Lover Tired

What can I say?  I'm in a poem kinda mood lately. 


Nothing but this room
Nothing but this bed
Nothing but the moon
Painting pictures on your back
Instead of conjuring the tides
Begging wolves to bay
While we lay
Intertwined
What's yours; What's mine
And there's nothing but us
All this time

Maybe it's been days
Maybe it's been years
Maybe it's all plays
Written centuries ago
A calligraphy of haze floating over our skin
That tells us it's our turn
For what we yearn
Just for now
Our spirits combine
As we reach for the peak
Of this tide

Lover tired
Floating away
Drifting in the current of the love we just made
Ntohing else matters
'Cuz I'm high on this dream
Riding the wave of fresh memories
With my mind all muddy
And cheeks on fire
'Cuz that's how it feels to be
Lover tired

Get Around Girl

Get Around Girl
Challenging the world
Running into fires
Jumping off cliffs
Sometimes half-way hoping to plunge into the abyss
Just to see what's there
'Cuz nothing's empty
even when it can't be seen
You can hear it, smell it, feel it, taste it, sense it
So nothing's nothing
There's always something it means

So the Get Around Girl goes at it unfurled
Unfettered, untethered, not regretting one day
If you ask why she does it
She'll say there's only one way
That's to live every moment and experience love
Not frightened of judgments
or being struck down from above
You can only love completely
And never halfway
No "I'm trying; I'm thinking; it might maybe hit me one day."
And that means you get hurt
But you can never bruise deep
You have to shake yourself off
Jump in with two feet
Do everything fully 'cuz life is today
There's only one rule, and here it is:
BREATHE
Your own way

What's tangled up in your knot?

Well, I've begun yet another new adventure.  This time I'm making video tutorials on YouTube.  Why?  Because I absolutely LOVE learning and doing new things!  Some of them turn out to be awesome, so I keep doing them.  The others end up in the burn pile, but I'm glad I've done them all!

Pen in hand
Glass of wine
Winds of my thought blowing around
Trying to unwind
This tangled yarn stretched out to be 
So many miles long
Probably 643
But it sometimes get twisted
Tied up in knots
Tattered and frayed
Stinky and matted
A frightening vision if it were ever displayed
But that means I've lived
And taken big handfuls of risks
The knots are full of journeys
Questions answered
Some unanswered
Paths hiked
Rivers swum
Prince met and many frogs kissed
If I ever jumped in the middle and took a big snip
With my trusty old Fiskers
Even one tiny clip
Of a fingernail cutter
What harm would it do?
Well, I may eliminate some disasters
And be able to move on along
Without any preconceptions or
The precaution of my sword drawn
But I'd also lose all the good stuff
The friends that I've made
The stories I've lived
The songs that I've sung
Because that snip would separate what led from here to there
and that's what makes us unique
And each one of us rare
So we can't undo the tangle
But we can move on gentle yet strong
Because the knots hold our lives together
And before we blink it will all be gone
So we just keep up the crazy mess and make it part of our song

And with that explanation, here's my first instructional video. Just click the link below. I hope you enjoy it!

Blister In The Sun Guitar Tutorial

Perspective

Man, what a day.  I love my boys.  I love them. I love them. I love them.  I love them.

But some days, I just need a break.  Wow, yes I do.  Last Thursday was one of those days.  I woke up (especially hormonal) and wondered, “What can I do to kill the most time, rid the kids of the most energy, and exert the least effort on my part?”  Well, I knew that I had a friend who wanted to buy one of the products I sell.  Normally I would just have her order from my website so that the distributor would send it her way, but today I thought, “Hey, that’s something I use, and I have an extra.  I’ll drive a couple of towns over, give her one, go to the jumpy fun house there so the kids can go insane for a couple of hours, and then I’ll drive back and hope the boys are asleep by the time we get home.”  That sounds like a day.

Little Guy woke at 3:00 am, ripped off half of his diaper, stood up in his crib, peed on the floor, and cried out, “Mama!”  I realized he had a couple of mosquito bites that were driving him nuts and gave up after a few attempts to get him back to sleep in his crib.  So, he ended up in my bed, on top of me, for the rest of the night.  About 5:00am Big Boy woke himself up coughing and found his way to our bed as well.   The snuggles and smooches are all so precious, but eventually I just NEED SOME EVER-LOVIN’ SLEEP!               So Daddy got up at 7:00, attempted to turn the box fan on high (our noise-maker of choice), gave up after he realized it had committed suicide at some point during the night, and began the breakfast ritual.  I slept for a solid hour (incorporating cries of, “ I need MORE syrup!” and “Dadda!!  Car! Car! Yellow!  Mama!!” into my morning dreams) and then woke to attack the day.  I finished the breakfast routine, played outside while drinking my magnificent, blessed, strong, black coffee, threw dinner in the crock pot, dressed everyone (including myself) and headed out the door at the crack of 11:00.  We stopped at the grocery store (out of car seats, into cart, taking everything back out of the cart after the boys threw random items in, toy tantrum, out of cart, and back into car seats) for 2 bananas, a box of raisins and some tampons, and headed out on our adventure.

Thirty minutes into our drive I thought, “Hey, we should stop by my good friend Carla’s house.  She’s a public school teacher (like I was until a couple of years ago), but maybe she quit and stays home with the kids now.  Now, I realize that sounds absurd.  If we’re such great friends, how would I not even know whether or not she has left her 12 year-long career?  Well, somehow that’s how it seems to work.  I spend all sorts of time with my local friends whose kids are playmates with my kids, but I lose touch with wonderful friends from previous lifetimes.  The good news is, when I see those friends, it’s like I’ve just seen them the week before.

Anyway, my hunch was accurate.  Carla was there.  My diva friend who always has her hair perfectly styled and wears gorgeous accessories that perfectly match her stunning high heels answered the door in cut-off sweats, a tank top, flip flops, a baseball hat, and no make-up.  (She was still wearing all of her diamonds, of course.  I mean, this is Texas after all). She has joined the ranks of the SAHM glamorous.  I love it.  So the impromptu play-date began.  My boys found her battery-powered riding toys and knew this was the nirvana of which they had never even dared to dream.  So while we were dragging all of the exciting toys out of the shed for them to ride, Carla’s little man decided to get his wheels situated all by himself.  You see, his riding toy was sitting innocently on the porch of the guesthouse.  So while Mama and I were finding toys for the others, he jumped onto his, gunned it, and jumped his almost-4-year-old self right off the porch, flipped his car mid-air, and landed on his back with his truck on top of him.  Carla was busy helping my kids, so she missed it.  I ran (as fast as my red fake-crocodile mile-high wooden clogs would go) across the 2 acres, scooped him up, and cradled him while he screamed. By this time Carla was right beside us and picked him up out of my arms to comfort him and evaluate his injuries.  

But here’s what struck me a bit later:  When I was running across the yard to that little boy and then cradling him, he wasn’t my friend’s child.  He was my child too.  Nothing in the world mattered other than getting to that little boy as fast as I could.  Once I realized he was okay, I was completely focused on comforting him.  Nothing else existed.  I’m not saying this because I think I’m some incredibly heroic person.  I’m not.  But I am a mother, and every once in a while something happens that makes it hit me suddenly and clearly just how much that role has changed me and defines me so much more than anything else in my life.   Sure, before I had my own children, I would have raced to help, but I wouldn’t have been filled with the utter terror and then overwhelming love that overcame me that day.

When I was a kid, my mother was an elementary school principal.  I remember overhearing her relay a conversation she had had with one of the teachers at her school.  She told her, “Every one of those children in your class is someone’s baby.  They are someone’s whole world.  You have to remember that every day.”  So throughout my nine years of being a public school teacher, my mind knew that.  But on Thursday I wondered what it would be like to teach now that my heart knows it so well too.

I stayed with Carla’s youngest and my two while she ran her boy to the doctor, who told her he might end up with a few dead baby teeth but wouldn’t have any other problems.  Once she got home, we chatted a bit and then I dropped off my friend’s order and headed home.  Two sleeping boys and I pulled into the driveway at about 4:45.  My husband pulled in right behind us and motioned for me to get into his car.  Why was he home so early?  As soon as I got into the car, I knew.  He was wearing shorts, a t-shirt, and flip flops and handed me a folder.  Yep, it was a severance package.  He had been laid off.  I’m pretty sure he expected me to lose my mind, but I didn’t, not even a little. I had just had a day that threw everything into perspective so clearly.  It’s funny how things work that way. We are all healthy.  No one is sick, no one is hurt, and we have a house full of so much love and so much laughter that it’s a bit ridiculous.  We’re gonna be okay.

By the way, six days later he is already juggling offers because he is a rockstar.  Life is good. 

So Bob, am I awesome or not?

I will never forget my first international love affair.  He was an oh-so-exotic trumpet player from the faraway land of Canada.  Not only was he from a mysterious foreign land, but he was also quite a bit older (and therefore significantly more worldly) than myself.   I mean, I was 15, and he was not 15.  He wasn’t 15 and a half.  He wasn’t even 16.  No, this was an OLDER man of 17.  And when we spent the summer together at Interlochen, the International Music Camp, we did not say adieu at the end of each night at the “shake gate.”  No, I followed this international man of intrigue to the “date gate” each night and actually smooched the night farewell.  I tell you all of this so that you can understand just how amazingly cool and sophisticated this man and our relationship were. 

Although I was only a summer student, my luvah continued on as a boarding school student.  Of course, I visited the following fall.  When I picked him up, so that he, my best friend Patricia, and I could cruise off campus, he popped a tape into my cassette deck.  I, being a voice student, said, “That is THE WORST singing I have ever heard!”  He raised his eyebrows in horror and replied, “That is Bob Dylan, the world’s greatest singer-songwriter.  What are you talking about??!  Are you even listening to the lyrics??”   Well, at that point in my adventure as a singer, I really hadn’t paid enough attention to lyrics.  I often mimicked the emotions of the singers I was imitating, but I hadn’t gotten to the point where I was actually interpreting lyrics and conveying the emotions they conjured.  So, I listened.

“Inside the museums, Infinity goes up on trial

Voices echo this is what salvation must be like after a while

But Mona Lisa musta had the highway blues

You can tell by the way she smiles

See the primitive wallflower freeze

When the jelly-faced women all sneeze

Hear the one with the mustache say, "Jeeze

I can't find my knees"

Oh, jewels and binoculars hang from the head of the mule

But these visions of Johanna, they make it all seem so cruel.”

What the hell????

I was horrified to find that I wasn’t even cool enough to realize how cool it was even after I slowed down to analyze the details that were right in front of me.  That was the first moment it struck me:  I was not awesome.

Yep.

And that blow has stayed with me now for the past 24 years. 

Until yesterday….

I saw this article, assumed it was from the Onion, and then realized it was not.  What?  Really?  Can it be?  Has my self-perception been based on a lie?  A falsification?  Maybe, perhaps, possibly I’m awesome after-all!

http://www.theglobaledition.com/bob-dylan-acknowledges-50-year-long-hoax

You really have to read the entire article, but here’s the first paragraph, “Rock and roll legend, Bob Dylan, acknowledged in a recent interview that he has perpetuated an elaborate hoax on the public for more than fifty years. “I can’t sing, half of the time I don’t even say real words, I just mumble, and my lyrics make no sense.”

This changed everything! 

Maybe I AM awesome.  Maybe it’s all been a huge misunderstanding brought about by this 50-year hoax perpetuated by this clever conniver. 

And if that’s so, it opens the door to so many more possible misconceptions that may have led to misinterpretations and under ratings of my coolness?

I bet crimped hair really WAS still cool in 1990.  Maybe ALL the cool kids watched “Weird Science” over and over until they had all of the dialogue written down in a spiral notebook.  That’s it; I’m going back to saying, “Okey Dokey.”

I really AM awesome, and I clearly always have been!

But then, alas, I tempted fate, and I Googled “The Global Edition”.  Here’s the article that threw it all back into the harsh light of reality:

http://www.theglobaledition.com/terms-and-conditions/

“Theglobaledition.com is a satire/fake news site – this means that all the stories published on it are there for the sole purpose of your entertainment and are not factual nor true and you should read them as such. The publisher accepts no responsibility for the accuracy of the information provided in the content. It is a fragment of authors’ imagination and any similarity with real events or persons are accidental.”

Damnit!!!

Oh well.  The world needs nerds too.

Supermom

Mommy Rating System:

IF AT LEAST ONE OF YOUR CHILDREN IS LESS THAN 9 MONTHS OLD:
*You downed 6 bloody Marys before 8 am, duct taped the kids to various pieces of furniture, and spent the day at the spa.

Your score…..0 Points.  You are a bad, bad lady.

*You kept enough of an eye on everyone to ensure they were all fed and survived the day.

Your score…10 Points.  You are incredible!  Congratulations!

 IF AT LEAST ONE OF YOUR CHILDREN IS STILL A TODDLER:

*You downed 6 bloody Marys before 8 am, duct taped the kids to various pieces of furniture, and spent the day at the spa.

Your score…0 Points.  You are a bad, bad lady

*You wiped noses, wiped bottoms, issued time-outs, cooked, cleaned, played Legos, made paper airplanes, wore a feather boa, a hard hat, marker smears and oatmeal clumps, took your own time-out or two while you plugged your kids into cartoons, ate your meals cold while you were standing up, had your make-up on the counter for 10 solid hours but never managed to apply it, cleaned up after everyone all day and ended up with a house that still looked like it was hit by a tornado, climbed into bed in all of your clothes (luckily never managed to put on a bra today), and passed out without even a goodnight kiss for your hubby.

Your score…10 Points.  You’re Super Mom!

*You woke before your children, washed and styled your hair, applied just enough make-up to look fresh, put on a simple yet sophisticated ensemble, and prepared farm-fresh organic scrambled eggs and from-scratch pancakes shaped to look like each of your children’s favorite animals.  You sat down and enjoyed a lovely breakfast with your family and then had the toddlers clean their rooms and make their beds while you washed the breakfast dishes and cleaned the floor.  You chose educational reading material to enjoy with the children and read it under a lovely oak tree while you all indulged in fresh squeezed carrot juice and dried seaweed specifically not harvested from the region of the recent oil spill in the gulf (You ALWAYS read labels).  You spent the day helping your children create crafts made from homemade paints and materials (cleaning up every step of the way) and going on insightful and enlightening nature hikes, only after applying organic bug spray you created from coconut oil and personally harvested citronella.  You don’t have a TV (duh). Your husband was greeted at the front door by the welcoming aroma of the lovely, nutritious dinner you prepared from the produce and herbs in your garden.  By the time you all sat down to quietly enjoy the meal, the kitchen was spotless and inviting. After the children were asleep (They always fall right to sleep after one short story you wrote yourself) , you slipped into a beautiful negligee and retreated to the bedroom to create yet ANOTHER passionate evening your husband will never forget.

Your Score:  0 Points.  Your fancy, perfectly-pressed pants are on fire, you lying witch.

Headwalkers

I haven’t been sleeping well lately.  I have no reasonable excuse.  I just can’t manage to slow my mind down long enough to slip into dreamland.  I’m an over-thinker.  I always have been.  I probably always will be.  It’s not like I’m terrorized by worries, fears, and various haunting regrets.  No; I mean, we have some pretty great parties, my brain and me.  I just need a brain-bouncer who determines closing time and then loudly proclaims, “We’re closed!  Get the F Out!” so we can all call it a night and get some shut-eye.

When I was young and single, I tended to blame my insomnia on the floor of my apartment.  If I lived on the top floor, I figured I’d sleep like a baby.  If I lived on any other floor, I would never, ever sleep again until I packed up all of my worldly possessions into 17 boxes (9 for books, 5 for music, and 3 for thrift shop clothing and couture shoes) and moved to a higher elevation.  Why?  Well, obviously it was the headwalkers.

The headwalkers bump and clump through the night

The sleepless sleeper gets no respite

With a tap and a whap and a clippity clap

They bump and they thump and they never collapse

Night becomes day and day becomes night

But relief never comes from BRIGHT FLASHES OF LIGHT

See, darkness pervades through the eyes in these hours

But each THUMP WUMP WHACK lights a spark with its power

Beyond the dreamless raccoon circled eyes

And into the ZIPPITY BIP WHAPPITY mind!

It’s really fun to say out loud, the faster the better.

Now I live out in the country with only the sweet, subtle sounds of nature to accompany my slumber.  However, it seems that when the bouncer evicted them, the headwalkers took permanent residence in my mind.  Good luck in there, fellas.  It’s a wild ride.

A Day In The Life

My husband called me at 10:30 this morning and left me the following message:  “Hey hon.  Let’s watch the season opener for Breaking Bad tonight!  I have it recorded.  You might want to re-watch the final episode from last season so you’re up to speed.  Well, I actually have the last 5 episodes on my computer at home, so watch them all if you want to.”

BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! Sob, sob, sob, sniff, and……crazy eyes

Here’s what I was thinking throughout the above quick succession of reactions:  #1  That’s hilarious!  I can just see the kids letting me watch a TV show. No, no, FIVE TV shows in a row! Haha!  #2  Will I ever be able to just sit and watch an inappropriate, adult TV show for no good reason again?  Is that part of my life just over? No!!!! #3  Dear God!  He’s serious!  He has NO idea what I do all day. Are you kidding me???

A day (today anyway) in the life of Heather:

4:00 Wake to sound of Big Boy bumping his head on the wall in his sleep.  Then, “Mama!  Mommy!”  Climb into tiny toddler bed and sleep with him. 

4:34  Return to my own bed. 

6:01  Wake to sounds of Little Guy screaming, “Mama!  Mama!  Cracker!!”  Grab peanut butter and jelly sandwich out of the fridge, take it and baby to couch, and pray.  “Please God, just let him either fall asleep mid-sandwich or eat quickly and pass out in a food coma. I just need one more hour.  I promise I will NEVER swear again if you just do me this one, simple favor.”

6:20 Make pancakes for the baby who quickly ate sandwich but then demanded more. “More cracker!  More!  More!  More cracker!” Shit.

6:35 “Mama!  I have to go poop!”  Turn on bathroom light, put potty seat on toilet, turn around as quickly as possible but not quickly enough. “I want you to leave me alone!”

6:35 “I’m all done pooping.  Wipe my bottom!”

6:36  Make more pancakes because Big Boy says, “But I want NEW ones!”

7:00  Coffee.  Sweet nectar of the gods.  The kids are using me as a jungle gym, but I am skilled at this procedure.  I will not spill one magnificent drop.

7:07 Prepare lovely and nutritious dinner for family, and turn on crock pot.

7:38 Attempt to fix toddler John Deer riding toy.  Fail.  Apologize profusely. Swear again (but REALLY try to do it quietly.  Really.)

8:02 Barefoot and still in my underpants, chase toddler down the long, gravel driveway after realizing he has escaped from the backyard and is halfway to the street chasing Daddy’s car. 

8:07 Pee.  I finally got to pee!  There is a God.  Thank you.

8:08  Get super excited about going to Zumba at 9:05

8:15 Tell everyone it’s time to come inside and get dressed

8:16 Tell them again

8:17 One more time

8:18 Give up, go to their rooms retrieve outfits, bring them outside to change everyone.  Find unexpected poop.  Cry a little.  Carry baby inside and start over.  Clean poop off of patio.  Few more tears

8:39 Get myself dressed and kiss goodbye my dreams of yesteryear.  No way we’re making it to Zumba. 

9:02  Carry bicycle and toy car up the driveway to the street.  Return to garage for baby.  Carry baby to street.  Watch toddler try to ride bike.  Realize bike needs training wheels adjusted.  Think, “Holy Hell; I have to go all the way back into the house to get a wrench, and I can’t leave the children in the street while I do it.”  Carry both children “I want you carry me toooo!!” to the house.  Find wrench in 17^th place I look. 

9:41  Throw both children in car.  Run over fire hat.  “Hat!!! Hat!!!”  Promise to buy new fire hat.  Stop to get sumbrero out of garage in hopes it will suffice (although straw is highly flammable so it’s actually sick and wrong). Throw bike and toy car into back of SUV.  Drive to park.

10:05 Play at park for eight minutes.  “I want to go to da gym!” 

10:18  Attempt to leave children in childcare at the gym.  “I no like the gym!  Noooo!!”

11:02  Give up and go home.

11:23  Turn on Curious George and attempt to clean oven from melted toy disaster of previous week

11:52  Turn on oven

11:53 Turn off oven due to horrendous odor and near certainty we are all about so either asphyxiate or explode.  Make new lunch plan.

12:18 Lunch of roasted almonds and cashews and Thai coconut/sweet potato soup.  Remove all chunks for toddler.  Feed chunks to baby.  Eat the nuts that get thrown at me after baby is full.  (My first meal of the day).

12:52 More Curious George.  Send 6 emails for my business.

1:06  Get pooped on. Clean everything and everyone associated with the poop.

1:20 Feel guilty about all of the Curious George.  Get determined to make new plan.

1:22  Find new plan.  Paint!  It’s too hot outside, so they can paint inside while I clean the kitchen.  

1:31 Great idea.  So cute!

1:33  Oh no

1:35  Bath time!

1:53  Give up for a few minutes.  Just give up.  End up covered in animal stickers.  Baby points to every one and says, “Roar!!! Doggy!”  Giggle.  Make baby dance just so I can giggle more. 

2:22 More Curious George.  Go ahead, judge me.  I’m too sleep deprived to notice.  Have your fun.

3:00 Clean the kitchen, finish making dinner, pack hubby’s lunch for the next day, pack dinner for tonight, feel no guilt when the baby falls over on the couch and passes out during “the monkey show.”  You gonna move him?  I’m sure as heck not.

3:51  Change out of pointless work-out clothes into whatever it is I’m wearing these days.  Pack dinner into the car.  Think about how I really wish I had done something today.  Laundry?  Music? Organized the still-in-boxes-after-4-years family room?

4:03 Pluck baby off of couch and chuck him into car.  Begin the hour and fifteen minute drive to church.

5:18  Arrive at church with two sleeping children.   Find hubby.  Wake kids, find an empty room, attempt to convince grumpy just-awoken babies to eat, shove food in face, run to meeting.

6:00 Arrive to meeting.

7:30 Leave meeting.  Get kids in car.  Gratfully (almost weeping) accept hubby’s offer to drive the kids home while I drive his car ALL BY MYSELF. 

8:30  Stop at the store for a fabulous box of Syrah.

8:47  Home

9:02 Breaking Bad!

Pause show repeatedly to ask husband things like, “Well, what was his deal with that woman?  Didn’t they make some international deal?  How is he out now?  Is he really out?”  “Where’s Mike?  Did he kill Mike? Does Jessie know that?”  “Who’s the missing kid? Why does he want to give him money?

And hubby asks, “Why didn’t you re-watch the last season today?”

Silly me.  I was too buys watching my soaps and eating bon bons.

Thanks, Wynona.

So, Wynona Judd told me to move to Nashville.  I had spoken to a handful of music industry pros who had all said, “If there is anything else you can do, do that instead.  This industry is hard.” Then I met Wynona. I casually explained that there were plenty of things I could do, but that when I did those things instead of making music, “There are these little, spikey bugs that crawl around inside of all of my veins constantly biting and pinching me and making me want to scratch off my skin.  When I do make music, the bugs are definitely still there, but it’s more like they’re swimming or riding intertubes down a lazy river.”  Wy leaned back, got comfortable, and said, “I think we need you here.” What’s a girl to do?  Bye bye Boston.   But first I needed to get some things in order.

Some of you may remember the Chicago Blizzard of 1999.  The day it hit, I woke to find my Australian friend, Clare, staring incredulously out of my bay window, where the cars lining the street were already completely buried.  She turned to me, eyes so wide I could see more white than hazel, and asked, “What does it mean???”  Well, it turns out it meant we were headed to Mexico. 

Clare took a bus to the airport about twelve hours after her toes turned black and frost bitten while she was waiting on the el platform for a train that never arrived.  It was so cold that it completely shut down for a few days.  I, however, was a bit short on funds.  I called all of the airlines’ 800 numbers (like we did back in the olden days), and found that I could get to Puerta Vallarta for a little more than $250.  I reasoned that I could pay all of my other week-long vacation expenses with an additional $100  (and we did.  We paid $18 a night for a 3-story house right on the beach.  We found it advertised on the cork board in a coffee shop the afternoon we arrived), so I walked into the restaurant where I had been waitressing and announced that I’d sell anyone my Honda Accord for $350 cash and a ride to the airport.  I sold it immediately.  I know, shocking right?  That trip is a story of its own, and I may tell it later, but that tidbit explains why I was carless when I moved to Boston.

Well, you can get by without a car in Boston, but you won’t last a day in Nashville.   When I told my mother about my predicament, she said I could have her car if I flew to Chicago (from Boston) and picked it up.  (So see, you thought I was an idiot for selling my car for a plane ticket, but then I bought another one to replace it with a plane ticket too.  Pretty crafty, eh?) I didn’t really want to drive 1,000 miles by myself, so I asked Cheekay, my adventurous friend from Hong Kong, if she’d like to go to Chicago the next day.  So, what I really meant was, “Hey Cheekay, do you want to fly into O’Hare, get a car into the suburbs and then drive straight back here without ever experiencing Chicago at all?”  But I MAY not have presented it like that.  So, off we flew to the Midwest.  We hopped right into the car and took off.  We didn’t even pack a change of clothes.  Then somewhere in the middle of nowhere New York, the car died.  I called Mom and she said, “I’ve driven that car for 220,000 miles and never had a problem.  What did you DO to it??”  Well, I drove it until the odometer hit 220,621.  I think that was the crux of the problem.  Anyway, we called a tow truck and  “Bones” rescued us on the side of the road and delivered us to the nearest Best Western.  By the next morning we were about 30 hours into our adventure and really wanted some clothes that weren’t beginning to adhere to our skin and graft themselves to our bodies.  Before I tell you this next bit, you need to get Cheekay’s voice in your head.  She is this beautiful, petite Hongkongese woman who was educated in London and then went to Cambridge, so she has a very proper English accent. She said, “I’ve always wanted to go to a Kmart.  Is there a Kmart in this area?”  I replied, “Well, there’s a TJ Maxx across the highway.  We could walk over there.  They usually have cute stuff.”  “Is it like a Kmart?  Mainly I want to know this:  If we go to this TJ Maxx and buy ourselves some clothes, can I say that I’ve bought them at a Kmart?” Why the hell not?  We bought ourselves matching jeans and Roxy surf t-shirts, ran back to the hotel to find that Bones had delivered the beast (who was later named Bessie), and we were off.   Cheekay wanted to show off her Kmart clothes to some of our friends, so when we got back to Boston, we met them at McCormick and Schmick for happy hour and then ended up ordering and sharing Lobster Thermadore because that’s a completely reasonable thing for college kids wearing phony Kmart clothes and driving a donated-by-Mom senior citizen car to eat for dinner.

Then I packed up everything I owned, which took about 40 minutes, and drove to Nashvegas.  One of my Berklee profs found me a house and introduced me to a few more people in the industry, and I was off.  Now you’re waiting for me to say I am a grammy award winning songwriter with multiple platinum records.  But really I worked a non-paid internship which eventually turned into $10/hr, became a private tutor for a 12 year-old girl who lived in a castle her parents built after they had a hand in inventing ATM machines and sold the company for a few billion, and had some really wild rides along the way.  

 So, although I never saw her again, I’ll be forever thankful to Wy for a few things, like the night I had a back-yard dance-off with the Chinese ballroom dancing champions of 2001, the time I won a dirty dancing contest with the man who designed and created Elivis’ white jumpsuit, and the night a 12 year-old calmly and confidentally explained to me that I was abused as a child because my dad ALWAYS made me fly commercial.  (It’s so relieving to finally know what to focus on in therapy after all of these years.) Thank you Wynona.  Thank you.

     

Adventure

I had a crush on one of my college professors, and when he spent one afternoon talking about a recent trip to France I thought, “Hey, I should go to France and then come back, visit him at office hours, and talk to him about it.”  That’s normal, right? 

That was Friday. Four days later, on Tuesday, I landed at Charles De Gaulle airport, stepped off the plane, grabbed my duffle bag, and passed through customs.   Luckily I had emailed my Belgium friend, Leah, the previous weekend to see if she could meet me.  She said she could only fly in and out the same day but she would love to have dinner.  Well, that was a relief because she was fluent in French and could surely call around during dinner and find me a place to stay for the next six days.   This was the 90’s, pre-9/11, so I remember being shocked that there were military personnel with semi-automatic weapons meandering throughout the terminal.  Anyway, I exited customs all excited to see Leah and have her direct my jet-lagged self to a nice place to eat and a warm bed to sleep in.  Uh oh, no Leah.  Hmmm…maybe I’d get a coffee and wait.  After two hours, still no Leah.  At that point I realized I had to call her.  This doesn’t sound like a big deal, but it really meant I had to exchange some money, go the kiosk, pull out my French dictionary, figure out how to ask for a calling card, find a phone, figure out how to use the phone with the calling card, and then (finally) call Leah’s cell phone.  Well, I did all of that, and a voice told me she was “out of area.”  I waited one more hour and then resigned myself to the fact that I was on my own and completely clueless.  I pulled out my “Lonely Plant Paris” book, looked up the “Hostel” section and whipped out my trusty calling card.  After being hung up on during the fist four calls (I kept calling and asking, “Voulez-vous couchez avec moi?”  It turns out that’s not how you ask for a place to sleep),  I finally called The Woodstock, a hostel that sleeps about two dozen in Montmartre, and an American answered the phone.  Whew!  Well, he told me they had a bed before I even got the chance to mistakenly proposition him.  Task one, complete!  Now I just had to figure out how to get there.

I grabbed an elderly man and asked him, in my pathetic French, to give me directions.  From his reply, I figured out that it was going to take me an airport tram, a commuter train, a Metro (subway), a transfer to another Metro, and then a short walk to finally reach my destination.  Yikes.  Well, I made it all the way until the Metro transfer and gave up.  It was a two-story station, I was completely jet-lagged, and every time I asked for help, all I got in return was this pained, sideways, curious expression in reply.  It was kind of like if you looked at a black lab and whistled at him in just the wrong pitch and volume.  Yeah, that look.  So, I gave up.  I got in a taxi that drove me around for about 30 minutes and finally landed me in front of The Woodstock.  Well, the next morning I realized I had hopped in the cab about a 15-minute walk from the hostel, but I still figured that for the amount of preparation I had done, I’d faired well.  

 When he dropped me off, I checked in, climbed the spiral stairway to my room, climbed into the top bunk, and slept for 12 hours.  The next morning I awoke, met my two roommates (two American guys) climbed down the stairs to breakfast, where I happened to sit with three Australians who lived on the same street I had lived on just three years prior, bought a postcard and mailed it to my professor, and then headed out on my roller blades.  Yep.  I spent the week rollerblading all over Paris and heading to the nearest Metro station any time I got lost.  I’d pick my next destination and just rollerblade around there until the next time I got lost.  On my third night, I agreed to an evening out with my roommates.  We bought baguettes, cheese, and wine, enjoyed it all cross-legged on the floor of our tiny room, and then headed out to the Latin Quarter where we happened upon Le Caveau.  Have you been there? 

It’s this bar with a tiny, rock-walled basement where people line the walls to hear jazz.  Well, the 60-something year-old proprietor of the bar grabbed me and whirled me around the dance floor for a few songs.  I can’t dance at all, but I can drink wine and be whirled off my feet (or I could anyway, before I became a grown-up mother who is too worried about what she might need to get worried about to really let loose enough for whirling).  It was quite a night.  When we got back to the hostel, I told one of my roomies, Job, that I loved his shirt.  It was a button-down red linen top.  He thanked me.  I knew that, after six months of traveling, he was returning to the states the next day.  Well, the next morning, I woke to find the shirt in my duffle.  (I know you are thinking now that I smooched him, but I swear I didn’t.)  I still find that very touching.  I spent the next couple of days checking out museums and art galleries.  Dad was a little surprised when I called him from Le Pompidou to say, “Hey, Dad!  I just found an art museum you would LOVE!”  He was paying my way through school and assumed I was still in Boston.  Uh, oops.

Anyway, it was a great adventure.  I made it back alive.  I had one hot date with my professor.  We talked all about Paris, and it was absolutely magical until he happened to mention his…..wife?  DATE OVER.

Why am I thinking about this right now?  Well, for one thing, I have a sick toddler.  I have cabin fever like you can hardly imagine.  If I felt like this fifteen years ago, I’d be on the next flight to wherever they were flying as long as they were leaving within the next ten minutes.  Now, it’s not really so much of an option, but I absolutely had to flee and get to somewhere, anywhere!  Get me out!  One guess where we ended up?  Yep, of course; you nailed it.  Target.  We bought finger paints, band-aids, and children’s Advil.  Mommy called the cops on someone for leaving their dog in the car, with the windows up, on a Texas August day, and then we headed back home.  I have moments where I miss those grand adventures from my 20’s.  Of course I do.  I miss them so much it hurts.  But then my three year-old stumbles out of his bed in the middle of the night, grabs my arm and asks, “Mama, will you lie down with me?”  So I climb into his tiny toddler bed, spoon him, and realize, this is the best adventure of my life, and we’re just getting started.  Yep, it’s a pretty good gig. 

My Sweet Friends

It’s hard to have friends when you’re a jokester smart-ass.

Today was a rough day, and Daddy wasn’t going to be home until after bedtime, so I figured I’d throw a frozen pizza in the ol’ oven and call it a night.  Then I noticed a disgusting odor.  I have two toddlers.  Disgusting odors are not rare, and I figure sometimes ignoring them is my best bet. (There’s really no logic in that, but it’s my go-to anyway.  After tonight I’m seriously considering rethinking it).  Then the odor got worse.  Then my head started to hurt.  Then my head REALLY started to hurt. Then my eyes started to water, and THEN I finally checked the oven.

Yeah, so that's what I found.

Of course the first thing I did (Well, I did manage to turn off the oven first) was text my bestie.  

Me:  “Heated oven for dinner without knowing it was full of toys.”

Patricia:  “Ur an idiot.”

Me:  “What??  I didn’t put them there!”

Patricia: “Hahaha.  The fact that you didn’t put them there kind of makes it worse cuz now I know your kids play in the oven when you’re not looking.”

And that, dear readers, is why we’ve been best friends since the 7th grade.  Everyone needs someone truly supportive to accompany them on this journey through life.

I’m very lucky because I have quite a handful of equally supportive buds.

One of my close friends is an amazingly talented photographer.  I have absolutely no skill in anything visual (except for selecting my awesome and amazing Target/Ebay/Forever 21 wardrobe, of course), so when I need something artistic done, I go begging and pleading to an artist.  Luckily, I married one, so I don’t have to go too far in most cases.  Photos though, are another story. 

 

David always shoots pics of me from down low, aiming up, so I look like I am 3 feet tall and 4 feet wide. 

Now when I’m desperate for a last-minute shot, I just tape the camera to the ceiling and set the timer.  Voila!  Skinny!

Anyway, this time I needed a decent, professional head-shot, so I called Rachel.  She is an absolute magician with the camera, so I knew I was in good hands.  I chose a new, cute shirt, got my hair and makeup done, and even had individual false eyelashes applied.  Well, we found just the right location with just the right light, but she kept saying, “You need to be a bit lower.  Bend your knees a little.  No, a little more.  Okay, just a bit more.  I'm trying to get the light just right.  There!  Perfect.”  

Wait for it.

Wait for it.

 

Wait for it.

Yep, there's my headshot.

Obviously I’m going to have to create a very straight-laced, straight-faced alter ego and have her collect a group of friends as well.  Sometimes they might come in handy.