poor rick

so Rick Springfield was on Oprah today and he still looks just like this. Hot, hot, hottie McHotmeister. But the dozens of 50-somethings wiggling around and clapping and screaming as he crooned "Jessie's Girl?" They all looked like Hillary Clinton. Looking out into the audience and seeing his pants-suited peers must be really jarring for Rick. Let's hope for his sake and sanity he is prone to '80s flashbacks.

Happy V-Day

I heard Woody Allen being interviewd recently and his response to the interviewer's question about what lessons or truths he's learned in his long life made me laugh. (Woody is 73 now. Can you believe it?)

Woody didn't hesitate before he responded, "Nothing really." I could totally relate.

The older I get the more I know I don't know shit. As a kid I just assumed that the grown-ups knew everything there was to know and I also assumed that once I too reached adulthood, I would somehow magically be instilled with this all-knowing-ness. So when I became a young adult I was shocked, shocked by the adults (especially the older adults) with whom I crossed paths who were complete fucking idiots. And by that I do not mean mentally challenged due to some sort of genetic mishap. No, I am referring to the idiots who choose freely to be ignorant assholes.

But that is a whole 'nother rant. This rant is about love. WTF is love? Who knows.

I know that most of the times in my life that I have been "in love" I have been in the end:

A: actually, just wanting to have sex with the person;

B: hugely disappointed at best and;

C: completely devastated at worst.

But unlike Woody, I haven't learned zip. I have had some moments of clarity. They may make no sense to you, but I don't give a shit. They're my truths. So here goes:

*Guys sometimes say "Baby,I love you..." during sex because at that exact moment, they sort of do. I mean, can you blame them for blurting those words out when their tiny little brains are being flooded by an electrifyingly euphoric tidal wave of hormonal surging? What they are really (usually) saying is: "Holy shit, it's good to be alive and THIS FEELS FUCKING GREAT!!!!"

*Lust is a wonderful thing. But it is not sustainable as a constant if you share the same bathroom for a few years. But if you truly had it at first, it comes back in flashes here and there, usually when the house is kid-free thanks to sleep-overs or grandparents and you have engaged in a nice dinner and/or a prolonged happy hour. It can return and manifest in a really hot romp of sweating and hair-pulling and loud vocalizing and happy endings that make your home a happy, shiny place for at least a week afterwards. And that's good to know.

*Some people (okay, not just men) oh, fuck it--it's the men--only want to be with you when you don't give a shit about them. This is particularly maddening when it's a case where you are hot for him but he has a thing for someone else who treats him like utter dogshit. So you're all: "Hey!!! Hello??? Come over here!!! I'm the one who loves you and appreciates you!!! I'm the one who really does want to give you everything you want!!!" But do they listen? No. And then when you have seen the light and walked away, they decide you may not be a bad bet after all. But at this point you're turned off and disgusted and don't give a shit anymore.

*Some of us say "I love you" without having the slightest fucking idea what that means. And how can we? It doesn't mean the same thing to everyone.

*If you find someone who loves you, wants to be with you and sticks by you no matter what (excluding acts of animal cruelty, child abuse, and certain felonies), you're good. If there's mutual respect and friendship the rest can be worked out.

*I know that I do not have one singular soul mate. I have many. And that's not a slam on the GITB who is awesome. It's about the reality of life and the odds and laws of fate and all that stuff. I know that there are a few people out there in the universe who I will never meet who are perfectly suited for me and with whom I could have shared a long, happy lifetime. Others are great guys I've met and adored but we just didn't get the timing right. A few drift in and out of my life even now. There's the guy I dated off and on in high school and college who got married impulsively at 21 then found himself single when we were in our early-30s. I loved him. But he tracked me down a few weeks after I had hooked up with the GITB. There's another old friend of mine with whom I have lunch once a year. We connect on every level and I think he's adorable. There's nothing going on, but given the right circumstances and timing for both of us, no doubt in my mind it would be a wonderful relationship. And there's nothing wrong with knowing that. Nothing is ever black and white. It's trying to force things and people into perfect compartments that causes the pain.

*I have experienced all sorts of love: puppy love; unrequited love; young, first love; intense, ill-advised psycho love; rebound love that was less real than other love but absolutely necessary; lust-driven love; and, finally, thankfully, contented, mature,I'll-take-care-of-you-after-you've-had-surgery-and-need-help-getting-on-and-off-the-toilet-love. And it's the best.

I will use the "C" word on V-Day

although I have asked my mom not to attend.

the amaryllis has bloomed

yay.

I wish I knew how to quit you.

fire cracker

when I was a teenager I had quite a lucrative babysitting racket going on. I unwittingly stumbled onto a goldmine: the field of specialization babysitting-- handling boys --which earned me hazard pay. Most of the families I sat for had packs of grubby feral boys who were (for some odd reason) like wet sauerkraut in my hands. This was not because I allowed them to smoke/drink/use foul language (although I suppose I did from time-to-time) but anyway, I never sat for sweet little girls who wanted me to play dress up with them and brush their hair and have tea parties and read Amelia Bedelia aloud to them.

No, I sat for boys who wanted to catch lizards and put them in the freezer and then play with them while they were semi-frozen and mostly in shock, or worse, they wanted to stuff the occasional firecracker into the mouth of the pop-sickled lizard, and, well, you know. They wanted to pee in the yard and ride their bikes off the diving board or roof into the pool and try to start their mom's car that was parked in the garage and look at their dad's Playboys and take bites right from the loaf of Velveeta and, well, I allowed that boys will be boys and so I let them now and then and so it went. The word spread among the moms in the neighborhood desperate for a night out that ell was cool sitting for boys and the boys liked me fine and I was booked all the time and made great money babysitting the cast of Lord of the Flies and it was good.

One of my favorite families to sit for was the Martins. They had two little tow-headed boys who were sweet as pie and the parents had a great collection of borderline-naughty paperbacks stashed on the top shelf in the TV room that I liked to peruse after I put Greg and Brad to bed. My favorite was The Sensuous Woman followed closely by The Happy Hooker.

The boys' mom was a statuesque redhead who worked at a nearby children's hospital and their dad was a fun-loving bad-boy type who I realized after I became an adult was what my dad calls "a ne'er-do-well." He had one job after another--none for very long, one venture after another that didn't quite pan out, wild hairs, crack-pot ideas and nothing that ever really took off or stuck. The boys were lucky that their mom was a grown-up and stable because their dad was Peter Pan. At one point he worked in the area making appearances as Ronald McDonald.

One night I went over to babysit and there was a pool table in the living room where a nice traditional set of living room furniture had been the week before. A month later he wallpapered the new "pool room" with tin foil and painted huge planetarium-ish spheres on the walls in hues of bright cobalt blues and deep bottle greens. Lovely, really, but kind of odd. The mom and dad split and got back together a few times. I could see that she was in love with him, but I could also see that she was embarrassed by his failure to step up to the plate and be a grown-up. They were not similar in any way. He married up when he married her and I think she was never not aware of that reality.

Eventually they split for good and he kind of faded away. I ran into him at a party when I was home one summer during college and we had a few drinks together and he seemed sad and depressed, kind of a sad, big kid.

The youngest of the two boys is a professional chef now and he lives out west. His mom and my mom are still friends and last week my mom mentioned that Brad is going to be on a new TV show on NBC called "Moment of Truth." It is one of those heinous, soulless game shows that gets people to vomit up all their pain and humiliation on camera for the chance to win a lot of money but they have to do it while attached to a lie detector machine. If they lie they lose all the money they have won. I am sickened that Brad is going to be on this show next week. It breaks my heart. His mom told my mom that one of the lines of questions the show's producers asked Brad was about his dad and they actually flew his dad to LA to surprise him on stage with a forced reunion. I say forced because under the circumstances -- on national TV --isn't it? They have been estranged since the boys were little. I guess it has a happy ending. At least for the segment that will air. Who knows what will happen afterwards. I hope it's good. I hope.

we hired the lesbian to tile the bathroom

Because the other two tile guys who came by to give us an estimate leered at me AND my kid. Ew. I told the GITB that if I have to be subjected to an ass crack in order to get the bathroom re-done, I much prefer Cathy, the strapping young lesbian, (who I KNOW will do a fabulous job because she's a girl) who, by the by, does not wear her work pants slung below her beer gut. She wears a belt, thank you very much.

Happy New Year

Things are going well. Too well. So rather than worry about what is not going so well, I now have anxiety that things are going so well that a major shitstorm of epic proportion surely must be around the corner. But maybe not. Maybe my karma ratio has finally evened out. Maybe the good stuff is finally catching up with the not-so-hot stuff and all this is gravy--good gravy that will not rise from the gravy boat and sucker punch me when I least expect it. Here's what I do know for sure: when I am making an effort each day to not be an asshole, I feel so much better about myself and the whole world. Even though one day we will all be dead and no one will give a shit.

turkey trotting into the day

getting up at the crack of dawn to go run a 5K race (like my dad--the dude in the blue visor) and my kid (the schmoopie next to him in orange shirts) with 5,000 of your neighbors may sound kinda kooky but it's been a tradition in my family for 27 years. We have not missed one Turkey Trot in almost three decades. The GITB and I did the one-mile mosey. But it still means I get extra pie. 'Cause, hey, I walked a mile this morning, dammit.

yes, I did say the neighbors raise donkeys

There is nothing like a 700-mile road trip with your kid and your dog -- three women out on the open road armed with Diet Coke, pepper spray and a bag of leftover Halloween candy. It was the best weekend trip ever. I picked Schmoopie up after school and we hit the highway, giddy with anticipation and pleased with our independence. We arrived in the middle of the night after a harrowing last five miles--a straight-up corkscrew incline to the top of a mountain on which the cabin of my dreams is nestled. It is a gorgeous piece of property in the Smoky Mountains adjacent to the Smoky Mountain National Park (so nice to have friends with money) but when my ears started popping as the engine whined and I prayed we encountered no vehicles coming the other direction because the road was not wide enough to accommodate two vehicles, it was a little tense. Luckily the girls slept through it and I had Todd Rundgren singing reassuringly in my ear bud which helped. Thank you, Todd. And Jesus Christ, can it be any more pitch black? Haven't these mountain people heard of street lights for god's sake? But the stars were so brilliant and huge up there that it was as if an angel had leaned down and sprinkled them all over the mountainside, like a sugary canopy just over our heads we could touch without even standing on our toes.

So we staggered into the cabin and collapsed in a heap, pausing only to turn on the heat. But when we awoke the next day--heaven. The leaves were at their absolute glory of explosive color and when Schmoopie got out of bed and opened her shutters she gasped then shrieked in delight at the sight of the valleys and mountain slopes she could see from her window -- all afire in purple and yellow and gold and orange, as if someone had snuck in and thrown buckets of florescent paint on everything as we slept. The trees vibrated with color and the constant breeze sent a slow, steady shower of leaves whispering down on our heads as we walked in the woods, explored creeks, fed the donkeys the neighbors down the road raise and collected every variety of leaf we could find to press in the books on the mantle.

We talked about boys and bras and periods and the pros and cons of thong underwear and death and kissing and The Great Gatsby and the way my grandmother baked every Saturday, lining the counter-tops of her kitchen with mounds of bread dough covered with damp linen cloths, the smell tantalizing every cell of my body as the dough rose and aromas wafted from the oven-- and everything else that a 14-year-old girl might want to discuss with a mom who is not totally uncool. We built huge fires in the fireplace each night and snuggled on the couch and sipped coffee and painted each other's toenails. At one point as I watched her feed carrots to the smallest of the baby donkeys it occurred to me that she is everything I never was as a teenager--she is my hero and I love her so much. She will leave us too soon and I want to cram as much time with her into our crazy-busy lives right now as I can. This is the stuff that matters.

October

My lovely woman-child and I are trekking to the mountains of North Carolina in two weeks to laze around the cabin of a friend for a few days and walk in the leaves. She and I last walked together through oceans of golden and umber leaves in Ohio when she was a little over a year old, so I think it is time that she again see the glory that is the fall in the north. We will be accompanied by Miss Daisy, the fuzz-covered wildebeast who will romp through the woods with us and allegedly provide us with companionship and protection. The GITB will be home rebuilding the deck. In gratitude, I offer a poem about Autumn:

On Fields O'er Which the Reaper's Hand has Passed

On fields o'er which the reaper's hand has pass'd

Lit by the harvest moon and autumn sun,

My thoughts like stubble floating in the wind

And of such fineness as October airs,

There after harvest could I glean my life

A richer harvest reaping without toil,

And weaving gorgeous fancies at my will

In subtler webs than finest summer haze.

Henry David Thoreau

PS--hey Amber--wanna come along?

but we can't

because time passes no matter how tightly we hold on, no matter how warm and comforting the embrace. Things change and nature has a way of sneaking up and kicking us all in the ass. Sigh.

I knew it was you. I just pretended not to

I graduated from high school in 1979. Nineteen-seventy-fucking-nine, people and I still can't get away from it.

A girl I knew in high school died of breast cancer about a month ago and it felt like the right thing for me to do to attend her memorial. I didn't really know her as an adult, but as a teenager, Sarah was a super cool chick, very much into jazz and organic peanut butter and foot massages and just being whoever and whatever you felt like being back in high school and I really can't imagine that as an adult she changed all that much. She was a genuine free spirit and didn't give a damn what people thought.

Some people thought she was a weirdo back then and some folks still do, I suppose. I was at the community theatre the other night and as I casually shot the breeze with one of our musicians before the show I asked him if he knew Sarah and he said "Yeah. She was a strange woman. A great musician but a strange chick." I didn't feel the need to argue with him about it because his reality is his and mine is mine and whatever. Sarah was her own person and she was not like most people so it doesn't offend me that someone would think of her or refer to her as strange. She probably would have found it funny.

Sarah graduated a year ahead of me and we were never close but I always liked her. I heard when she finished undergrad she decided against med school even though she got accepted and instead spent a few years travelling around the world making a living as a street performer. We did not stay in touch after high school and went our own ways as we all do but I've always thought of her with fondness on the rare occasions that I do think about those days. When I read in the newspaper about a year ago that she was battling breast cancer and some area musicians were holding a benefit concert to help her with medical expenses it made me really sad. I decided to send a check but I never got around to it. She was always warm and I remember her kindness to me at a particularly dark time in my life when I was incapable of being kind to myself. So I wanted to acknowledge that in some small way which is why I decided to go to her funeral. I felt like Sarah would know I stopped by to say thanks and I liked the idea of that.

So I went to the memorial which was a rocking music-filled celebration that Sarah had planned at a Presbyterian church in the old neighborhood. I was surprised to learn during the service that Sarah had become an elder in the church in recent years. I sat in the back row of the sanctuary, and as the church filled up before the service started, the guy seated next to me greeted a lot of people who walked by us as they made their way to pews up front. He seemed to know a lot of people who looked vaguely familiar to me. Some I recognized but others had faces that I knew I knew some 30 years ago but could not now attach names to. It was a very odd feeling. I also noticed that the guy turned and smiled warmly at me several times but I shrugged it off--he probably figured I was there alone and he was being nice. Then midway through the service it dawned on me who he was. I sort of leaned a little toward him, looking straight ahead and said "John?" and he whispered back "Ell?". John and Sarah and I had all been band geeks. I remember him most for his Prince Valiant hair and the way his ears stuck out like handles on a trophy. He played the trombone in high school and dated a girl named Claudette who had a wicked unibrow but a rocking body. John is married now, has two kids and is a firefighter. He'd printed a bunch of photos from a trip the marching band had taken in 1977 and brought them with him. He wordlessly handed me the envelope and I browsed through them. It seemed like yesterday. And it seemed like someone else's life a million or so years ago.

After the service John and I hung out, I chatted casually with a few more acquaintances from high school and John and I exchanged e-mail addresses and I left. I'm glad I went.

But I had the distinct feeling that a few of my high school acquaintances were no less thrilled to see me than I was to see them. That reality came to me with some discomfort--resigned discomfort but a queasiness nonetheless. Teenagers can be such fucking assholes and I certainly was no exception. John seemed thrilled to renew our acquaintance (I guess I was never a bitch to him, I don't know, I really don't remember a lot about high school and a lot of what I do recall with clarity I really wish I didn't). I was no angel as a teenager but I wasn't evil. At least I don't think so. But I may have been. I think some people who are assholes as young people either get their shit together and finish the job of raising themselves into adulthood and become decent grown-ups and others just remain assholes. I am definitely the former. I have gotten my shit together and I am a decent human being now but there was a time many moons ago when it could have gone either way. Knowing that I have been granted a longer life than Sarah, who so deserved it more, humbles me and makes me want even more fervently to be as decent and kind and productive of a human being as I can possibly be.

Which brings me to my last story. Remember the show I mentioned? It was a god-awful musical that was miscast and badly directed and badly sung by most of the cast but it did have it's brilliant and moving moments and the audiences loved it.

One of the girls in the cast approached me last Sunday--the final performance of a three-week run that felt like an eternity in hell's coffee bar--and asked me if I had gone to ____ high school. I said that, yes, I had. She said "My mom wanted to know because she recognized you by your bio in the program." Which is flabbergasting to me because there is really no identifying info about me in my theatrical bio that could in any way connect me to the high school I attended. It was weird. Her mom must have recognized my headshot in the marquee in the lobby and because I really pretty much do look like I did in high school (my ass not included), that must have been it. But this woman would have eaten broken glass before she admitted it. And I had seen her in the lobby on opening night and had recognized her but chose to keep walking because she was a total bitch to me in high school so why the hell would I want to chat her up now, you know?

So what I wanted to say at that moment was "Tell your mom to kiss my ass." But I didn't. I said, "Oh! Wow! Small world! How is she?" even though I don't give a rat's ass how she is. The only thing the daughter could come up with was "Well, she's divorced and she's kind of unemployed right now." I stood there looking at this girl thinking that she looked very much like her mom which isn't a compliment, and it didn't make me feel good. It made me feel like I need to work harder on being kind.

I have a notation on my to-do list that reads "Donation to charity in Sarah's name." I need to do that first thing tomorrow.

"Never has there been a good war or a bad peace." Benjamin Franklin

we need to get our asses the hell out out of the Middle East.
That is all.

Queen of the May

Happy birthday Randy, the sweetest queen I've ever known and the best girlfriend a girlfriend has ever had. Love ya, Miss Otis!

to my Coloroado soulmate: I have a great title for your manuscript: The Girl Who Fell From the Sky.

to my Destin soulmate: I forgot to ask you about the hiker. Is he still? Have you been in touch?

PS--my breast biopsy came back benign.

still hotter'n hell

My kid is off to her first day of high school tomorrow morning. I cannot believe it. She finished her required summer reading this morning and shot off an articulate and insightful summary of the Old Man and the Sea in no time--I was impressed that she got all the metaphor, the existential crisis and Hemingway's drama queen bent all on her own. She's a pretty cool kid. We have one more afternoon of sitting poolside--me working and her musing about the lackluster sequel of High School Musical. Life is sweet.

we are two months into the annual hurricane season with nary a tropical storm or even significant rains lately. Which makes me nervous. The last real ass-kicker of a hurricane we had close to home was Elena in 1985 and that was bad. The worst ones seem to kick up around Labor Day so I'm wondering if the unusually quiet summer storm season is more of the proverbial foreboding calm before a major ass-kicking from mother nature. I hope not.

On other fronts, Schmoopie is preparing to enter her freshman year of high school. I am stunned that she will be a HIGH SCHOOL STUDENT in a week and more depressing--that the time we have with her here at home with us is winding down. In four years she'll be gone. Argh.

Did I mention that the small, familial mom and pop operation I've worked for for 5 years was recently purchased by an entrepreneur from Seattle? It's been painful. It's been entertaining. I fear we will not exist a year from today. I hope I am wrong. But I don't think I am.

more fun on vacation

my kid is in love with a dolphin. At least he is appropriate age (17) and a mammal (unlike many of my former paramours).