brokedown palace

I am fixated on the dingy filth that coats my walls. It’s time to paint, but I’m paralyzed by the enormity of the can of worms that will be unleashed when that daunting project takes shape. When we moved into this house, we hired a guy to come in and paint all of the interior walls. He used a sprayer. We chose the same nondescript shade of white for the walls and the high ceilings in the common areas, and we had yet to tear out the carpeting, so it must have been the world’s easiest gig. Now, after too many years while toddling babies morphed into clumsy kids with wheels on their shoes and mud on their hands, the walls are trashed and it’s time to paint. But now the house is full of stuff. There is so much stuff that will need to be moved, and you know as well as I do that if you have to touch the stuff, you have to sort the stuff. Otherwise, if you move the stuff around without sorting through it, you’ve got issues and it’s likely that you will end up crying on Oprah’s couch while one of those hazmat turbo organizing teams cleans out your closets with a blowtorch.

I have been making vague promises to my girl for a while now that it is high time we spruced up her room. Her room is teeny tiny, and had become a catch-all for the weird stuff that had no place. We had this huge black bookcase in there that would sometimes self destruct under the weight of its random burden, and a shelf would crash down in the middle of the night, scaring the beejesus out of my poor girl. The other furniture in there was always at weird angles and never looked quite right, and the room was chock full of what Ellie would call buckets – because Ellie calls everything capable of holding matter a bucket. My girl’s buckets were varied in size and scope, but the common thread that ran through all of them was a bizarre system of organization that explains the existence of a Christmas gift bag filled with: an empty piggy bank, a newborn’s knit hat, one red sandal, a huge jar containing 7 marbles, and my dress purse full of littlest pets.

When I left for the gym last Saturday morning, I told my girl that if she cleaned up her room, maybe we’d go pick out the paint for her walls. She barely acknowledged that I had spoken, I assumed that I was in the clear. When I got home, I idly asked whether or not she had worked on her room. She jumped up and asked me to follow, she said I would not believe how clean her room was. I turned the corner to find that she had unceremoniously chucked everything she could reach out the door of her room. Destination? Unknown. There was a colossal pile of debris in the hall, spilling into the bathroom. Everything from dirty laundry to art supplies to buckets to books to step stools was heaped halfway up the wall – I could not even step over it. I was too stunned to speak. Too intimidated to shout. Too overwhelmed to even grab my camera. There were so many things, and I was going to have to touch them. And you know what that means.

48 hours later, my girl has a clean and sassy blue room. I want to hang out in there all the time, because now more than ever I am fixating on the dingy filth that covers my other walls. And everywhere I look, I see that my shit is broken down. I open a cabinet and the mismatched Tupperware falls out. I hang a towel and the hook falls out of the wall. I watch helplessly as my stupid dog runs through the screen door, again. The printer’s out of ink, the vacuum bag is full, and the camera battery is dead. The sunroof that I had installed in my car will not open, and the passenger window that I’ve had replaced and repaired three times since this unfortunate incident started to fall halfway again, so that a pointy peak was sticking up when I tried to open it. I went back to get it repaired and they wanted $600 and I got mad and insisted that I could find a better deal, so they locked it in the closed position. Know anyone who can fix that for me so I don't have to eat crow and pay the $600 after having a tantrum then driving around with the window locked shut for two weeks?

I need a burst of inspiration, I’m sure it will come in good time. I need to start small and focus on one thing at a time, finding pleasure in what I get done rather than giving in to despair when I think about how much more there is to do. It’s a brokedown pile of shit, but it’s my palace. And that makes me the princess.

Surprise revealed

So Satruday night’s surprise was stupendous. The best kind-of surprise one can hope for. It was neither embarrassing nor overwhelming, nor did it require any on-the-spot acting by the time it happened, because I was actually let in on the secret a little early.

It wasn’t that I was dying to find out, I just had my suspicions, which I voiced out loud (to my co-blogger Jacquie), which were overheard by my four-year-old daughter, who let out a disgusted, “Mommy, how did you know?!” comment, which, of course, confirmed it for me.

No one was happy with my discovery (except me, of course). My husband felt he’d wasted his time and energy working on planning it, my youngest daughter was dismayed, as I just mentioned, and my oldest daughter, after finding out I knew, voiced angrily, “Why does everything always get ruined? I don’t even want her to come anymore!!”

So now you know too. The surprise involved a person, a female person. A very beloved female person -- my old, great, true blue friend Mary Ann.

Mary Ann was that friend in college you couldn’t do without; the friend who you shared everything with, and who you were with so much that people always sometimes confused your names.

It’s true that over the (many) years since college we’ve seen each other less and less, our lives playing out in different locations, our life choices not always on a parallel path, but our friendship is one of those that doesn’t really need constant tending. I mean, we should, and hopefully will, get together more, but I feel I know her in a way that cannot be undone, or diminished by the passage of time. We were tight during a time in our lives when we were growing, and playing, and learning, and coming into our own.

Your college years, and those immediately following, can be some of your best, and lucky for me, mine were. Mary Ann was right there with me for most of them. We spent countless hours driving up and down the coast of California to see live music, spent a summer in Gudalajara together, traveled together during the European Dead tour the autumn after our college graduation, and both eneded up in San Francisco for a time after that.

We shared countless good times. Seeing her Saturday night, and reminiscing about some of these times, was so much fun, and something you can’t do with just anybody.

What made this visit even more terrific was the fact that Mary Ann came to visit me here, in my new home, the one I now share with my new husband, who Mary Ann also knows, because he was kicking around with us back in those golden years too.

In fact we met him during the summer we spent Guadalajara, and became fast friends. He was also on Dead tour in the fall of 1990, and ended up in SF for a (very) short stint as well. And when I drove back down the coast in the late summer of 1992, leaving Marin County and Mary Ann north of me, it was at his house I crashed while waiting for my new San Diego apartment to be move-in ready.

So the reunion was joyful, and my husband hit it off with her husband, and before we knew it the plates were empty, the kitchen a mess, the beers all drank drunk drinked consumed and the night drawing to a close.

So thanks to all of you for one of the best surprises ever! To Mary Ann and Rich for all that So Cal hell highway driving, to T for all his scheming and planning, and to my girls for keeping the secret and not complaining when we neglected to feed you dinner until half past eight.

I love you all!

(I know, can you belive we didn't take one photo to document the night and post here for your enjoyment?!?)

Weekend 3-Way: Surprise!

Do you like surprises? Really enjoy the suspense and feeling of not knowing? Or do they put you on edge, make you anxious, or perhaps so flipping curious that you go out of your head?

What kind of surprise person are you?

I’ve got a surprise coming this afternoon. I’m looking forward to it. I have my suspicions about what it entails, but I’ll have to wait and see.

I’ve received some clues, like, how many miles away from home is it safe for your piece of shit jeep to roam? But at the same time the house is being cleaned up more than usual. Are we going somewhere or is someone coming here? Hmmm….. I just don’t know.

So again, I ask what kind of surprise person are you? And please share a good or bad surprise if you so choose.

Beth:
I like surprises. I’m not the kind-of person who will go snooping around to try and find clues, or evidence, or the like. I do not ask for hints regarding birthday gifts or Christmas gifts, or any gifts at all; why spoil it? I enjoy that building anticipation.

On the other hand, the down side to surprises is that to everyone else it is not a surprise, and whether they know it or not, they have some preconceived notions about how the person being surprised should react. Sometimes the reaction is not what the others have anticipated and then there’s a feeling of displeasure on their part and feeling of guilt on the part of the person being surprised. But really, how were they to know? They had just a split second to react, they didn’t savor the idea and let the let the excitement grow like everyone else, they didn’t have the chance.

So, I guess I’m pretty good with surprises, but don’t always like the pressure of making everyone involved feel as though it was worth it. Perhaps I just need a few acting classes and I will never disappoint.

Jacquie:

Surprises? I do not like them, Sam I am. I prefer knowing what to expect, and when to expect it. You hear about those families where the doting husband plans a vacation and packs for everyone and then whisks his beautiful wife away to a destination that is only revealed in the airport lounge? That would never happen here. Except the beautiful part.

I’m the planner, I’m the shopper, I’m the control freak organizer.

When I was pregnant with my first bambino, my work peeps were planning a surprise shower, and it drove me nuts. I figured that they were planning something, mostly because no one had said a single word about having a shower for me! Being pregnant and super emotional and crazy, I began to fret that maybe they just weren’t having a shower, maybe they didn’t think of it, maybe they didn’t like me and hoped I would never come back from maternity leave. My secretary finally told me what was in the works, mostly just to shut me up and cease the dementia. When the big day came, I acted completely surprised, and even shed a few tears, thinking: “They like me! They really, really like me!”

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Ellie:

Hmmmm. I wonder what your surprise is, Beth? Can't wait to hear.

I like surprises, I do. But mostly I like surprises that are planned by someone else, and happen to someone else. I like being the one in the crowd who shouts, “Surprise!” Because then I'm not the one lying planning the surprise, and I'm the one who has to be a good actor.

A couple of years ago my mom had an, ahem, significant birthday. So all her daughters -- 6 of us, spread far and wide -- planned to gather in Chicago, at my sister Jane's house, where Mom and Dad were going for Thanksgiving. It was a great plan, it really was. Bill and I were leaving the northeast, as we always did that time of year, and spent our last night in Connecticut at Mom and Dad's. In the morning said good-bye, and pretended to head south to Asheville, to Julie's house. Instead we headed west, to Jane's. Julie's flight was delayed, but she got there in the nick of time, all we sisters and some of the kids gathered at a neighbor's house, and Mom walked in.

Surprise!!!

And it very nearly worked. Mom was almost hugely surprised. If only someone hadn't written that email that Mom saw............

Poof Day

There's one day every year, after a long winter of snow and barren landscape, and then an interminable early spring, when everything finally just pops.

The grass gets green and the buds on trees turn to leaves and the sun comes out, and the whole world goes "Poof." That is what is called Poof Day.

Poof Day happened around here on Sunday, Mothers Day The Day of the Mutha.
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There are rules to follow when Poof Day occurs. First, mow the grass.

And then, plant the veggies and herbs.

And plant flowers for Mothers Day Mumsie's Day.

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Another thing happens around here on Poof Day as well.
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Remember early spring?

All that yellow?

All those forsythia and daffodils?

The yellow is gone.

It's been replaced by a more dramatic, a more fragrant, a deeper and more delicious color.

You know about business time? Well, around here, it's purple time.

mind the gap

Do you ever take those quizzes on facebook and in between the idiocy, you hit on something that is dead on? I’ve only taken a few, and they were total bullshit, but recently quite a few of my friends seem to have found quizzes that are eerily accurate in their descriptions of the participant. Pam said that the result of her What Your Birth Date Reveals About You quiz was “so true”, and Suton said that the very same quiz had her “spot on”. When Kendra’s result from the What kind of fighter are you? quiz was “Brawler”, she said “I already knew that about myself!” (I love you Kendra, don’t hurt me); and although Rita accused the Which book character are you? quiz of not even knowing her (how can you hate Holden?), she found the What element are you? Quiz “freakishly accurate”

I find it a little unnerving when the results of those things ring true, I want to resist the notion that I can be so easily defined based on the representative question of whether or not my perfect weekend involves excessive drinking (duh). important aside: for research purposes, I took the “what movie is your life” quiz. Footloose. So am I Kevin Bacon or Lori Singer or Sara Jessica Parker?

But there are those times and tools when I feel pegged, like I’m really not the inimitable radical that I fancy myself to be. I think it’s about knowing yourself, though. If you can’t honestly answer questions on a tool like the Myers Briggs, you’re not going to come up with a personality type that resonates. As hard as it is to resist the urge to respond as who you want to be rather than as who you are, there is really no point in adorning yourself with some idol’s personality. Not if you really want to discover something about yourself.

I recently attended a workshop about communication across generations, and I experienced that “whoa” factor when hearing about the values and preferred communication styles presumed to define me based only on the era in which I was born, my age group, aka Generation X:

• Works better alone
• Expects swift communication
• Wants to be heard
• Values the entrepreneurial spirit, loyalty, independence & creativity
• Appreciates and expects access to information
• Likes feedback and uses it to adapt
• Works smarter, not harder
• Wants to be kept in the loop
• Responds to an informal style of communication

It’s hard to imagine that these descriptors do not apply to everyone in the world though, right? They seem so commonplace to me, so universally human. But then we talked about the complications we sometimes face in communicating with our parents and grandparents, and with college students. People who maybe lived through the depression, and others who were born after 19-freaking-80. When you think about it, it seems impossible that we'd all identify with the same Facts of life character.

Consider the perspective of someone who had to tune in for the nightly news to receive a polished report about selected developments in the ongoing war; compared with that of the person watching the events of September 11th unfold alongside the confused and terrified media.

What if you wanted to call your spouse to tell him something important, but he was not at home, so you just didn’t get to tell him. Or you have to leave a message on his huge, clunky answering machine that will be recorded onto an actual cassette tape.

I take the ability to text, voicemail, and generally track my husband for granted, but these innovations have developed over the course of my lifetime. College students have never experienced a delay in communication. They have no frame of reference for a scenario in which their message will not be heard.

It’s easy to get all grandmotherly about this kind of thing, to squawk about: “kids these days” and how they have it so easy. But I’m not so sure that they do. They’ve got nowhere to hide from the constant influx of information. They’ve had an unobstructed, front row seat to Colombine, Oklahoma City, Iraq, and God help us, the legacy of George W. Bush. Anything could happen, at any time, and they’re going to live for the moment. We’ve made sure to stroke their egos, to boost their self esteem, to ensure that everyone’s a winner and everyone gets a trophy. Isn't it our onus to figure out how to talk with this legacy we've created?

I think we can all just get along, we just need to find some common ground. What better way to start than by finding out What color crayon are you?

Working at the car wash...

I forgot about writing today’s post until late last night, after the lights were out and I was lying in bed. Something I ate yesterday at lunch made me feel uncomfortable for the remainder of the day, so I was unwilling to get up and write at that point, or to even give it much thought in all honesty, so I told myself I’d blog about whatever I happened to dream about.

I ended up dreaming about, well, I’m not exactly sure, but it was reminiscent of the summers I spent in Ocean City, Maryland. The dream involved a bunch of young friends, including myself, who all worked together at the beach.

That was my summer for four years, starting after junior year in high school and lasting until the summer after my sophomore year at college. It was every high-school (and college) kids’ dream: renting an apartment at the beach with friends for the entire time school was out. No parents, no rules, no teachers, just you, your friends, parties, the beach, and work - so that you could fund it all. In retrospect, I can’t believe my mother let me do it.

Each summer was different, having as they did a different combination of roommates, a new apartment, and normally a change of jobs, but all were the same in most other respects. There was always too much sun, too much drinking, and too much work.

What I woke up thinking about this morning was my various places of employment. I’ve already blogged a bit about my stint at Candy Kitchen, which was my first, and second, job in Ocean City. But I worked there solo, no roommates or friends being stupid enough to work alongside me. It was all inside work, with no tips -- not the most desirable or lucrative gig in town.

But I did wise up and accept help from my roommates and friends after this, as did most people, which left businesses with four, five, or even more friends all working for them at the same time -- both a good and bad thing for a proprietor. On the up side you could have one of us call a roommate if they were short shifted, but there was also the possibility of us inviting our friends to frequent the establishment, and in this case somehow those tabs never totaled up to nearly what they should have.

Take for instance the summer I lived with seven other roommates. There were five guys and three girls living in that three-level apartment on 94th Street. Five of us, that’s five eighths, people, ended up working at the same restaurant; between us we held most every job they offered, from laundress, to hostess, to bar keep, to server, to busboy, to cocktail waitress. The photos from that summer’s employee party look almost the same as the photos from our house parties.

Or the summer when I worked at Ocean City’s one and only car wash. My friend Dorothea, who now leaves regular comments here on Me and You and Ellie, hooked me up with this job. In fact, all of the girls who worked there were in my high school graduating class, all on the advice of Dorothea.
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Looking back on this job is quite comical: five girls (or what it six?), working two at a time, in bikinis, at a roadside car wash in Ocean City. And the bikinis were matching. It was a sort of skimpy uniform. Almost like these guys'. We made pretty good tips there, and spent a lot of time between cars just sitting in our beach chairs working on our tans and reading (I still remember reading the Thorn Birds that summer). Plus we had each other, all already friends, to hang with. Friends, sun, a pay check, and good tips.

Why isn’t work more like that now? We have our annual holiday party, celebrate each others’ birthdays, and I like my coworkers, but my current job is not nearly as fun as those summer jobs from long ago.

I’m game to try something new. Anyone have any good leads ? I’m an excellent scooper of ice cream, weigher of fudge, dryer of cars, washer of restaurant linen, cocktail waitress (in the sand, no less), and more.

Get back to me with any ideas (and please ignore the fact that I am blogging, while on the clock, from my current place of employment).

Mistah Schleckah, XLVI

My little friend Mistah Schleckah is 46 today.

Happy Birthday, Mistah!

Let's take a quick, abbreviated look at Mistah's life, shall we?

Little Billy started his life as any little Billy would, with a Dad, and a Mumsie, and a little sister Kelly.

Billy and Kelly had a lot of fun, and looked good doing it.

I mean, really. How handsome can one boy be?

Oh, right. This handsome.

And then 20 or so years passed, and Billy met me. Exactly one week before this photo was taken.

I'm not sure he even was legal then . . .

. . . he sure didn't look it.

We had a great time together, and traveled from Detroit . . .

. . . to St. John.

And then I married him. Of course I did.

He was, after all, a hot potato.

Soon after Bill met me he became an Uncle-to-be.

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And he latched right onto that.

He immediately embraced the Uncle life . . .

. . . and is really good at it.

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And then, in 2001, we took off in the Westy . . .

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. . . and nothing has been the same since.

From the Outer Banks of North Carolina . . .

. . . to the canyonlands of Utah. . .

. . . from the Florida Keys . . .

. . . to Wrigley. And NO, we did not have a son along the way . . .
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. . . but we did have a lot of nieces and nephews along the way, including Bayba D, who was mere days old at Wrigley, and turned 8 the other day.

Mistah hiked in the Baja peninsula in Mexico . . .

. . . and in the Mojave Desert . . .

. . . and on the banks of the Rio Grande in the Big Bend in Texas . . .

. . . and, of course, in Fort Davis. This was his 41st birthday.

. . . On the road, there's not always the immediate chance to shower . . .

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. . . and the sand of the desert -- the Anza-Borrego, here -- can coat you like a cutlet.

But that's what springs and streams and the Colorado River, at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, are for.

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Mistah Schleckah has had interesting jobs . . .

. . . and successful shopping excursions . . .

. . . and connects fully with the munchkins . . .

. . . and is, all of a sudden, a solid citizen of Connecticut once again.

Well, semi-solid.

Happy Birthday, Mistah Schleckah!

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Now get out there and have a great day.

what it's all about

One day at the beach, Uncle Bill (that’s Mistah Schlekah to some of you) took the kids for a little jaunt down to the rock jetty. For some reason, we were not in bathing suits – it must have been winter or late or something. But they came back soaking wet, and when I questioned the decision they had made to partake in whatever activity had resulted in the sandy wetness, my girl retorted: “But Uncle Bill said that’s what it’s all about!”

This has become a catch phrase in our family, a line we use a lot, and it helps to ground us when we get too caught up in whatever it’s not about.

This year, Mother's Day Mothers' Day The Day of the Mutha was a celebration of what it’s all about. I knew exactly what I wanted from this day, and the universe did not disappoint.

It began with the requisite ceremonial awakening and bestowing of gifts. I love the school-made gifts. I’ve collected quite a few over the years:

clockwise from top: last year's still life by my girl, the boy's puzzle frame circa 2006, heartbreakingly goofy framed photo of my boy in 2005, group project potted flower children, and a portrait of me done by my girl, featuring a photo of the artist at work

This year’s crop was the best yet. My girl, in second grade, still employs the crafty approach, and her creative spelling made the sentiments that much more endearing:

If you ever receive a card from someone in my family, the back will say: "You Rock"

In fourth grade, more finesse is required. My boy’s project was less craft, more composition.

My other request for my special morning was to enjoy fruit salad -which was lovingly and thoughtfully prepared last night - by me - before heading off to the gym.

Fruit salad? check.

Gym? check.

The overcast sky did not dampen my enthusiasm for the next leg of our quest toward mommypaloooza. The beach beckoned. My stipulations were that my husband drive (and park), and that we'd first grab a bite at our favorite oceanfront eatery. I'd had my eye on one of these:

Have you ever seen anything more appealing? mmmmm. That's cranberry juice in there next to the champers. Lovely!

We had parking mojo, we had table mojo, and just as our empty plates were cleared, the sun burned right through that overcast sky and opened up the world's most beautiful day.

I am really digging the mom thing these days. My kids are old enough to be self-sufficient and can generally be trusted not to do anything stupid enough to ruin the day, like drown or get kidnapped. They headed out with their boogie boards

They tore it up out there


And when they had something to report or exclaim, each one sought out the other

before heading out for more

I was left to smile from the comfort of my chair, pumping my fist with every triumph, sipping drinks with my husband, and reveling in the day, the kids, the beach, this life.

And that, my friends, is what it's all about.