his turkey. He had a hand on my knee.
And I knew this was him trying to tell me it was okay, that I shouldn't make a fuss, that I should just keep on eating my potatoes. But I was filled with a sudden rage. Just who did my grandfather think he was? I didn't want to have to sit and listen to him one more second.
So I made my voice steady and calm. I said, "Grandpa? It's Christmas. Please."
The whole table stopped moving. There was silence. Nobody breathed.
My grandfather looked at me as if he'd never seen me before. He stared at me for maybe four seconds, but it felt like eternity. Then he told me he didn't give a damn if it was Christmas. This was his house, I was eating his food, and he was going to say whatever he pleased.
I looked back down at my plate, at my mountain of potatoes, and started eating again. Around the table, breaths expelled. I swallowed gravy and the urge to cry.
An hour later we were gathered in the living room for gift opening. My grandmother's tree burned brightly in the corner. Flutes of champagne glittered in the blush of the multicolored lights. I'd steadily made my way through a pile of gifts I'd gotten: waffle maker, crock pot, DVD player.
I felt a little better, but I should've known it wouldn't last for long. The gift opening continued. Each person had a turn, and we kept circling the living room that way. When the next turn fell on my uncle, he bent to select a gift from his pile. His pants rode up with the bend. His ankles were suddenly visible, and they were outfitted with a bright holiday sock--a sock that was most likely worn to please my grandmother, who hoarded and handed out holiday-themed socks with unparalleled glee.
My grandfather, upon seeing those socks, gasped. "Did you steal those socks off a dead nigger?" he asked. As he said that last word he turned to look directly at me. See? his look said. See? I can say whatever I want, and I don't care what you think about it.
I said nothing. His look was already too smug, and I didn't want to give him more occasion to look that way. I turned to say something to my boyfriend. I leaned up against his knee. I rested there and tried to ignore my grandfather.
This didn't work. The gift opening had passed to my uncle's wife, and she was ripping paper to reveal a set of ivory combs my uncle had gotten for her.
My grandfather raised his voice and stared right at me. "You know what kind of hair that comb wouldn't work with?" he asked. "Nigger hair."
What happened next was ugly. I don't know what happened inside my brain--I don't know what fired or burst into action--but I do know what I felt was something snap. Something unraveled and I lost all control. I was on my feet. "I can't believe you!" I was yelling. "How could you do this? And in front of strangers! My boyfriend! A guest in your home! I asked you nicely! Politely! I said please! It's Christmas!"
That's when my grandfather started thrashing in his armchair. Wrapping paper flew into the air. The chair rocked noisily on its hinges as he struggled to get the footrest down. I thought for a second maybe he was going to come after me. He thrust a finger at me. "You!" he howled. "You are nothing but a spoiled brat! A little know-it-all! Well, you don't know anything! You don't know shit from shit! I am seventy years old, and no little bitch is going to come into my house and tell me what I can and cannot say! Not you, not anyone! I could care less who is visiting! Do you hear me?"
I heard him. I heard him loud and clear, which is surprising because I was crying by that point. It was a hard crying--loud and jagged. He kept yelling, kept saying what an awful girl I was, so spoiled and so inconsiderate, so stupid. But I couldn't hear it all anymore. I was out of the room, running down the hall, running into a bedroom and throwing myself on a pile of coats. I cried in that nest of down and zippers for a few minutes until my boyfriend came after me, told me to put on my coat. He said he wasn't going to sit in a house where people treated people like this. He said, "Come on, we'll go home."
And I was putting on my coat and asking him why my grandfather would do something like that, say those things, treat me that way. I was ready to walk out. But my grandmother appeared in the doorway. My mother, too. They made me sit down. My grandmother told me I had to go back out there and apologize. She said, "He'll never change, Jess. He'll never change, and you have to accept that."
But even back then I knew there was a difference between asking someone to change and asking someone to respect you. If he wanted to go on thinking that way and saying awful things, he could go right ahead and do so. But to deliberately make everyone around him uncomfortable because he thought that was power--and that's what he loved more than anything--that wasn't right. And I wouldn't apologize for asking him to stop. I would never apologize for that.
But my grandmother pleaded. She said I had to, I just had to apologize. I had to be the one to make it right. She wrote me regular letters up until her death, letters that kept begging for an apology from me. He's family, she argued. I wondered what I was. What made me less worthy of receiving an apology?
I didn't apologize. I didn't the night it happened, and I haven't since. My grandfather and I didn't speak until after my grandmother died, and those first few conversations were fueled by guilt. Every conversation after that was fueled by another type of guilt--this one not by death but by my mother. I don't want her to have to deal with it anymore.
And so that is what I was thinking about when I sat in the room with my grandfather, who had started losing his eyesight at noon but hadn't thought to call anyone about it. By the time his girlfriend called for an afternoon chat, he was several hours into a stroke and the doctors couldn't do anything but wait and wait and wait.
I was thinking what a shitty person I was. Here was a man--my own grandfather--who was almost in tears because he couldn't see anything or anyone, and he was saying, "What am I going to do? Oh Jesus Christ, what a thing to have happen. What a thing. How will I live?" And I didn't feel much of anything. I did what everyone did--I put on the good front. I did schtick with my family to take his mind off of it, I told stories, I nodded and said yes, yes, yes when people would say, "It could be worse. It could be worse." I drove to the next hospital after they airlifted him to Buffalo. I stayed late into the night. I went back and forth from his curtain in the emergency room to the waiting room, where my mother and uncle were sleeping. I stayed up with his girlfriend. I waited with him until he went for his MRI. Then I went back to the waiting room and tried to fall asleep, which I couldn't. I stayed at that hospital until 6:00 AM, and then I followed everyone into the parking lot so we could go eat some food, take a shower, get some sleep.
And I did sleep. I slept a lot. I went to bed at 7:30 AM and didn't wake up again until 4:00 PM. I spent the rest of the day wandering through the house like I wasn't quite sure where I was or what had happened or how to feel. I bumped through the next few hours before falling asleep again at 11:00. Sometimes, I guess, it's just easier to sleep than it is to think about things.
Saturday, April 07, 2007
Heard Around the Easter Table
My Mother's Boyfriend's Possibly Gay Black-belt Son
Me: This ham is delicious.
My Cousin: Yup, great ham.
Mother's Boyfriend's Possibly Gay Black-belt Son: So, this year I got drunk on New Year's.
Me, My Cousin, My Aunt: Whaaat?
MBPGBS: Yeah, I did. We were so crazy. We were down in the basement and the parents were upstairs. We kept running around and giggling and screaming.
My Aunt: Did you find a liquor cabinet or something?
Me: Or some beer?
MBPGBS: No.
Me: What did you have then? Where did you get it?
MBPGBS: Oh, the adults gave it to us.
Everyone: Whaaat?
MBPGBS: Yeah, they gave us sparkling grape juice. Man, we were so drunk. I had a hangover later. Hey, you wanna know what else is cool? Freezing BBs and then shooting them at people.
My Grandfather
Grandpa: You want to know what Easter reminds me of?
Us: What?
Grandpa: Killing baby chickens on the farm.
Us: Oh.
My Brother
Adam: Do you want to hear the real story of that time I got lit on fire and burned my leg?
Me: Yes.
Adam's Friends: Yes.
Adam: Well, we were back at the cabin. Just me and the cousins. We had a bonfire going, but there was this stump that was bothering us. We wanted that stump out of there. So we devised a plan. A good plan. We had it all worked out.
Me: And you were unsupervised.
Adam: Oh yeah. Totally unsupervised. We had a Snapple bottle full of gasoline, so we decided we were going to douse this stump in gasoline because we'd already tried to chop it apart and that didn't work. So we started a fire on the stump but it wasn't going as good as we wanted it to, so the cousins started tossing more gasoline on it. Well, the fire started going everywhere. It was spreading into the woods.
Me: You were starting forest fires.
Adam: Well, it wasn't our intention. We just didn't like that stump. So we all started stomping it out, but that wasn't working. And the bottle had fallen on the ground by that point, and it was setting everything on fire, so I tried to kick it out of the way. But when I kicked it, it spun around and spewed gas on me. And I didn't really know what was happening. I tried to stop, drop, and roll... what a bunch of bullshit that is. You know how they always teach that? Well, it didn't work. I was still on fire. And that's when David came running out of the cabin and launched himself at me. He smothered my leg with his body and a towel. He saved my life. And that was the end of my leg hair.
Monday, March 05, 2007
No Matter What They Say, I Still Think "Purity Balls" Sounds Dirty
I've been grading papers for the last forever. I've been grading papers so long that my brain feels like it's turned to mush. Strings of words dry up on my tongue when I try to speak. I'm spelling things wrong. My thoughts never bloom the way they're supposed to--instead, they just shrivel up in some dank corner of my brain.
Tonight I took a break from the grading to sit in the living room and eat dinner with my father. He wanted to watch the news. I said fine. I would've agreed to anything at that point. He could've said, "Jessica, I'd like to watch a video of a frog being blown up on a hot plate, and I'd like to watch it on repeat," and I would've said, "Sure, Dad. Great."
But he didn't say that. Instead, he flicked to the news, and we watched and chewed and grumbled about things we didn't like. When the anchor came back to throw it to commercial, that's when she gave us the teaser for what was coming up: a segment on purity balls.
"Purity balls?" my father asked. He made a face. He pretended to be shocked and scandalized, like purity balls was the name of some new over-the-counter erectile dysfunction medicine. Who needs Viagra when you can have Purity Balls?!
Turns out purity balls are not so much erectile dysfunction pills as they are excuses to fluff your little girls into poofy gowns, excuses to slip on their patent leathers, excuses to get your husband's tux steamed. Purity balls are really father-daughter dances for the Christian crowd. Girls wear miniature wedding dresses and sign purity pledges. No way, no how are they going to lose their virginities. Nuh-uh. These little girls don't care how cute Tommy McMurray is going to look after the homecoming game junior year. They don't care that they'll say, Okay, Tommy when Tommy says, "Let's go for a ride, you and me." They don't care that he'll put a blanket on the hood of the car and kiss them under the stars until they're so dizzy they can't tell where their bodies leave off and the night sky begins.
The teaser video showed a beautiful blond girl tippy in heeled shoes. Her golden curls cascaded down her back, bounced against the milky fabric of her white ball gown. "I made a promise to God," she said. She beamed. "I'm going to stay pure until my wedding night. My daddy's here to sign a promise to protect me and be a good male role model." And there was dear old dad: towering above his daughter, yanking on his bow tie, looking nervous about all that.
Ick, I thought to myself. Ick, ick, ick.
I tried to picture myself in one of those little-girl-dresses. I tried to picture myself flouncing around with a new purse and a new hairdo. I tried to picture myself telling my father I was so happy he was there to celebrate my virginity with me. We'd get to take our pictures in front of the purity backdrop: a swirly blue background with a wooden cross looming behind us. We'd eat mashed potatoes and carved ham from the buffet station. We'd dance to Frank Sinatra songs sung by a sweaty wedding singer wearing too much spandex. I pictured discussing the significance of the event with my father--which would mean, really, I'd be discussing sex with the man who still makes me uncomfortable if he's sitting in the same room as me when a love scene comes on. I'd be discussing it at twelve years old. Ick.
I'd like to think I would've been a savvier little girl than the ones who get cajoled into going to these purity balls. After all, when we were in high school and my friends were saying I'm not having sex until after I walk down the aisle or Blowjobs are gross, and I'll never give one or On top? Gross. I'll never be on top, I was the one saying, "Well, I'm pretty sure I'm going to give all those things a go, so good luck to you."
Even before I'd been touched by a boy, even before I'd been looked at by a boy in a way that didn't involve revulsion, I still knew things were coming, they were just around the corner, and boy were they going to be good. I'd done my tour of Sunday school. I'd promised to remain faithful and shining and golden for the Lord. I'd let priests smear ash on my head. I'd let them dash me with holy water. I'd gone through everything I was supposed to, but I could still feel reality nagging at me like a canker sore in the farthest, most unreachable part of my mouth. It was an itch that didn't go away.
So I'd like to think I would've been the little girl who would've sat her father down on the bed, put his fancy bow tie away, and told him it was okay, we didn't need to go to the ball, didn't need to make promises we couldn't and wouldn't keep. I'd like to think I would've been the little girl who would tell him there were mistakes to be made, and it was okay. Things would go wrong and I would make the wrong decisions, but all of that--all my mistakes--would be okay. They'd be stupid beautiful mistakes, and they would spin me into the stars, clear up into the chalky mist of the Milky Way, and really, that wasn't such an awful place to be.
But I would've told him we were keeping the dress.
Tonight I took a break from the grading to sit in the living room and eat dinner with my father. He wanted to watch the news. I said fine. I would've agreed to anything at that point. He could've said, "Jessica, I'd like to watch a video of a frog being blown up on a hot plate, and I'd like to watch it on repeat," and I would've said, "Sure, Dad. Great."
But he didn't say that. Instead, he flicked to the news, and we watched and chewed and grumbled about things we didn't like. When the anchor came back to throw it to commercial, that's when she gave us the teaser for what was coming up: a segment on purity balls.
"Purity balls?" my father asked. He made a face. He pretended to be shocked and scandalized, like purity balls was the name of some new over-the-counter erectile dysfunction medicine. Who needs Viagra when you can have Purity Balls?!
Turns out purity balls are not so much erectile dysfunction pills as they are excuses to fluff your little girls into poofy gowns, excuses to slip on their patent leathers, excuses to get your husband's tux steamed. Purity balls are really father-daughter dances for the Christian crowd. Girls wear miniature wedding dresses and sign purity pledges. No way, no how are they going to lose their virginities. Nuh-uh. These little girls don't care how cute Tommy McMurray is going to look after the homecoming game junior year. They don't care that they'll say, Okay, Tommy when Tommy says, "Let's go for a ride, you and me." They don't care that he'll put a blanket on the hood of the car and kiss them under the stars until they're so dizzy they can't tell where their bodies leave off and the night sky begins.
The teaser video showed a beautiful blond girl tippy in heeled shoes. Her golden curls cascaded down her back, bounced against the milky fabric of her white ball gown. "I made a promise to God," she said. She beamed. "I'm going to stay pure until my wedding night. My daddy's here to sign a promise to protect me and be a good male role model." And there was dear old dad: towering above his daughter, yanking on his bow tie, looking nervous about all that.
Ick, I thought to myself. Ick, ick, ick.
I tried to picture myself in one of those little-girl-dresses. I tried to picture myself flouncing around with a new purse and a new hairdo. I tried to picture myself telling my father I was so happy he was there to celebrate my virginity with me. We'd get to take our pictures in front of the purity backdrop: a swirly blue background with a wooden cross looming behind us. We'd eat mashed potatoes and carved ham from the buffet station. We'd dance to Frank Sinatra songs sung by a sweaty wedding singer wearing too much spandex. I pictured discussing the significance of the event with my father--which would mean, really, I'd be discussing sex with the man who still makes me uncomfortable if he's sitting in the same room as me when a love scene comes on. I'd be discussing it at twelve years old. Ick.
I'd like to think I would've been a savvier little girl than the ones who get cajoled into going to these purity balls. After all, when we were in high school and my friends were saying I'm not having sex until after I walk down the aisle or Blowjobs are gross, and I'll never give one or On top? Gross. I'll never be on top, I was the one saying, "Well, I'm pretty sure I'm going to give all those things a go, so good luck to you."
Even before I'd been touched by a boy, even before I'd been looked at by a boy in a way that didn't involve revulsion, I still knew things were coming, they were just around the corner, and boy were they going to be good. I'd done my tour of Sunday school. I'd promised to remain faithful and shining and golden for the Lord. I'd let priests smear ash on my head. I'd let them dash me with holy water. I'd gone through everything I was supposed to, but I could still feel reality nagging at me like a canker sore in the farthest, most unreachable part of my mouth. It was an itch that didn't go away.
So I'd like to think I would've been the little girl who would've sat her father down on the bed, put his fancy bow tie away, and told him it was okay, we didn't need to go to the ball, didn't need to make promises we couldn't and wouldn't keep. I'd like to think I would've been the little girl who would tell him there were mistakes to be made, and it was okay. Things would go wrong and I would make the wrong decisions, but all of that--all my mistakes--would be okay. They'd be stupid beautiful mistakes, and they would spin me into the stars, clear up into the chalky mist of the Milky Way, and really, that wasn't such an awful place to be.
But I would've told him we were keeping the dress.
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
The Headlines Will Read Bootsie Smith Weds Taffy Miles
This is what my father has told me ever since he and my mother got divorced: "I will never get married again. I'm done. It no longer interests me."
This is what my father told me last week when he called from Florida, where he was vacationing with his lady love: "I'm getting married."
This news struck me as surprising for several reasons. First, I've had his I'm never getting married again mantra driven into my head for the last seven years. Second, he never mentioned a thing about it. He was stealthy in his secrecy, a regular James Bond--just without fancy gun-pens or floating cars.
As soon as he told me, I hung up the phone and called Amy and Keith to break the news. "How do we feel about this?" I asked.
Amy was happy. "When's the wedding?" she exclaimed. I could tell she was seeing summer dresses and strappy shoes and another reason to drink Bacardi-Cokes in the warm summer afternoon. I could tell she was thinking, Yessss. We get to see the girlfriend's hot son in dress-up clothes! I could tell she was thinking that because I was thinking that, too.
Keith was happy, too, but for different reasons. The news meant he could gloat. He'd been predicting this for months, and I'd been repeating the same words my father had drilled into my head since the divorce. "No, Keith," I would say. "He's never getting married again. He told me so. They might live together, but that's it."
"We'll see," Keith would say in one of those irritating sing-song voices. "We'll just see about that!"
When I told him the news, Keith yelled into my ear. "Ha!" he said. "I told you so!" Then he said, "Can I sleep with your mom now?" and I had to inform him that no, he could not sleep with my mother now. He couldn't sleep with my mother ever, no matter how much he might want to or how much he liked to say that to irritate me.
They both went on to ask me how I felt. How was I dealing with it? What did I think?
I felt fine with it. I like my father's girlfriend. He's had some girlfriends I really wasn't fond of--for example, the girlfriend I nicknamed Rafiki because she resembled the blue-butted monkey from The Lion King--but this one is an all-around good time. And she has a hot son. Really, it's a win-win situation for everyone. So, I feel good about this. I am happy for my father, happy that he gets a second-go at marriage, even if that's what he spent years thinking he didn't want.
Really, I suppose, there were hints, and I should've seen this coming. About a month ago my father walked into the kitchen balancing his and my mother's wedding album on his palm. "I think," he said, "it might be time to get rid of this."
"Are you freaking kidding me?" I exclaimed, snatching the album from him. I could see him tossing it in the garbage. I could see the album getting buried in the landfill, underneath a cascade of rotten bananas, socks with holes in the heels, forgotten furniture. I told my father I was taking over custody of the album, and I pushed it underneath my bed, where it would be safe forever.
He must have been considering it--a new start with a new woman--for awhile now, and if I had paid closer attention maybe I would've guessed it. But that's okay. The surprise was fine. And last night I decided it was extra fine because we all sat around figuring out our porn-names, and my father's would be Bootsie Smith and his girlfriend's would be Taffy Miles, and let's face it--that's a good-sounding couple. I can see the invitations, the headlines now: Bootsie Smith Weds Taffy Miles; Children Smoky Place, Dusty Place, and Squeaky Kelly Throw Reception in Their Honor.
Let's hope, though, that my father picks a more attractive outfit and hair situation than he did the first time around, when he married my mother:
This is what my father told me last week when he called from Florida, where he was vacationing with his lady love: "I'm getting married."
This news struck me as surprising for several reasons. First, I've had his I'm never getting married again mantra driven into my head for the last seven years. Second, he never mentioned a thing about it. He was stealthy in his secrecy, a regular James Bond--just without fancy gun-pens or floating cars.
As soon as he told me, I hung up the phone and called Amy and Keith to break the news. "How do we feel about this?" I asked.
Amy was happy. "When's the wedding?" she exclaimed. I could tell she was seeing summer dresses and strappy shoes and another reason to drink Bacardi-Cokes in the warm summer afternoon. I could tell she was thinking, Yessss. We get to see the girlfriend's hot son in dress-up clothes! I could tell she was thinking that because I was thinking that, too.
Keith was happy, too, but for different reasons. The news meant he could gloat. He'd been predicting this for months, and I'd been repeating the same words my father had drilled into my head since the divorce. "No, Keith," I would say. "He's never getting married again. He told me so. They might live together, but that's it."
"We'll see," Keith would say in one of those irritating sing-song voices. "We'll just see about that!"
When I told him the news, Keith yelled into my ear. "Ha!" he said. "I told you so!" Then he said, "Can I sleep with your mom now?" and I had to inform him that no, he could not sleep with my mother now. He couldn't sleep with my mother ever, no matter how much he might want to or how much he liked to say that to irritate me.
They both went on to ask me how I felt. How was I dealing with it? What did I think?
I felt fine with it. I like my father's girlfriend. He's had some girlfriends I really wasn't fond of--for example, the girlfriend I nicknamed Rafiki because she resembled the blue-butted monkey from The Lion King--but this one is an all-around good time. And she has a hot son. Really, it's a win-win situation for everyone. So, I feel good about this. I am happy for my father, happy that he gets a second-go at marriage, even if that's what he spent years thinking he didn't want.
Really, I suppose, there were hints, and I should've seen this coming. About a month ago my father walked into the kitchen balancing his and my mother's wedding album on his palm. "I think," he said, "it might be time to get rid of this."
"Are you freaking kidding me?" I exclaimed, snatching the album from him. I could see him tossing it in the garbage. I could see the album getting buried in the landfill, underneath a cascade of rotten bananas, socks with holes in the heels, forgotten furniture. I told my father I was taking over custody of the album, and I pushed it underneath my bed, where it would be safe forever.
He must have been considering it--a new start with a new woman--for awhile now, and if I had paid closer attention maybe I would've guessed it. But that's okay. The surprise was fine. And last night I decided it was extra fine because we all sat around figuring out our porn-names, and my father's would be Bootsie Smith and his girlfriend's would be Taffy Miles, and let's face it--that's a good-sounding couple. I can see the invitations, the headlines now: Bootsie Smith Weds Taffy Miles; Children Smoky Place, Dusty Place, and Squeaky Kelly Throw Reception in Their Honor.
Let's hope, though, that my father picks a more attractive outfit and hair situation than he did the first time around, when he married my mother:
Sunday, August 20, 2006
Strangest Conversations of the Last 48 Hours
Conversation #1: The New York Institute of Massage
The phone rings. I answer it.
Woman: Hello, this is the Lou at the New York Institute of Massage. I'm looking for Adam. He was interested in our programs, and I just wanted to call to follow up with him.
Me: I'm sorry, he's not here.
Woman: Well, do you know if he's still interested in the program?
--Important Side Note: since my brother failed out of his auto-tech program at a state school, he has been working a string of strange jobs, the latest of which is at a tool company where he is an assistant manager/cashier, and it's sort of hard to tell exactly what, besides Hooters waitresses, he really IS interested in. Who goes from auto-tech to massage therapy? No one. No one except my brother.--
Me: Uhm, I really couldn't say.
Woman: Well, what about you, sweetie? Do you want to come to school here?
Me: I have a masters degree. I think I'm pretty much set for now. But thanks anyway.
Conversation # 2: My Brother, Parts 1 & 2
Part One
Adam: So, I'm headed out to the house. Me and the guys are gonna spend the night in the cabin.
Me: Oooooh.
Mom: Oooooh.
Adam: What?
Me: Are there gonna be any giiiiirls there?
Adam: No. NO! NOT AT ALL!
Mom: Sure there aren't.
Adam: Mo-om! There will be NO GIRLS THERE, OKAY? NONE. ZERO. WHY ARE YOU FLIPPING OUT LIKE THIS?
Part Two
The next day. Adam popped into the house after his night in the cabin.
Adam: Listen, I need to tell you something. You can't say stuff like in front of Mom, okay? She doesn't want or need to know about what I'm doing back at the cabin.
Me: Adam, you're a moron. If you're going to lie, at least learn to do it well. The way you went insane, we totally knew what you were up to.
Adam: It's not a big deal, okay? I've known her since high school. She's of age. We're just friends with benefits.
Me: Oh my God, I think I'm going to throw up.
Conversation # 3: Josh's Mother, Step-Father, and Gay Cop Aunt
Last night I went to pick Josh up at his house. He and his whole family had just come home from a wedding reception down the street. All involved were completely drunk. I'm not kidding about any of this part, which is excerpted from my 10 minute stay.
Step-Father: Where did you come from?
Me: Uhm, Minnesota?
Step-Father: You just came in from Minnesota?
Me: Oh, right now? Hamburg. I was at a movie.
Step-Father: And how old are you? And where were you born? Where did you grow up? You and Josh are watching movies tonight? What kind of movies do you like?
Me: Wow. Well...
Gay Cop Aunt: You know what movie I like a lot? Sahara. Have you seen Sahara?
Me: Sort of. I fell asleep during it.
Gay Cop Aunt: Matthew McConaughey is in that movie. I would have sex with him.
Josh: But you're gay.
Gay Cop Aunt: So?
Me: He does have nice abs.
--Josh opens a beer.--
Mother: Josh, you don't need any more to drink.
Josh: Neither do you, Mother. Hey, Jess. I climbed a pole tonight. Without using my legs.
Step-Father: Do you like action movies, Jess? Dramas?
Gay Cop Aunt: Sahara's a great movie. So is Syriana. Have you seen that?
Me: Yes.
Step-Father: What street do you live on?
Gay Cop Aunt: What's your license plate? We'll run it after you leave.
Josh: She's kidding.
Mother: So what are you guys going to do?
Me: Watch movies.
Gay Cop Aunt: You know what movie I just thought of? A Time to Kill. Matthew McConaughey was so sweaty in that movie. And his ass in those pants? Amazing.
Josh: You're GAY. Your girlfriend is downstairs sleeping.
Step-Father: You grew up around here?
Me: Yeah, I did.
Josh: She went to Holland.
Step-Father: It's a way better school than yours, Josh.
Josh: It is not.
Step-Father: Yes it is. How did you two meet?
Josh: We worked together at the Hearth.
--Josh's mother drops a tortilla chip on the floor. Josh's Gay Cop Aunt reaches down to pick it up, but Josh's mother grinds it under her foot before she can get it.--
Mother: I think I need some water. You know, Josh talks about you all the time.
Step-Father: I think we've met before.
Josh: Jess, you should've seen this pole I climbed. It was amazing. And this old guy was climbing it, too. Want to go?
Me: Sure.
Gay Cop Aunt: Jess, I just want to tell you this: Click it, or ticket. Cops are cracking down everywhere.
Josh: Do you think I'd be a good cop?
Gay Cop Aunt: You're very sensitive. You'd be good at the counseling part of it.
Josh: I'm tough.
Step-Father: It's foggy out. Be careful. Watch for deer.
Me: Okay. It was nice to meet you all. Have a good night.
Everyone: Bye!
--Josh and I get in the car. We get ready to leave.--
Josh: That was my gay aunt. Isn't she cool?
The phone rings. I answer it.
Woman: Hello, this is the Lou at the New York Institute of Massage. I'm looking for Adam. He was interested in our programs, and I just wanted to call to follow up with him.
Me: I'm sorry, he's not here.
Woman: Well, do you know if he's still interested in the program?
--Important Side Note: since my brother failed out of his auto-tech program at a state school, he has been working a string of strange jobs, the latest of which is at a tool company where he is an assistant manager/cashier, and it's sort of hard to tell exactly what, besides Hooters waitresses, he really IS interested in. Who goes from auto-tech to massage therapy? No one. No one except my brother.--
Me: Uhm, I really couldn't say.
Woman: Well, what about you, sweetie? Do you want to come to school here?
Me: I have a masters degree. I think I'm pretty much set for now. But thanks anyway.
Conversation # 2: My Brother, Parts 1 & 2
Part One
Adam: So, I'm headed out to the house. Me and the guys are gonna spend the night in the cabin.
Me: Oooooh.
Mom: Oooooh.
Adam: What?
Me: Are there gonna be any giiiiirls there?
Adam: No. NO! NOT AT ALL!
Mom: Sure there aren't.
Adam: Mo-om! There will be NO GIRLS THERE, OKAY? NONE. ZERO. WHY ARE YOU FLIPPING OUT LIKE THIS?
Part Two
The next day. Adam popped into the house after his night in the cabin.
Adam: Listen, I need to tell you something. You can't say stuff like in front of Mom, okay? She doesn't want or need to know about what I'm doing back at the cabin.
Me: Adam, you're a moron. If you're going to lie, at least learn to do it well. The way you went insane, we totally knew what you were up to.
Adam: It's not a big deal, okay? I've known her since high school. She's of age. We're just friends with benefits.
Me: Oh my God, I think I'm going to throw up.
Conversation # 3: Josh's Mother, Step-Father, and Gay Cop Aunt
Last night I went to pick Josh up at his house. He and his whole family had just come home from a wedding reception down the street. All involved were completely drunk. I'm not kidding about any of this part, which is excerpted from my 10 minute stay.
Step-Father: Where did you come from?
Me: Uhm, Minnesota?
Step-Father: You just came in from Minnesota?
Me: Oh, right now? Hamburg. I was at a movie.
Step-Father: And how old are you? And where were you born? Where did you grow up? You and Josh are watching movies tonight? What kind of movies do you like?
Me: Wow. Well...
Gay Cop Aunt: You know what movie I like a lot? Sahara. Have you seen Sahara?
Me: Sort of. I fell asleep during it.
Gay Cop Aunt: Matthew McConaughey is in that movie. I would have sex with him.
Josh: But you're gay.
Gay Cop Aunt: So?
Me: He does have nice abs.
--Josh opens a beer.--
Mother: Josh, you don't need any more to drink.
Josh: Neither do you, Mother. Hey, Jess. I climbed a pole tonight. Without using my legs.
Step-Father: Do you like action movies, Jess? Dramas?
Gay Cop Aunt: Sahara's a great movie. So is Syriana. Have you seen that?
Me: Yes.
Step-Father: What street do you live on?
Gay Cop Aunt: What's your license plate? We'll run it after you leave.
Josh: She's kidding.
Mother: So what are you guys going to do?
Me: Watch movies.
Gay Cop Aunt: You know what movie I just thought of? A Time to Kill. Matthew McConaughey was so sweaty in that movie. And his ass in those pants? Amazing.
Josh: You're GAY. Your girlfriend is downstairs sleeping.
Step-Father: You grew up around here?
Me: Yeah, I did.
Josh: She went to Holland.
Step-Father: It's a way better school than yours, Josh.
Josh: It is not.
Step-Father: Yes it is. How did you two meet?
Josh: We worked together at the Hearth.
--Josh's mother drops a tortilla chip on the floor. Josh's Gay Cop Aunt reaches down to pick it up, but Josh's mother grinds it under her foot before she can get it.--
Mother: I think I need some water. You know, Josh talks about you all the time.
Step-Father: I think we've met before.
Josh: Jess, you should've seen this pole I climbed. It was amazing. And this old guy was climbing it, too. Want to go?
Me: Sure.
Gay Cop Aunt: Jess, I just want to tell you this: Click it, or ticket. Cops are cracking down everywhere.
Josh: Do you think I'd be a good cop?
Gay Cop Aunt: You're very sensitive. You'd be good at the counseling part of it.
Josh: I'm tough.
Step-Father: It's foggy out. Be careful. Watch for deer.
Me: Okay. It was nice to meet you all. Have a good night.
Everyone: Bye!
--Josh and I get in the car. We get ready to leave.--
Josh: That was my gay aunt. Isn't she cool?
Saturday, August 19, 2006
On Horses and Fairs
A horse. That's all I wanted when I was a girl.
My mother had a horse when she was young, so I thought it was only fair I should have one too. I talked about it a lot. I was going to save my allowance (back then $4 a week) and I was going to get a tall black horse with a white star on his head. I made plans and adventures for my horse. We would gallop across our alfalfa fields. We would explore the acres of woods behind our house. We would pack picnics and stop for lunch by quick-moving streams.
None of that ever happened, but I never quit dreaming that it someday would. I think it's all tied up in the romance of where my house is. Middle of nowhere, lots of land, woods, creeks, places to run. I always wanted to be more outdoorsy than I was. When I would mow the lawn on the weekends I would make up elaborate alternative lives in my head, where I was the favorite daughter of a wealthy ranch owner. My father employed tall cowboy-types who were a few years older than me, and they would wait for me to finish my chores so we could go riding together. One of these cowboys was in love with my cousin, who my wealthy ranching father had adopted after her parents died in a car crash. One of these cowboys was in love with me, but I always bucked his advances. I was afraid, of course, of the strong feelings I had for him. When he would kiss me under the canopy of trees heavy with ripening apples I would push away, say no, no, we can't, we can't!, then we would kiss some more.
It was a fine alternative universe.
Last night I was thinking of that world I made for myself. I was thinking of it because I herded everyone into the horse barns at the Erie County Fair. Besides the food, seeing the horses and letting them rub their velvet noses on my palms is my favorite part of any fair. I like to put my hand on their foreheads--where the white star would've been on the horse I dreamed about--and think what my life could've been like if I had been a farm girl, if I had even a fraction of the life I worked up for myself while I cut the back lawn.
I guess I've always been imaginative like that. And I guess that a lot of my fantasies involve horses. When I was small, I thought I was an Indian princess. I loved to wear my mother's old riding outfits: leather skirt, leather vest, both fringed. They smelled of summer sun and green grass. They smelled of wind and rain. I would put them on, stick a feather in my hair, and run around the yard whooping. If I'd had the horse I was seeing in my head, we would've been able to rush down past the big apple tree and into the creek, where cold splashes of water would fly up from his hooves. We would've kept going past the grapes and blueberries, past the other apple trees, out into the field, back into the woods. And then we would lose ourselves in the dark cover of forest, and I would whoop and whoop and whoop and no one would tell me to stop it already because it was giving them a headache.
Last night I wanted nothing more than to have one of the owners of the horses, who had names like Tequila and Tidy and Beaner, to say, "Hey, you. Want to take one out for a ride?"
I would've taken them up on that in a hot second. And then I would've immediately looked like a giant ass, because I can't ride horses for anything. A few years ago, my mother and I went out to a place near where I went to college and we went on a trail ride with a bunch of other people who wanted to spend the afternoon pretending they were Indian Princesses or daughters of wealthy ranchers. I could walk the horse fine. But when it came to going faster than that, I bounced up and down like I was on a carousel.
"Don't lock your legs like that," our guide said.
"Let the horse move for you," my mother said.
None of that advice helped. I walked funny the rest of the day.
My mother was sad that they hadn't let us get the horses up any faster than a lope. "I just wanted to take off," she said. She looked dreamy and half-sad. "I just wanted to tear off past everybody."
I understood the sentiment. Boy, did I ever. All I wanted was my tall black horse with the star on his forehead. I wanted to know how to ride him without bruising my inner thighs. I wanted to have a boy in a cowboy hat watch me finish mowing the lawn, then hand me the reigns to my horse so we could go, go, go, far away from everyone else, and we would kiss and not kiss, then kiss some more.
But that's never happened, and it never will. So last night I just let the horses nuzzle my hands, my shirt, my hair, looking for apples or other treats. I let them nudge me with their soft noses. I let them switch their tails in anticipation. I let them look at me with those dewy eyes that looked like they were saying, Let's go. Let's go, go, go.
And then we left the horse barn and stepped back into a world without Indian Princesses and cowboys. And there was the Erie County fair in all its glory. Demolition derbies, gyros, fresh-pulled taffy, warm fudge, hard-shelled candy apples, bustling I Got Its, sizzling funnel cake, men (and the unfortunate baby) with mullets, triplets performing magic tricks with poodles, Chiavetta's chicken BBQ, hot tubs for sale, the Polish gifts table, the amazing (alive! real!) Snake Lady, the World's Smallest Horse (only 50 cents!), and the golden, whirling midway.
And, of course, the 25 cent refresh! rejuvenate! relax! your feet center.
My mother had a horse when she was young, so I thought it was only fair I should have one too. I talked about it a lot. I was going to save my allowance (back then $4 a week) and I was going to get a tall black horse with a white star on his head. I made plans and adventures for my horse. We would gallop across our alfalfa fields. We would explore the acres of woods behind our house. We would pack picnics and stop for lunch by quick-moving streams.
None of that ever happened, but I never quit dreaming that it someday would. I think it's all tied up in the romance of where my house is. Middle of nowhere, lots of land, woods, creeks, places to run. I always wanted to be more outdoorsy than I was. When I would mow the lawn on the weekends I would make up elaborate alternative lives in my head, where I was the favorite daughter of a wealthy ranch owner. My father employed tall cowboy-types who were a few years older than me, and they would wait for me to finish my chores so we could go riding together. One of these cowboys was in love with my cousin, who my wealthy ranching father had adopted after her parents died in a car crash. One of these cowboys was in love with me, but I always bucked his advances. I was afraid, of course, of the strong feelings I had for him. When he would kiss me under the canopy of trees heavy with ripening apples I would push away, say no, no, we can't, we can't!, then we would kiss some more.
It was a fine alternative universe.
Last night I was thinking of that world I made for myself. I was thinking of it because I herded everyone into the horse barns at the Erie County Fair. Besides the food, seeing the horses and letting them rub their velvet noses on my palms is my favorite part of any fair. I like to put my hand on their foreheads--where the white star would've been on the horse I dreamed about--and think what my life could've been like if I had been a farm girl, if I had even a fraction of the life I worked up for myself while I cut the back lawn.
I guess I've always been imaginative like that. And I guess that a lot of my fantasies involve horses. When I was small, I thought I was an Indian princess. I loved to wear my mother's old riding outfits: leather skirt, leather vest, both fringed. They smelled of summer sun and green grass. They smelled of wind and rain. I would put them on, stick a feather in my hair, and run around the yard whooping. If I'd had the horse I was seeing in my head, we would've been able to rush down past the big apple tree and into the creek, where cold splashes of water would fly up from his hooves. We would've kept going past the grapes and blueberries, past the other apple trees, out into the field, back into the woods. And then we would lose ourselves in the dark cover of forest, and I would whoop and whoop and whoop and no one would tell me to stop it already because it was giving them a headache.
Last night I wanted nothing more than to have one of the owners of the horses, who had names like Tequila and Tidy and Beaner, to say, "Hey, you. Want to take one out for a ride?"
I would've taken them up on that in a hot second. And then I would've immediately looked like a giant ass, because I can't ride horses for anything. A few years ago, my mother and I went out to a place near where I went to college and we went on a trail ride with a bunch of other people who wanted to spend the afternoon pretending they were Indian Princesses or daughters of wealthy ranchers. I could walk the horse fine. But when it came to going faster than that, I bounced up and down like I was on a carousel.
"Don't lock your legs like that," our guide said.
"Let the horse move for you," my mother said.
None of that advice helped. I walked funny the rest of the day.
My mother was sad that they hadn't let us get the horses up any faster than a lope. "I just wanted to take off," she said. She looked dreamy and half-sad. "I just wanted to tear off past everybody."
I understood the sentiment. Boy, did I ever. All I wanted was my tall black horse with the star on his forehead. I wanted to know how to ride him without bruising my inner thighs. I wanted to have a boy in a cowboy hat watch me finish mowing the lawn, then hand me the reigns to my horse so we could go, go, go, far away from everyone else, and we would kiss and not kiss, then kiss some more.
But that's never happened, and it never will. So last night I just let the horses nuzzle my hands, my shirt, my hair, looking for apples or other treats. I let them nudge me with their soft noses. I let them switch their tails in anticipation. I let them look at me with those dewy eyes that looked like they were saying, Let's go. Let's go, go, go.
And then we left the horse barn and stepped back into a world without Indian Princesses and cowboys. And there was the Erie County fair in all its glory. Demolition derbies, gyros, fresh-pulled taffy, warm fudge, hard-shelled candy apples, bustling I Got Its, sizzling funnel cake, men (and the unfortunate baby) with mullets, triplets performing magic tricks with poodles, Chiavetta's chicken BBQ, hot tubs for sale, the Polish gifts table, the amazing (alive! real!) Snake Lady, the World's Smallest Horse (only 50 cents!), and the golden, whirling midway.
And, of course, the 25 cent refresh! rejuvenate! relax! your feet center.
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