The Daily Write: Winging It (October 31, 2012)

A painter. Abstract Expressionist. Although if you ask his daughter, she'll say he was "derivative" like it's a dirty word. Perhaps that's why there are hundred left in the rafters of the desert house, and many on our walls. Still, when people come over, they are wowed, especially by the Diebenkorn-esque painting. I guess that proves her point.

He was gone by the time I came around. Probably good in the end, because he was not exactly accepting. Although, I like to think I have a certain charming ability to warm up grumpy old men. If history is any proof, I've got a 60/40 success rate. He grew up in the South but left for the West after getting kicked out of Westpoint. Talking back in military school is probably not the world's soundest behavior.

I don't know much about when he started painting, or what his folks thought about his talents. Talented he was. I love the work I've seen. And prolific. He left New Mexico for Nevada to paint and teach alongside his wife, an English Professor on the tenure track. She got a job, he followed and they worked at the university together.

He had all the usual conditions you'd expect from a mid-century artist- and got the treatments that went along with the times, to greater and lesser degrees of success. His "issues" showed up in funny ways at home where he insisted on a neutral color pallet and lined the magazines up on the coffee table in perfect order. My partner, his daughter, was never allowed to draw in coloring books because he felt they stifled creativity.

And so, it was only last night that she finished the homemade costumes for our kids. Every year we go through the stress of figuring out what to make and how to make it. Neither of us is particularly crafty and both of us procrastinate. I used to ask more pointedly why we couldn't just buy them off the shelf, but after so many years, I know the answer and besides, as much as it stresses us both out, the end result is always worth it. Not perfect, not particularly well done - but full of character and homemade realness.

My daughter, who is 6, is a bat this year. Her wings made from the split halves of a black umbrella with the ribbing still in. My son, Binary Bard, a character from a popular online game. He looks like a purple and yellow jester with a robotic red eye. They are adorable, she is spent but satisfied, and I'm doing this instead of facing the mess my house became in the process.

The Daily Write: Skin (October 30, 2012)

She had two fur coats, two soft Himalayan kittens and bottles of lotion and shampoo from every hotel in which she had ever been a guest. Not to mention the white guest robes tied neatly together at the waist and the multiple pairs of first class slippers from her many flights between SeaTac and JFK. Not only was she a first class flight attendant, she had married a much older man who had grown children and a fancy law degree. An unlikely couple it seemed to me. But then, I was the poor kid who had just come from living in a mobile home behind a giant chain link fence with people who vowed to kill anyone who trespassed on their property.

When they were gone, I liked to open the closet to touch the coats - so luxurious and unfathomable. So dead. So elegant.

The same can't be said for the kittens. They were annoying, only had eyes for their owner, and suffered through bath time in the sink of the utility bathroom. Cats don't like getting wet. They certainly don't like being blow dried. I don't know what she was thinking. Perhaps, in her mind ,she had mixed up fancy Hollywood mini-dogs with cats.

I moved in when I was 18, having left my country nanny job for one I thought would be more tolerable and sophisticated. The house was three times as big, not including the downstairs play room with a built in stage and professional ballet bar. There was a pool. And his and her bathrooms. Her's even had a bidet.I was in my own wing with their daughter, who inhabited a room of white, pink and giant stuffed animals. She had a closet across one entire wall with two tiers to hold all her clothes.

My room was less glamorous, at the back by the side entrance. I had a TV and a phone. And by the time I moved all of my stuff in, not much room to move. Not that it mattered, I was hardly ever in there. I worked six days a week, often from morning until hours after dinner. My wage? $300 a month, plus room and board. They told me they'd give me an extra $100 a month if I lasted a year. Little did I know I was one in a long string of nannies.

I should talk about their little girl. Golden white blond, cute smile. Loved to watch Frosty the Snowman (over and over and over) while she ate breakfast. Mostly I didn't know how to keep her entertained and her parents didn't know how to pay her any real attention. I was the utility caregiver - they were there for occassional encouragement and presents.

I never did get that extra $100 a month. Couldn't make it past two months there before I realized I was being taken advantage of. After that I was unemployed for too long before landing a job delivering pizza. I would do that 100 times over again rather than live with the nouveau riche and all their furry pretensions.

The Daily Write: Photo #2 (October 29, 2012)

Buddy hated bowling. Couldn't stand the way people looked all gangly and awkward on that slippery wooden floor, couldn't stand the smell of the old carpets which looked like they'd been pulled off the floors of Studio 54 after 20 years of use, and absolutely hated the cheap diner next to the equally cheap and tawdry bar. He was so vehemently opposed to the notion that bowling was a sport that if you asked him about it, he would practically start screaming.

"Don't bring up bowling. You know I hate it! Stupid."

Jeanie couldn't exactly understand what was stupid about bowling. Not that she loved it, but her young son had decided to join a "league" (more like a gathering of tired kids on the too-early Saturday mornings and weekend dads with hangovers and unkempt beards), so she found herself trying to be positive about the game far more often than she could have ever imagined.

"But my son likes it!" She would say, innocently, emphatically, and not without wry enjoyment of Buddy's escalating pulse.

"Let's just talk about something else." Buddy grabbed a pack of smokes off his desk and high tailed it outside to the smoking section by the old Hydrangea bush. Jeanie hated the way the smokers took over all the beautifully outdoor space. It was bad when people smoked indoors, but at least you know you could escape to fresh air. Now the smokers took all that too.

"Okay, okay, fine." Jeanie replied. "Remember that scene in the first Indiana Jones where the boulder almost hits him in the tomb?" She snickered to herself and waved the smoke out of her face.

The Daily Write: What a deal! (October 28, 2012)

I walked into the girl's room at the end of the hall by drama and music. Shawna, LaTonya and some chick I didn't know where in there, smoking and laughing. I fucking hated it when people were in the rest room. I just wanted to pee, but instead, I felt like I was walking the gauntlet. I had to make small talk, pee while hoping they would talk and not listen to the tinkling, and get out of there without having some bad shit go down.

Bathrooms and junior highs are a bad combination. Unsupervised tough chicks worse. They did that stupid thing where they suddenly got all quiet while I was trying to finish., shushing each other and laughing and then going totally silent. I should have told them to fucking knock it off, but I wasn't quite one of them and that would have been idiotic, especially with my pants down.

They were all staring at me when I got out, mean. Like they were about to beat the shit out of me. I thought they might - Shannon was known for going off on people and LaTonya you did not fuck around with. But they busted up and told me to come over.

Shannon was holding a skinny joint wrapped in red, white and blue smoke paper. She told me I should take a toke. I didn't want to in the bathroom at school. Being high at school made it worse than it already was - the Rah Rahs and their evil boyfriends, the slamming lockers, the clicking of the school secretary's heels on the scuffed linoleum floors.

I tried to get out of it, but then LaTonya got in my face, smiled big and told me it was laced with Angel Dust. My heart started beating too loud and fast, I thought they were gonna realize what a pussy I was. I remembered the black and white movie we saw in health about PCP. A women smoked it and then turned into a lunatic before she tried to cut up someone and then jump out the window of a mental hospital.

Shannon was watching my face. I thought she could hear me breathe. That other bitch was by the door, guarding it. LaTonya was breathing in my scared air, the light behind her making her hazy. Or maybe that was my nerves.

I wanted to run out but there was no way. If I did that, they'd either catch me before I got to the door and beat the shit out of me, or they'd tell everyone and I would have to leave school. So, I did it. Took the joint, sucked a toke and wondered why it was so light - no taste except burning paper. Then they started laughing at me again while they walked out the door.

"That shit ain't no PCP Strauss. That's just a paper."

I turned red, felt tingling down my arms and was so goddamn relieved.

The Daily Write: Up close (October 27, 2012)

Up close

It has a new name now. Daynight Donuts. They sell a lot of different foods and there are signs all over the windows. It's not clean and simple with clean glass that lets you see through to the curved counter. There's no more cigarette machine under the window to the fryer where I used to stand watching my accidental friends drop rounds of batter into simmering oil.

The smokes were .55 cents a pack, two quarters and a nickle. I usually had enough to buy one pack and one cup of coffee. When it was just Shari and Beth, they would let me stay there all night, refilling my coffee while I smoked, they worked, and we talked between customers. I liked to watch Shari refill the coffee while Beth made more donuts. Sometimes I had enough money to buy an old-fashioned glazed, my favorite.

At night on the corner where the four lane street split into two, one going toward downtown and one going toward the freeway, I sat under the buzzing bright florescents in the corner closest to the back wall and the glassed in edge of the counter. From there I could see what was going on in the service area while I talked to my friends, and watch outside, looking to see who was pulling in, who was walking by and who was coming in the double doors.

I could hide if I wanted, play with the paper from a sugar pack while watching the end of my cigarette as it sizzled with my inhales. Or I could look up at whomever came in, trying to get noticed, or get a free donut. Mostly, I waited while the girls worked. When they couldn't talk to me and no one interesting walked in, I sat there and thought about what might be coming next, always ready for that thing I knew I was missing, the reason I didn't sleep at night. I couldn't bare the thought that I might miss out on the action. And I kept hoping I'd meet a man, someone who would understand me, take care of me and finally make me feel beautiful. I wanted to be rescued.

I liked dark men, men with muscles and long hair, men with tattoos and rugged faces. I liked big men. Men who were tall and tough, but had a gleaming warmness in their eyes. Men who only cared about me. I liked men who were handsome and protective and kind, but hard. These are not the kind of men that came through the doors of Dunkin' Donuts. So, not wanting to turn down the only attention I could get, I went home with a skinny blond guy about 7 years older than me to look at his photos.

As hard edged as I tried to make myself appear, I was soft, naive, and actually thought that I'd be viewing his photos while we got high in his living room in the nondescript box of an apartment. Not much in the way of decorations. White walls. It wasn't dirty and I wasn't really looking. I thought I was supposed to be showing interest in his images. That was the right thing to do. That's what I agreed to do. So when he invited me into his bedroom at 3 am while he turned on the stereo, I was confused. When he had me sit on his bed and didn't pull out a stack of photographs for me to look at, I was not sure how to act. When he leaned in and put his tongue in my mouth, I went with it. I was high, he was a port in the storm, and I liked being touched, even if his hair was too light and too stringy, and his body was too small.

At 14, I wore widely flared jeans that drug on the ground and got holes in them. Or worse, ripped when my rubber wedge Famolare sandals were caught in the denim while I tried not to trip. I often wore a blue t-shirt with cut outs around the neck and I tried to feather my frizzy brown hair, clipping in a silk flower on one side, just like my mom. On my neck was a cloisonne unicorn necklace, one of the many unicorns I collected. I wore liquid beige foundation from my neck up, blue eyeshadow on the top of my lids and under my bottom lashes, and lipstick that smeared on my buck teeth. I wasn't exactly ugly, but I never thought of myself as cute either.

I don't know exactly what that skinny white boy saw in me. Someone vulnerable. Easy. When I tried to, at his urging, suck him off, I scraped his dick with my teeth and he moved my head away, telling me I could stop. I was relieved. I had never seen a penis up close and didn't like the look of it. I read a lot of porn back then, Penthouse Forum stories. I knew the words, but not the mechanics. And I really wasn't ready. So I left.

I was always leaving before things got bad. Sometimes I ran. Sometimes I hid. Sometimes I prayed that the car I was in would stop so I could get out before I was trapped. But this time I just walked out, disheveled and down to my last smoke, and walked a long way in the dawn light down the street, past the graveyard, to my house.

I was a reject who had done something wrong. I felt sick about having gone home with someone whose intentions I had so badly misinterpreted. I was ugly. I was stupid. And I was so relieved. Of course, now I can add another word: Lucky. Anything could have happened, and it didn't. I survived that experience and countless others.

The same can't be said for Shari and Beth from the donut shop. All those nights hanging out until dawn talking to them about the monotony of our lives while I drank coffee, smoked and waited. All those nights looking at beautiful dark skinned Beth, wishing I had some of her good looks. And admiring Shari's perfectly feathered hair. I had no idea what was coming. No one could.

By the time they were cleaning the office building at night, when the intruder broke in and hog tied them, I was up the street, having moved from all night donuts to a 24-hour Carrows Restaurant. By the time they were shot in the head, one by one, I was taking rides with Danny and Lori in his van, the Sundowner, the orange words painted in script across a desert scene with a cow skull and tumbleweed. That same orange lined the floor and platform inside the van behind the bucket seats, shag carpet.

I had moved on to another tedious situation where I smoked, drank coffee and shared extra crispy french fries with barbecue sauce with my friends while Shari and Beth had been terrorized by a notorious serial killer. One lived and one died.

There's some things in life you just don't get over, even when they didn't happen to you.

The Daily Write: Why am I here? (October 26, 2012)

My friend, Claudine and I, with whom I always got into trouble and never felt safe anyway, were somehow convinced to get into the big old hot rod of Bruce, the older kid from down the street who had a mean younger brother named Brian that tried to rip my clothes off in the park one night. Bruce was popular as a bad boy with his big blue car and propensity for having the pot we all wanted. He didn't pay much attention to the younger girls like us; he only ever noticed me to laugh in my face and make me feel as ugly as I thought I was.
So, when he asked us to go for a ride to pick up something outside of town, we went, excited to have been noticed. I probably slipped out of the house without telling my mom. Not that it would have mattered much; she had no control of me and I didn't listen for shit. Which sucked actually. If she had and I did, then I might have avoided feeling as if I were so often on the verge of danger: rape, murder, accidents, fights.

We got into the back seat of Bruce's car with its jacked up back tires, some chick I didn't know in front, him laughing, passing us a bottle to drink from, a joint to toke. We went all the way out of town on Commercial Street, to I-5. He wouldn't tell us what was up - where we were going, exactly what we were picking up. I got scared when the town dropped away behind us and we were out by Enchanted Forest and the Turner exit on the freeway. That's where he turned off. Nothing much there - an abandoned gas station, a hill with a rough rode. The freeway on the left, dark night shadows on the right. And then he pulled over at the gas station and told us to get out and wait. Said he'd be back as he and blond girl in the front laughed and screeched off up the hill.

There were no cell phones back then, not even a phone booth. There wasn't an open store or people driving by except on the freeway. Night. Isolated. We didn't understand why he dropped us off. We didn't know when he'd be back. Down to our last two smokes we waited. And waited. But Bruce never came back. Which we figured was why he was laughing when he dropped us off. Stupid, inconsequential girls. Gullible wannabes.

We had to get down to the freeway from the exit overpass and stand on the side with our thumbs out, finally getting picked up by some old man whose eyes were a little too bright. Lucky for us he said he was an off-duty cop and he actually took us back to my house. Lucky.

The Daily Write: Something silly (October 24, 2012)

Something silly

"So it really doesn't exist?" She asked, somewhat rhetorically, while hoping for an answer that would not destroy her long held fantasies.

"Not that I've found," Monica replied while pretended not to eat the cake by only picking off little bites at a time, as if being non-committed would somehow mean that she wasn't actually mainlining the chocolate decadence.

Jonesy liked this "absentee eating," pattern of her friend. She found it endearing. But then, Jonesy's tactic in life was to find things about others, and herself, endearing so that she would be less annoyed.

They were sitting at a table near, but not in the window seats with warm golden light from the caramel colored ceiling lamps warming up the orange wood of the floor. Outside a light drizzle in the dim gray light made everything feel a little more quiet, a little more contained, safe even.

Monica wiped her fingers absentmindedly on the cloth napkin and started fidgeting with the tea cup, golden white contrasted with the oily mahogany of the small but heavy table.

"You know, I've been thinking...." Jonesy sighed slightly and looked out the window as she talked. "Maybe I've been limiting myself too much with marriage."

Without moving her head or changing the position of her mouth, Monica lifted her eyes to look right at Jonesy with that "you've got to be kidding me," look Jonesy knew she'd get.

"What? I mean come on, you've been dating for a year now and you're getting it more than you ever did with old Mack. And look at you, never been more radiant, or self confident."

Monica shook her head, "You've got it all wrong Jonesy! I do the best I can in my circumstances. And yeah, sometimes it's fun. But come on, do I have to remind you about Stalker Steve? Or Pouting Tom?" She tapped one finger against the edge of the saucer holding her nearly empty cup. "Give me a break!"

Jonesy laughed. "Okay, I know I know. But geezus aitch Monica, I just don't get it enough."

"That, my friend, is the fate of all women - starting with puberty, then pregnancy, and finally peri-menopause. We're at the whim of our chemicals." And with that she dug back into the cake while laughing ruefully.

The Daily Write: What's in the bowl (October 21, 2012)

What's in the bowl

At Gavilan Ranch far up in the New Mexico mountains with red clay roads and long eared bunnies that loped ahead of me on the path, there was a geodesic dome. Buckminster Fuller designed them. I knew his name and face at the exact moment I knew his structure. You don't utter "geodesic dome" without also mentioning the man. I'm not sure why. It's not like we do that with the Empire State Building. Or pyramids. Well, that's not fair. Pyramids were a group effort.

The dome, white and otherworldly, sat at the back of the lower camp, next to a rustic rock and wood labyrinth (Naturally. I mean, who would consider erecting a dome without also putting in a meditation maze?). The same property contained a yurt big enough for encounter groups, a pool and a hot tub which I floating in, naked and blissful, during a summer thunderstorm and downpour, having no idea of the danger.

Not to digress, but that's the thing about life. Anticipation is a bitch. It kills spontaneity. It overcomes good times with fear. Anticipation, my friends, is a buzz kill.

But, since I didn't make the old Ben Franklin connection, I had no idea that I was in danger. Therefore, I relished the feeling of warm bubbly water against my cold wet skin as I got drenched from above and watch the clouds erupt with shocks of light, fingers of electricity.

On this same trip I set up my tent all by myself (I am not mechanically nor manual labor inclined), but having arrived late and not knowing a thing about just how much rain could fall in the desert, I ended up drenched on a shifting but uncomfortable surface. And so, like so many other times in my life...I slept on the couch. This one was in the common room between the porch and the dining hall. Not much privacy, but that was a secondary concern.

The Daily Write: It didn't work (October 19, 2012)

It didn't work

I poured over Bon Appetit every month as I sat on my single father's rag-tag couch in a too hot living room in an ugly house on a wreck of a street in an otherwise opulent town. The afternoon light was the worst, when the dust bunnies rose in the air, filthy reminders of what I didn't have.

I dreamed, in equal measure, of sinking my feet into lush wall-to-wall carpet in a home with a foyer and pool, and of eating Boeuf Wellington, the rich mushroom Duxelle coating my mouth in luxurious salt and dark, loamy sauce.

While I turned the pages, willing myself into an imagined state of culinary pleasure, I tried to close the fingers of my right hand around my left wrist. That has always been my test. Weight gain, can't wrap. Weight loss, I can touch my finger tips together.

Only 3:30 in the afternoon. Not time for "dinner" and no snacks except another pack of sugarless gum. I had already exceeded my 5 piece quotient for the day. I ached for something more. Nourishment. A big house. Dinner.

I regretted my last meal. I wanted something fancy and memorable, a memory to sustain me through the months of impending starvation. I wanted sophistication like the kind I imagined was happening at the formal dining room tables of all those lucky rich kids. I wanted to make it myself, to prove just how good I was. Unfortunately, I chose ostentatious and deeply greasy Chicken Kiev as my pièce de résistance. No matter how bloated my stomach got from lack of food, no matter how dry my mouth or scaly my scalp, no matter the fact that the enamel on my teeth was coming off in future months, the thought of that last meal always made me queasy. Still does.

Nothing prepares you for starvation. And nothing makes being poor seem palatable when you are hungry for more.

The Daily Write: Shoes (October 18, 2012)

Shoes

Achmed walked all over campus barefoot. Amusing in spring. Interesting in fall. Crazy in winter, especially in the year of the big snow storm. Night time, campus street lights shining down into Red Square covered with frozen crystals. A winter of magic. Thanksgiving break. Me still on campus in the dorms, nowhere particular to go. A few of us still around, building giant snow people, the kind you start rolling on the road above the lower courtyard and then push down the hill until the ball is as big as a truck and your boots get stuck in the snow when you try to push it to make it even bigger.

Achmed - a flabby white boy with a blond Afro. Jewish probably. But with a Muslim name. He was one of those self-contained guys with a Mona Lisa smile. Not self conscious. Not trying to prove anything to anyone. Smart. Self directed.

And barefoot.

I remember watching him walk up the icy frozen cement stairs by the College Activities Building toward Red Square and the library clock tower. I was cold in ill fitting boots and whatever layers I could pull together. The Ecuadoran wool sweater in greens and blues that smelled like the hay the sheep must've eaten. A shawl on my head. Baggy jeans. And Achmed with those big, meaty feet.

Did he do it for religious reasons? Was it some sort of survival test? Did he simply hate to be shod? I hope I never find him on Facebook so I can never ask him. Sometimes satisfying ones curiosity isn't worth ruining the embedded memories.

When I think of snow and winter and the Northwest of the 80's, Achmed, I think of you.

The Daily Write: In the corner (October 17, 2012)

In the corner

I think all 5-year-olds are obsessed with their own butts. It's just natural. They are very regular, but somehow slightly naughty. And you can shake them. Plus, that's where the poop comes out. But still, he shouldn't have hit me.

 

In fact, he should have appreciated the fact that I was developmentally right on target. And it was his daughter who egged me on anyway. She wanted to flash her tush at the boys as they ran by the bathroom door. I thought that sounded fun. I mean, I was scared, but excited. So I did it.

 

And guess who walked by? Yep. Him. The dad.

 

I was only five so I don't remember much. I get him confused with a man I helped die once, long after he had grown old and I had grown up. A father of my  best childhood friend. A man who intimidated and ignored me when I was the hungry little fat kid who hung out at his house every day after school hoping to eat something from his wife's special dinner buffet. At my house, we usually had frozen mixed vegetables with Hamburger Helper and iceberg lettuce salad. Or pop up TV dinners. Or Burger King. Once in a while my dad would grill a steak, but only when it wasn't too hot or too cold.

 

I thought everyone "normal" ate at buffets every night like my best friend's family. I wished I lived with them instead of with my stern and scary dad and my brother. Can you imagine being motherless in a wealthy bedroom community in the early 70s? Without a mansion?

 

But when I was 5 I hadn't yet met them. I was with another friend. A girl whose name I will likely never remember. Her mom was named Bee. I know that cause she was mean and fat with a bulldog haircut and a stern face. She looked so old to me in her mumu. Her hair seemed salt and pepper black shorn on top of her head. I don't even know how she let a wild hippie child like me in her house. And her husband. I don't know if he ever did talk to us kids. He wore white sleeveless t-shirts under button ups. He probably liked country music. Like Dawn's father. Like Wendy's dad. All those crotchety redneck white men. We never did get along much.

 

I guess he felt like it was okay to spank me. He did it to his daughter. It was our bare butts together that got us in trouble when we stuck them out into the hallway. My mom was not happy about it. But how old was she by then? Maybe 27. Struggling. Next to no money. She needed neighbors who would look after the kids. She probably told him it wasn't okay, but in some passive 1960s voice that didn't really get noticed.

 

My daughter is 6. She loves to shake her booty. She stands in front of the mirror admiring her own rear. I laugh. I don't tell her what happened to me.  Butt shame is not worth passing down.

The Daily Write: The surprise (October 16, 2012)

The Surprise

A nighttime bike ride at the age of 47. At least 100 pounds heavier than I was when I was 14 and thought myself so fat. A helmet, we didn't wear those in the 1970s. Bike lights. Those didn't exist either. At least, not on the 10-speeds of any of the other teens I knew. No smokes. It's been longer than you can imagine.

But here's what I did notice: the way you can tell something about a neighborhood from its smells. Even at 9:30 pm, I went by a house of fried chicken. Three times. And down a dark neighborhood street where I told myself all the places I could stop or scream someone's name if I got jumped, the smell of cigarette smoke. As if the ghost of a person had just exhaled. No sign of a human, but a lingering scent of vice. I felt watched in the dark tooling by on my Electra Cruiser with a pink silk flower on one handlebar and a squeaky wicker basket on the front.

Ride by a car full of people chatting by a well lit park during a ballgame once, they look with some interest but continue their car/sidewalk conversation. Go around the park and ride by again, they stop talking for a second. The third time, you and they look each other in the eye. It's the polite thing to do. They notice that you are a middle-aged pudgy joy-rider. You notice that they parked their white SUV at an odd angle as if to say, "I own this here part of the street and I'll make it mine."

I read someone's comment on a blog or an article or maybe Facebook recently amounting to the declaration that biking is shitty exercise. That was deflating. I hope it's not true. I felt my heart rate rise tonight in the coolness of an autumn summer breeze. I was even sweating a little when I got home, talking through the window to  my barking dogs. "It's me guys. It's me."