I’m really shy
August 1, 2013
and quite honestly, it’s a pain.
I was invited to a party tonight. A party thrown by a woman and man I don’t know that well, but that I think are probably incredibly cool. I know a few of the other people that were going to be there, also pretty cool. I live in a small town, so I feel like it is not only a good idea for me to make friends with incredibly cool people, but that it would also be helpful to my kids. The more friends I have, the wider the circle of people in my kids lives. It all sounds pretty silly, but trust me, every kid wants a parent that hangs out with the “cool” parents.
I didn’t make it thru the front door. I got home from work, took Katy to the library. Walked the dog next door. Picked out the dress, and removed the chipped polish from my toe nails. Took a shower. Put on the dress. Put on another dress. Put the first dress back on, and put my hair up in a knot, designed to look like I had put no thought into it all. (For about six hours, I had been debating up do or quality time with the blowdryer. Decided didn’t want to take forty five minutes to blow dry my hair, was late enough already.) Scowled at shoes. Scowled at toenails. Put shoes on, and kissed kids goodbye. Actually, tried to kiss kids goodbye, in truth, got half a cheek and a nod.
I drove to the gas station a block away. Called my friend from high school in New Jersey. We spent a half an hour talking about teenagers, sex and personal, personal grooming.
I drove the car home.
My son wasn’t happy with me; he liked the idea of having a mom with a social life. Maybe he thinks if I go to more cocktail parties he will have more time on the internet without me looking over his shoulder.
Most of my friends, and I do have friends, just not a “circle” of friends, maybe a kind of large sliver, would not think of me as shy. I come across like a golden retriever, bliss and smiles, easy conversation and, I hope, an empathetic ear.
But the truth is, groups scare the hell out me. Even brief conversation occasionally terrifies me. I fill in those moments with what seems to be casual observations about someone’s jewelry, job or kids until the feeling passes.
Social grace does not come easily to me. But writing about my lack of social grace is not nearly as terrifying. That is a mystery that might make good cocktail party conversation, that is if and when I make it to a cocktail party. And choose to come across as a self involved bitch who wants to do nothing more than talk about herself.
Oh my. Maybe I should think about moving to a really, really small town where no one speaks any English.
It’s My Party
July 28, 2013
My family threw me a surprise party today. There were hamburgers and hotdogs, grilled chicken and pickles, vanilla cake with strawberry filling, ice cream. I got a candle holder in the shape of an owl and some candles scented like apple pie to nestle inside the owl, approximately where the owls digestive tract would be. My daughter gave me a designer contact lens case, my neighbor gave me a bracelet, my brother in law cooked for hours.
I had plans for this evening; my friends at church were holding a pot luck to meet the candidate for the position of Director of Congregational Life. But when I got home from the surprise party, I was a little drunk. My sister in law’s gift was a really good bottle of Chardonnay. And I wanted to wait for my son to get home from an afternoon with his basketball coach. Mostly, I was a little drunk, and overfed on chips and cheese.
I gathered the dogs. Sophie, the Magnificent, Wondrous Creature and Coco, the Almost As Magnificent and Wondrous Creature, who lives next door. I found the last of the headphones that work. I poured a cup of this mornings coffee into a go cup. I sprayed on bug spray, I stuffed my bare feet into a pair of Colin’s sneakers.
I went to the woods. I was alone. I put Warren Zevon on my phone, placed my head phones over my ears, and followed the dogs. They raced thru the woods. Coco hops, he’s a mini Doberman Pinscher. Sophie bounds on three legs; she might have Lyme, she might have arthritis, we can’t afford another trip to the vet.
The dogs laughed, and ran, and wrestled. I sang along to songs about Carmelita and headless gunners. There was no one else there, it was almost dark and the clouds promised rain.
I was probably still a little drunk from earlier, I don’t drink much these days. So it felt like a party, walking in the woods with the dogs, some songs and my own self.
Second time round, and I guess at my age it’s ok; happy birthday to me. And thanks to all of those in my life that make me incredibly so happy.
Happy Birthday
July 26, 2013
Today is a big day, it is my birthday. For three days, I’ve been thinking- Do I write about this? Do I not write about this? Do I have anything profound and/or funny to say about birthdays in general or my birthday, specifically?
At first, I considered writing about the time I truly realized that I was going to die someday. I was in my 20’s, never really pondered mortality that much, (kind of strange considering my father had done just that a few years before,). I remember laying there, on this huge bed, trying to figure out how I felt about the fact that someday I was not going to be around. I was eating Greek pizza from a place down the street. I remember wondering if maybe I should try to go back to college so I could get a really good job and have the money to buy organs of the black market. I remember putting on the soundtrack to Dangerous Minds and dancing around to the song “Gangsta’s Paradise” so I’d stop thinking about it. Twenty years have gone by since my obvious revelation and I’m still not happy with the idea that my life has a preordained, unsatisfactory conclusion.
That’s a little too gloomy, and besides, it’s a bit boring.
So, I approached my topic from another angle. What about if I simply examined…
Me. I could talk about how I’ve changed thru the years. These days, I’m sunny and easy going; before I was described as flighty, dramatic and moody, ( the vodka gimlets and copious amounts of wine might have had something to do with the latter.) I eat salads with fruit on them, and l admit, in the midst of my very closest friends, to listening to country and western music. I am a dog woman, formerly a devout cat worshipper. I am even tempered, where as before I was one of my very favorite hobbies was to indulge in the great pleasures of the wallow.
And I want to go back. Just to the wallowing, (I really like salads with fruit, and easy going is kind of a nice way to be). I would like nothing more than to put on a pair of ugly pajamas, poor myself a glass of wine with a screw top cap and indulge in a boatload of self pity.
My one birthday gift was that Colin consented to help Katy clean up the dog poop in her room without me having to beg him.
There is no cake anywhere in my immediate future.
And it’s raining just enough so that I have no hope, even with the assistance of a blowdryer, product, and a straightning wand imported from Italy, of having even a tolerable hair day.
I shouldn’t feel bad. My girlfriends took me out to dinner the other night. And they remembered without me dropping even one hint. And it was good. I only wish that in our little foursome, I was still Samantha, the tall blonde with the sexy voice and nasty sense of humor. These days, I’m afraid I’m Miranda. With thicker thighs and less promising career.
But-
My brother in law sang me happy birthday this morning.
We are taking my son to Six Flags on Tuesday for his birthday and I really, really love amusement parks.
And though it’s raining, and there is no hope for my mane, it’s not raining hard enough to keep me from walking the dogs.
And, if I really want cake, I can stop at the store and pick one up on the way home.
Because that is the person I am now.
I let myself wallow, but only for fifteen minutes at a time.
I Miss Smoking Sometimes
July 19, 2013
In the course of my life, I’ve made some really bad choices. As a matter of fact, one of my chosen topics-to-ponder of late is just how many of these bad choices, and in how much detail, do I share with my kids. Should I be a walking, talking, cautionary tale, or should I tell stories about a dear friend of mine from high school. That died a horrible, painful death.
I’m still working that out, and I will let you know what I decide. That is, unless they peel themselves away from IFunny and Instagram and read my blog. In which case, it’s a mute point.
I don’t miss standing in line for the bathroom, or checking my nose in the mirror before heading out. I don’t miss long, intense conversations about bad things that happened in high school, endless Scrabble games, or racing to the liquor store at 10:45, (I’ve spent a good part of my life in Massachusetts, liquor stores close at 11.)
I’ve never been able to figure out why I clung to those things for so long. For a little while, it was fun. We felt like we were all part of an inside joke, had stumbled on a way to feel perpetually like a member of the cool crowd. We thought our conversations were unique, our observations hysterical, our taste in clothes and restaurants and drinks and clubs and friends were impeccable.
Looking back, I suppose clothes looked good because all I’d have for dinner was three bites before I got distracted by another trip to the ladies room. Restaurants were amazing because I was only nibbling on food until I could get up and use the ladies room again. Drinks were amazing because they got me drunk, or took the edge off, depending on where I was in the evening. And friends were anyone and everyone that were doing the same stupid things that I was.
So, it’s established, I don’t miss those days. But sometimes, I miss the cigarettes. The standing outside with a stranger. The first puff, the curl of smoke and the smell of sulphur. The way that first drag established the end of a meal. The end of a day. The end of really good sex. Regret, joy, exhaustion… all of these seemed to be well celebrated with a lit Marlboro, a few minutes, and a deep couple of drags.
Now at the end of a day, or at the end of a meal, I go to the pool. We live in a small town, right outside of Boston. There is a huge outdoor pool about a mile away from our home.At 6:30 most nights, I head over. Some nights I bring my daughter. Tonight, I went by myself.
I am probably the only adult in my age group that visits Cunningham Pool without trailing behind a few kids. I know the man at the gate that checks the tags. He hasn’t asked for mine in about five years. Which is good, because I put them away as souvenirs the first day I pick them up.
I smile, make brief conversation about how hot, cold, humid or rainy it’s been. He agrees. We decide that tomorrow it will be more of the same.
Then I step inside. I peel off my clothes, I always wear my swim suit underneath. I drop them on top of my cell phone, on top of my gym bag, on top of my purse. I creep into the water, down the kiddie stairs in the shallow end. I ignore the cute babies. Most of the time, I love cute babies, but at the pool, it’s best not to think about them.
Then I swim. I slip down the length of the pool to the lap lane. First lap, I dolphin dive. I follow the floor of the pool, parallel to the bottom. I look at the pine needles and elastics. I wiggle my stomach and flop my legs like a novice mermaid. I come up, I gulp air, I dive down again. Next lap is free style. I sprint. I stretch my arms long, out of their sockets, I reach far like my coach taught me thirty some years ago. I take few breaths, I slid thru the water like a blade, or a shark, or a competitor. Next lap is back stroke. I leave my goggles on, they are cloudy, but I can make out the sun falling down, and the pine branches above. I pull hard.
I rotate the strokes. I go fast, mostly, except when I’m playing little mermaid under the water. I swim for about an hour, straight thru the adult swim, until about fifteen minutes before the pool closes. Then, I make my way thru the shallow part of the pool, to the stairs. I step out of the water I peel my goggles of my face. I pull the bottoms of my swim suit back to where they belong. I smile at the cute babies. I say hello to the moms I know, and nod at the moms I don’t . I look at the pregnant women with a mixture of awe, recognition and on really hot days, an expression that probably says “thank god I’m done with that.”
I don’t know how I can swim so long, and so fast when I consider all of the horrible things I’ve done to my body over the years. Especially the smoking. I don’t know how I can swim the length of the pool without taking a breath when I consider that for a lifetime my favorite thing to do was to fill my lungs with smoke, hold it like a gift, and then blow it away.
But I do know when I look back on these days, it will be with the knowledge that these days, and these choices are not mistakes.
I can tell my children that truth, and maybe that will hold them for a while.
In Case I Forget To Tell You…
July 13, 2013
The other day a friend of mine asked me why I blogged. Since then, I’ve been giving the matter a lot of thought. I turned over the obvious reasons for a bit. I like being able to get in touch with my “creative side”. I enjoy sharing my own particular view of the world as much as I savor getting glimpses from others when I bump around their pages.
But they really weren’t quite right.
I just like to write stuff down.
For a long, long time, from about the age of eighteen, to somewhere in the middle of my 20’s, I watched my father succumb to Alzheimer’s Disease. Many of my memories of him are flavored with the picture of him trying to light a cigarette upside down, squinting at a friend of mine while he searched for their name, looking at me with an expression of total joy, then asking- “Are you the person that brings the ice cream?”
For about twenty years after that time, I did pretty much most of the stupid things people do when they are lost in grief. I drank way too much. I stuffed, snorted and smoked anything I could get my sad nicotine stained little hands on. I stayed up so late I actually bought curtains for their ability to block out morning. i woke up so late, it was sometimes night. And so I’d start it all again, right after I had my “good morning” cigarette.
I don’t know how I got my life back. These days, I work at the YMCA. I just passed my ACE exam, which means I am now a certified personal trainer. I get up at six in the morning most days, and I don’t have to drink coffee to stay awake. I like coffee, and I like being awake. I know this sounds pretty normal to most people, but to me, even after about ten years of not being an idiot, I still savor not having a hangover. I still relish opening my eyes because I’m happy. And not because I really, really have to pee from the two bottles of wine I drank the night before.
I like going to sleep at night instead of passing out.
I started my blog for my kids. I want them to see our lives, right now, while they are young, the way I see them. I want them to know how very much I love going to the pool with Katy and how much she makes me laugh. I want them to read about how proud I am of Colin, when he catches a snake, or stuffs a ball thru a hoop. I want them to know I love these days, that I celebrate the chance to be front and center in the audience while they grow up.
I watched my father lose his mind, and for a long time, that took a toll on me. But at the end of the day, it taught me how elusive the moments that make up our lives are, and how sometimes the memories don’t last.
I wish I had more of him than some photographs, a painting and some records. He was the most wonderful, charming, loving man in the whole world. He looked like Robert Redford. He laughed with his eyes. He loved me and for a long, long time he made me feel like there was nothing wrong in my life he couldn’t fix. That other person he became was just a man that taught me what I needed to know. It just took me a while to figure it out.
I don’t know if I’ll get Altzheimer’s. But I do know that someday, I’m going to die. And I really like to write stuff down.
I am blessed to be living a life that has contained so many memories worth saving.
Missing
July 11, 2013
It was a tough day. Lost library book. Hot. Fight with Colin, my son, about what I know now was absolutely nothing. Three hours ago it seemed important while I sat on my stairs and weighed punishments.
Each disagreement we have now that he is heading toward his thirteen year is dark with danger – is this the moment he stops liking me? Each punishment or consequence is an opportunity to establish important policy. (There are repercussions for not leaving a note, for taking five dollars from my purse, for teasing his sister.) Each punishment or consequence is an opportunity for me to prove myself to be an inflexible ass. (He did call my cell, I’d told him I’d give him a few dollars, and what twelve year old boy doesn’t tease his sister.)
So I removed myself, and his sister, from the battlefield. It is July, there is a pool less than a mile away, and it is open from 6 until 7:45 every week night.
Katy and I swam. I did laps, she chased behind me and grabbed my toes when she could. I taught her the words to a song that begins “There once was a farmer who took a young miss”. I got irritated when she fell behind on our way to the car. She wasn’t happy when I denied her movie request. It was a wonderful, normal summertime night.
When we got home, the lights were out. I called for Colin. No answer. I fed the animals, I reminded Katy that we were not going to add a hamster to our menagerie until I was not the only one feeding the animals.
I called for Colin. It was dark. There wasn’t a note. Most nights, I would have just taken the dog to the park to remind him of the time. But he and I had been arguing. He wouldn’t have gone to the park.
I checked the phone for incoming calls, a telemarketer called from Seattle at 7:30. I checked the phone for outgoing calls. He’d called a friend at 5:15.
I went to the park. It was dark. It was quiet. There was a teenager smoking by the batting cage. The teenager said no one had been there for at least an hour.
I texted the moms of his friends. “Looking for Colin. Heard from him?” I didn’t want to panic anyone, or look like an idiot when he strolled in dribbling his basketball. I don’t like it when he bounces that damn ball in the house. I looked for the ball, couldn’t find it. No word from Colin
I called one of the moms, and kept my tone light. She volunteered to come pick me up, take me out so we could look for him together. I made a joke about not being ready to be “one of those moms”, but if I’d known her better, I would have said yes.
When he’s nervous, everything that he says sounds like it’s heading for a punchline. It’s why by the end of the school year, half of his teachers are in love with him and half of them want to give him detention in someone else’s classroom for the rest of his life.
That is my son. And right after I thought just that thought, it occurred to me. When he’s in trouble, he gets scared. When he gets scared, he gets tired.
He was in bed. Colin was tucked in, under four blankets, behind a door in a room sealed shut, like I told him to do, when he runs the air conditioner. The air conditioner must be ten years old. It is loud. It doesn’t have power saver or even a thermostat. Just high and low.
Colin had it on low. I guess he had heard my lecture on not wasting power and that other charming ditty of mine about not zoning out in front of the tv. He’d even paid attention to that speech about reading more books; “The Chronicles of Captain Underpants” was just next to him, on top of his blankets, book mark placed towards the end.
He was missing and I missed him so much. And there he was, sleeping upstairs while I worried, cursed, wept and made stupid jokes so no one would know just how scared I was.
There is a lesson here, and I’m just not ready to learn it. I hope I have a little more time.
I’ve been checking out the fashion magazines and
July 8, 2013
Is it really true that this summer I need to think about booties?
I don’t have an infant crawling around on the floor that is in need of new footware.
According to more than one article, 2013 is the year of the bootie. Short ankle boots, available in hot summer colors. Some are an interesting amalgamation of a sandal and boot, with cuffs around the ankle and toe cleavage spilling out the tips. Some are stilettos, there are quite a few platform booties out there, and a few sport the wedge heel. According to my research, the only common difference between shoes that are known as short boots, and booties is booties are universally more expensive. But I wear flip flops, so maybe I’m missing something.
So I can now cross think about booties off of my must do list for the summer.
Just below booties, word around town is this season calls for mismatched prints, (“power clashing”) lucite heels, faux, or vegan leather skirts, overalls and anything orange.
I’m lost.
I don’t think I will ever have the time in the morning to coordinate an outfit that tells the world I’m working a power clash. I think people would simply assume all of my clothes were dirty.
Lucite heels? I’ll stick to flip flops.
Faux or vegan leather skirts might not be so bad. If it wasn’t 95 degrees, and I got aroused by the feel of vegan leather sticking to my thighs.
I always liked overalls. They have lots of pockets, which I appreciate. They are usually blue, which looks nice with my eyes. I had a pair of overalls I wore until they literally disintegrated when I was a teenager. I couldn’t go thru that pain again.
And orange. I don’t really understand orange. Maybe they picked the color orange as this season’s color because no one ever, ever wore orange before. And if you wear orange this summer, you are telling the world- ” I read fashion magazines. I do what they tell me to do. Even if everyone that sees me has experiences a sudden desire to visit the mall and order a lovely frozen orange julius from someone behind a counter that is wearing exactly the same shirt.,I don’t care. I want to look like a Kardashian.”
I have never really paid attention to fashion trends in the past. But this year, I wanted to make an effort. I don’t want to look like I’m on my way to either a Grateful Dead concert or the gym.
But if that calls for the wearing of booties and jumpsuits, I’m just going to have to wait for next year. Although it’s already July. Which means in a week fall fashion will be splashed everywhere.
I wonder how I’d look in gauchos?
Book Club
June 21, 2013
I love being a girl. I haven’t loved being a girl this much since I used my period to get out of gym class. Honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever reveled in my gender. I didn’t have bridesmaids when I got married, I’ve never had breasts that made me particularly proud, and I don’t really possess much in the way of feminine wiles. At least not when I’m sober. Or not when those I might want to practice them on are sober. Sorry, off point. Girls do that. Women do that. And it’s fine.
I went to my first book club meeting tonight. It was everything you’ve heard. There were carefully laid out snacks, the carrots on the tray were all the same size and the celery’s green perfectly matched the platter. There was lots of wine. And lots of diet coke. There were wine glasses, real glasses, and tall slim tumblers for those of us that chose diet coke.
And we didn’t spend our time talking about our kids, or “Shades of Gray”. Or why our husbands always forget to take out the trash. We talked about the book. Only two of us had read the whole thing, and one of us had read it five years ago. But we still talked about the book, and we talked about why we hadn’t had time to read the book. We talked about why we picked the book, and what we wanted to read next. We ate food, and we laughed and we had a really good time.
I like that women make plans to get together and talk about books. I like that we acknowledge that sometimes we want to learn something and sometimes we don’t, sometimes we want to just visit someplace we aren’t. I like that the conversation was easy, even though the wine was in the other room, and that the snacks were mostly healthy. I liked the brownies.
I like that I’m a grown up, I’ve lived here a long time, and a new bunch of girls invited me over to play.
Crash
June 20, 2013
Mostly I live my life wandering around about two or three inches above planet earth. That is how I’m oblivious, mostly, to the grime along the baseboards in the kitchen, how I barely see the dead chipmunk I need to step over on my way down the walk to get the newspaper, how I avoid dealing with cluttered closets and a pile of “artwork” I’ve been collecting since Katy figured out what crayons were for.
This attitude applies to most parts of my life. When it comes to our finances, or lack of finances, 95% of the time I’m in a blissful place where it’s lovely to have my daughter give me pedicures. I don’t even stop and think when I stop to count quarters before I suggest a trip to the Dairy Freeze.
But today I found myself yanked, unpleasantly delivered, to solid ground, no rose colored glasses, no down pillows to break my fall.
It’s the end of the school year. My son misplaced a geography textbook. Katy lost two library books. The notices say if I don’t “remit payment before the end of the school year”, five days from now, report cards will be withheld.
I’m in the process of negotiations with the powers that be at both schools to purchase replacements on EBay. The powers that be aren’t terribly pleased with my offer, since the books won’t arrive until about a week after the last day of school. Right now, it looks like my refrigerator is going to have to hold onto last semester’s report cards until fall.
After about an hour exchanging emails and bumping around used book sites, I needed to get up and get out. I didn’t give my children the usual speech about not talking to strangers and not to put anything metal in the microwave.
I told Katy she was never, ever going to get another book out of the library again.
I told Colin he needs to get a job making bagels at Brueggers, even if he has to lie about his age on the application.
I think they were probably pretty happy to see me go.
I broke out my music, and my ear buds, and in the search bar, punched in the word “martyr’.
“Accidentally Like A Martyr? came on by Warren Zevon.
I’m not going to ramble on about the amazing music of Warren Zevon. If you have any interest, you should listen. Especially if you’re not having the best of days.
His songs are beautiful, sweet, funny, loud, obnoxious, bitter and silly. He died of a brain tumor a few years ago. He worked on his last album, with the help of his friends, right up until he died.
He wrote the song “Poor Pitiful Me” and then he moved on to singing about werewolves and teenagers.
I went home and apologized. Colin isn’t going to make bagels at Bruegger’s. But he will mow the lawn. All summer. Every summer, until he can hire someone else to.
And Katy can take out library books. Paperback library books. One at a time.
I don’t have a brain tumor. I do have a house, a husband, two kids who love me most of the time, and quite a few plans for the future. So I guess, what I’m trying to say, though I’m not sure I am all the way there yet, is that
Things aren’t all that bad.
And there is always the possibility that tomorrow will be amazing. It seems distant right now, but it’s there.
Not in San Francisco
June 16, 2013
My heart is walking around outside of my body. It is far, far, far away, the next town over. It is with my son, my twelve year old son. He is at his first “real” party. By this I mean, it’s not a birthday party or a school dance.
My husband took him shopping. He is an athlete, which means for the past couple of years, his clothing budget has been spent on sneakers, shiny polyester shorts, eighteen dollar socks that bear the logo “elite”, shooting sleeves and ankle braces.
On the invitation, the dress was described as semi formal. My husband’s definition of semi formal is a suit. Colin’s is bermuda shorts. New bermuda shorts. I think he consented to wearing a belt. Oh my, I just realized tonight my son wore his first belt. Let me pause to sigh meaningfully.
Now, here are my prayers. I hope a few other kids at the party show up in bermuda shorts. (Are they still called bermuda shorts? If they aren’t called bermuda shorts, what are they called? Shorts? Really short pants?)
I hope he has fun. I hope the food is good. I hope he ate something before he left so that he doesn’t fall on the buffet the way he does when we go out for brunch. I hope he forgets about the fact that his team lost two games today. I hope he doesn’t brag. I hope he doesn’t stand in the corner and wish he was home watching the Bruins.
I hope he does’t miss me. I hope he is happy to see me and tells me that he had a good time. Even if he didn’t. But of course, he is having a wonderful time. I hope.
I hope I learn to get a life sooner rather than later, and that my heart returns to my chest so that I can walk around and go about my life like a normal person.
Who am I kidding? I lost my hearth a little more than twelve years ago, and I lost it again nine years ago when my daughter was born.
And normal is way over rated.
julierichmond 