Fire and Rain

I took my kids camping.

Alone.

That means, I had to do all the camp-y things by myself. Sans Husband.
I don't know why, but as soon as I know that I will have to do anything like that by myself, I go into some kind of paralytic-amnesia. Suddenly, I don't feel competent to do the same things I have watched a man do for twenty years. Which is ridiculous, because when a man is performing camping tasks, I almost always watch on with the sense that I could do whatever he is doing easier, faster, and a lot less expensively. In high heels. While breast feeding. Blind.

Yet, when I set out to go camping with my two kids, suddenly, I doubted my capability to make fire. To set up camp. To change batteries in the lantern, or set up the grill.  "What if the car breaks down? What if I get a flat tire? What if I hit a deer? What if there's bad guys?"

Eek.

Like any good mom (or woman) I quietly harbored my doubt and replaced it pseudo-confidently with phrases like, "I got this!"

Even though I was driving a new vehicle up the mountain, I still had internal diagnostic monologue. "What's that smell? Is it the car ahead of me or are my brakes on fire? Do you hear that?"  Every once and a while I made a mental note of the odometer reading when passing landmarks so I could tell a dispatcher EXACTLY where I was. Should the need arise. I had nervous poop cramps for like two hours on that drive wondering if we would make it without me having to whore myself for a tow.

We arrived at camp with all our tires and brakes in tact. It started to rain.

No problem, because remember, I got this.

It started to thunder. Lightening. Hail. Locusts. Famine. I unloaded the car, fed the kids, and headed to the pit to try and start the fire I had promised.

Using my body as a human wind shield, I hovered over the damp fire pit.  I stacked wood, lit paper and built tiny pyramids of kindling. I huffed, fanned, poked and prayed prayed for my fire to start. "Please God, thank you for sparing me hitting any deer on the drive up, but I really, really need a fire now." I spent two full lighters with my efforts.

White smoke billowed in my face with no sign of flames. I could hear a puddle boiling and sizzling under my pyramid. I was fighting back doubt and tears. I was wet. Cold. Dizzy from smoke inhalation, I was ready to quit. As I hovered over the pit, my back aching and my knees screaming...a tiny burn crept up the side of the twisted paper and caught fire.


Fire.

The kids watched on, jumping up and down in their hoodies, their wet marshmallows poised and ready to roast. "Yes! Mom! You did it!"

I stood in the rain and savored my first fire as it spat and coughed like a baby being born. As the fire took its first breaths and burned brightly into existence, I realized that I am a Mommy. I can make you warm, feed you and take you camping.
 I've got this.

The Man Umbrella

“It’s a head or something!”


My 8 year old daughter coiled back, drawing her fists up under her chin while assuming a flamingo-like pose on one toe. I looked through the window at the puppy and tried to spy from a safe distance what he was chewing on. I assured myself that it was a rotten apple, fallen from the tree. 


 This is probably the only time in my life I wished for a rotten apple. Please, please, please be a rotten apple…


But, there was firmness in his bite that told me I was dead wrong. 


Closer inspection revealed it was a bird head the dog was eating. 

 “Get it!” she screamed at me. 

Um? No? Disgusting?



The puppy spat the head out at my feet to show me how pretty it was. I stared at the decapitated, walnut-sized noggin of the tiny bird, its feathers licked into a comb-over and its eyeballs eerily missing. 

As a mom, there are a lot of really disgusting things I have subjected my gag reflex to. But  Bird Flu, Malaria, Rabies, worms, Black Death would be the end-all-be-all of gross-me-out. 
 I draw the line at prying a bird head out of my puppy’s mouth as long as there is a brave husband within screaming range to do it for me. 


 I don’t consider myself a Feminist, but, there are certain tasks that I believe are covered under the Man Umbrella. 


Car repairs, fixing big, broken things like garage doors and appliances and anything dead definitely reside in Husband territory. However, in an effort to promote equality, I am happy to pull my weight by addressing items that are more motherly (and menial) in nature.  Scraping dried up toothpaste off the bathroom sink comes to mind.


 Marriage is a give and take. Except for when it’s Honey-do.


If my car breaks down, it’s just understood that the Husband will make a few phone calls, take my car to a Far Away Land where mystical people will do magical things to it (for free) and bring it back in perfect working order. The car goes away broken, it comes back, fixed.  This is a way he can take care of me without taking away my freedom or independence.


 My husband has saved me from lots of disgusting horrors in our time together. With shreds of toilet paper stuck to his calves, jeans rolled up to his knees, he bailed raw sewage out of the basement when the sewer main erupted. I think that if your potential mate is willing to wade through crap to help you, it’s a good sign that they are in it come hell or high sewer water. If he or she is going to comfort you when you puke, rescue you when your car breaks down and do the things that you just don’t have the wherewithal to do for yourself, you can feel confident that you have probably found your soul mate.


The realities of being in a married relationship sometimes reveal themselves in atrocious ways. Maybe it’s a sewer main erupting in your house. Maybe it’s dealing with a dead animal in the back yard. Real life happens in real life. Whatever the crisis may look like after marriage, I firmly believe that as a fair warning, wedding vows should come with an addendum to clarify what you are really signing up for when you promise, “I Do.”
Wedding promises should include a clause, “…will you stay faithful even though your mate has vomit in her hair and her makeup is smeared in streaks down her face? Furthermore, will you flush the toilet, carry her to bed and bring her a pan –your favorite pan- to throw up in again while she cries like a baby in bed? In front of God and these witnesses, do you promise to love her, even when she is seemingly possessed by Menstruation and has a migraine?” 


When getting married, no one ever stops to think about who will be called upon the day the family puppy is caught nibbling on an avian cranium.
Life, marriage, parenting; it’s all about finding the balance and being patient when everything teeters on the fulcrum. 


 Some days you’re the puppy, some day’s you’re the bird.


My husband willingly assumed the role of “Decapitation Extraction Technician”. He asked for a bag, which I fearlessly handed over. Expressionless, and without complaining about the grim task at hand, My Hero disposed of the head. After a while, it occurred to me that where there is a head, somewhere else is the body. I resigned to cross that carcass when I come to it.


For now, I simply paused with gratitude for having a life that is real, and a husband that won’t take flight when the going gets tough. Would I take this day and all the rest, to have and to hold from this day forward?
I do.

In A Fickle

Being fickle isn't easy.

Sometimes it's downright embarrassing. And expensive.

But, it's an expensive, embarrassing cross I'm willing to bear because in addition to being fickle, I'm also a control freak, martyr and homemaker.

 I bear many crosses.

My fickle nature drove me to have the house painted one color, and weeks later paint it again; a different color.  But, my indecision isn't limited to the confines of my 4, twice-painted walls. This costly quirk of mine forces me to wander store after store, again and again, purchasing and returning, buying and trying as I try to build a comfortable nest for my family.

At our housewarming party, a guest pointed out a beautiful armoire in my formal living room. It has it's original 100 year old cream paint finish, lovingly chipped away in all the right places, rickety dovetail drawers, turnlegs and claw feet clutching clear marbles.  It even has a charming midi crest gently sweeping across the top and back of it.

Sigh.

I didn't have to change a thing about it except the hardware, which I updated with vintage-looking apple green crystal knobs to match my green chair. Yes, I put NEW, old-looking knobs on an antique armoire. Heh.

"Thank you. I found that at the Antique Gallery for $100!"

My humble self then pointed out all of my other fabulous finds from the Gallery.
"Gallery (point), Gallery (point). Gallery (crane neck around corner to next room, point)"
My guest was very impressed and intrigued. And, who wouldn't be? I pretty much decorated my whole house with conversation starting, attention grabbing, 'I wish I had that!' exciting Gallery pieces.

"What is this 'Gallery' you speak of?"

*dies*

Because I'm kind of a promoter and (unpaid) whore of The Antique Gallery, and overall good person, I invited my party guest to come with me the next time I go to the Gallery, so I can expose her to the wonderful world of tasteful, eclectic, affordable home furnishing and design.

I haven't been to The Gallery since I found out Dale died.

 Dale worked at the Gallery and is to thank for loading all my large furniture finds into the back of my SUV for the last ten years. Dale always validated, with sincere jealousy, my wonderful finds. "I don't know how you do it! You're an inspiration!"

Thanks, Dale. It's not easy.

Even though I love, love, love The Gallery, it has two huge problems. The first and most awful being, 'No returns or exchanges allowed'. Never mind that the turn off is hand-written, landscape style on an 8x11 sheet of binder paper and stuck to the front door with silver duct tape. I get it.

The sign could easily read, "Check all large bags and fickle behaviors at the front desk because your indecisive ass ain't coming back in here with no dresser that didn't fit." 

There is no point, pick and pray at The Gallery.
There is no hoping it works, thinking it will work, or 'just liking' it.
There is no blind shopping at The Gallery. There is no Fickle. Which completely goes against my savvy cross-bearing, home decorating whims.

As a result, I now have a basement full of 'PERFECT!' items the Gallery won't take back. I have enough to open my own Gallery. By definition, I'm probably teetering on Hoarder territory. But not by design.

And now, I'm committed to taking my neighbor to the Gallery.

I don't need anything else at the Gallery. I'm done. I'm good. But, I CANNOT go in and not buy something.

It's what Dale would have wanted.

But, I also cannot go in and buy something with designs on returning it once I've shed my buyers regret. I'm running out of room in the basement for regret. So, half of me doesn't even want to go.

The other half of me is just dying to see if they have any antique crosses.

Meanwhile, Back on the Branch...

My husband has left town for business. The kids are with their "other" parents, and with no kids or husband under my wing, I'm alone in our nest for the first time overnight.

Being alone in our big house made me think of The Shining. While I didn't face any bloody hallways or resurrected Groundskeepers, I admit it probably is possible to go mad from isolation. I ate crappy food, watched far too much TV and talked to the dog like he was a person. "Do you want to watch another episode of 16 and Pregnant? Or do you want to watch River Monsters? Oh! Biggest Loser is on tonight! We'll have popcorn, ok?"

I left my dishes in the sink, one of the few perks to staying home alone.

At bedtime, there were no lunches to pack, no jammies to find, no teeth to leave out for the Tooth Fairy. No monsters to be shoo'ed, no homework to be signed. There were no prayers to be recited, no blankets to be tucked. I did all the nighttime chores my husband usually does; taking out the trash, making the next day's coffee. My efforts only amplifying the fact that he isn't here. No one is here.

I left more lights on than I would have if my husband had been home. I shook the doors extra firmly. Yep, still locked. 

And while I'd like to say that I had a great time on my own, I was lonely, lazy and afraid.  I realized that a Mommy is just a person when in an empty nest.

Cat Scratch

"The night that cats were wished away was a hard one full of wine, tears, and spectacle."


No more filthy litter box. No more allergies aggravated by hair and dander. The cat would not hog his pillow anymore, would not howl inexplicably at 4 am. His not-so-secret wish had come true.

The Goddamn cat was finally gone.

The night that cats were wished away was a hard one full of wine, tears, and spectacle...


But the wine was bitter, infused with subdued mourning. I shed tears silently in the shower. My spectacle lasted until the wine ran out.

Did you get my telepathic message as I held you in the front seat? You love riding in the car. How odd. You are shedding on me furiously and he is driving with his eyes swollen shut. Am I clutching you too tightly? So tightly, your hair is popping out?

I will drive home with your hair all over me. The only trace left of you.

Yes. I have to give you away so I can keep something, someone else. Someone bigger than you. Someone more important than you. Someone with a voice and opposable thumbs. But, you have been my voice, howling to be heard. Screaming to go out, bound to stay in, for some unseen reason.

 You would not give me away. You would not put me in a box and hand me to a stranger. You would hold me. Pet me, and let me sleep on  your pillow. You would get up at 4 am and open the door, again and again even if every one of those times I only stared at you and I didn't go out.

So trusting, so understanding, so patient.  So this is the thanks you get, old friend. 

It has to be done, doesn't it? I'm giving again. I'm giving away my voice to a stranger, and all I have left is my regret, my sorrow, my apology, my terrible sadness.

"The night that cats were wished away was a hard one full of wine, tears and spectacle."

I Can't Read

Of course I can read. I'm a Writer, for Christ Sake. But what I own in ability, I lack in desire. And, therein lies my conundrum. It's the kind of conundrum that can keep me up at night.

A Writer who doesn't 'like' to read? It's as preposterous as a Navy SEAL with an aversion to water.

I'm a Writer without a library. And, while I do have a few books, most of them are children's books.  The others are Buddhist  philosophy; short one-liners on how to be a good person.

One liners. Those are alright.

But, let's call a spade, a spade. I've never been published. I don't have any publishable prospects. I'm not really a Writer. I'm an aspiring Writer. Longing to join ranks with people who can say that their prose is read by billions of people the world over. I don't care if I ever make any money at writing, I really only want someone to read my writing and tell me it's wonderful. I want someone to read what I have written, and feel like my ideas are spot-on. If only they could articulate their emotions like me, if only they had the talent; the ability. The right words.

I truly, with all my heart love to write. I need to write.

But, this blog post isn't about being a Writer, it's about not being a reader.

I don't like to admit my lazy distaste for reading. All too often, when I tell others that I don't like to read, my confession is met with quizzical, pained, heartbroken stares. It's embarrassing.

"But, aren't you a Writer?"

Yes. There's a difference.

I didn't even read my kids bedtime stories. I made stories up, spinning tales I concocted on the fly. That's what Writer's do. They tell stories. They don't read stories.

Sometimes, I make a half-commitment to myself that I will read a book over the summer. I lie again and again to my culturally starving self and promise that I will discipline myself and READ. But the truth is, if I can't sleep at night, I don't reach for a good book.

I reach for a pen.