The Day After

Dellinger Park Color Edit, originally uploaded by Lisa Golden.

Thank you all so much for the birthday wishes! The day was a blur of well wishes, laughs, UPS fantasies, calls and chats, cards and chocolate cake.

I realize that I'm a huge disappoint to some of you, but one of the highlights of my day was getting into bed between freshly ironed sheets. While I didn't do any work on the manuscript yesterday, I did some meditative ironing as I considered some changes I want to make to that work in progress. I had to bat away thoughts about the next book I want to write. Focus, focus...

I made up for my domestic indulgence by playing drinking games with the cats. Those felines can put away the whiskey when they're drinking competitively. We watched a rerun of Jersey Shores and every time someone got bleeped, you had to drink. I ended up wasted on a combination of what was left in the liquor cabinet, a quarter cup of Marsala wine and a shot or two of cooking sherry with an expiration date of 1997.

I'm probably on the Queen's shit list because I totally forgot to call her back to tell her I wouldn't be coming to tea. In my inebriated state, I did manage to drunk dial three old boyfriends and my Senators' offices. I think I'm supposed to be making a large donation to some conservative cause. Good thing I told them I was Rachel Maddow. They'll never call her office to follow up.

MathMan and Nate arrived home bringing with them a decadent chocolate cake. The annual fight over who would have the privilege of torturing me by scrawling my age in frosting across the top of the fudgey confection broke out, I screamed obscenities and threatened to run away from home, a plate was smashed in the ensuing melee, fire broke out when some whiskey reeking cat jumped up on the counter and yawned next to the 45 blazing candles and then Happy Birthday was sung in double time.

The cake was delicious. Kroger, you done good. We just worked around the flecks of melted wax, cat hair and fire extinguisher foam.

Things eventually settled down. MathMan got to work writing some kind of math test, Nate and Sophie ridiculed the television program they were watching and I went back to thanking people for their birthday wishes while I secretly tried to reconstruct a couple of those drunk dialed phone convos. Had I really told that one guy about what my mother had said about him? I was going to have to send an apology for sure.  Maybe some flowers.  Wait.  No. That would seem like a dig.  A gift card to The Bass Pro Shop.  Yeah, that would sooth my conscience and reinforce his masculinity.  Damn my mother and her opinions anyway.

MathMan stood, stretched, said something about being tired and walked into the bathroom. "Honey?" He opened the door a smidge and stuck his head out.

"Yes?" I looked up from the laptop.

"Why is there a UPS uniform hanging on the back of the door?"

********
How is your Tuesday shaping up? Ever drunk dialed anyone?  And what happened to the UPS guy?

The Number of Candles Remains A Mystery

The day after my parents found me under a cabbage leaf.  Or so my sister said.

The secret to staying young is to live honestly, eat slowly and lie about your age. - Lucille Ball

I woke up this morning and checked my phone like I always do.  I do it mostly in case Chloe has sent some overnight angst-o-gram, a wish goodnight or photos of a mysterious rash she wants me to diagnose using my super special mom powers.  Instead, I was overwhelmed by a number of Facebook text messages from friends wishing me a happy birthday.

While MathMan burrowed deeper under the covers and gave me a good morning grope, I read the messages and wondered how I could be so lucky.  In a year that has had its ups and downs, the human connections have been the highlight.  There's no question about it.

MathMan and the kids presented me with cards before racing off to school, leaving me to thank the cats for not spelling out Happy Barfday in hairballs this year and to contemplate what to do with my day.  Write?  Read? Work out?  Accept that invitation from the Queen to come for tea? Don my tiara reserved for special occasions and strip the bed linens for laundry?

I'll probably do all of those things.  Except the Tea with the Queen thing.  She's so needy.  It's my day, you know?  I don't want to talk about her favorite Corgi's "nasty habit" or how one can't find a proper set of gloves at WalMart these days.

I looked for my tiara, but couldn't find it.  Instead, I put on Sophie's headband with the devil horns, some matching red lipstick and got busy vacuuming.  One of the nicest things someone like me can do for herself is fix it so that she doesn't think "Dear lord, why do I bother vacuuming on a Friday?" every time she strolls through the living room on her way to fill her coffee cup.  Self-care can too be practical.  It doesn't have to be all spa and chocolate, yo.

The doorbell rang and I went to answer it.  The UPS guy stood there smiling.

"Sign here."  He glanced at the top of my head.

"Okay."  I'd forgotten the horns.

He cleared his throat.  "So Halloween's coming early at your house?"

I blinked at him, then my hand shot up to my head. My fingertips rested on the satiny horns with feathers. I had a choice here, didn't I?

"Actually, it's my birthday," I said, bringing my hand down and resting it on his chest.  "And I couldn't find my tiara."

He looked down at my red nails drumming on his brown shirt and shifted the electronic signing thingy under his arm.  "Well, happy birthday." he smiled and swallowed hard.  I could see his Adam's Apple play up and down.

I patted his chest and then removed my hand.  "I suspect this package is the rest of the costume."  I held up the small package and smiled my sweetest Blanche Dubois smile.

"Are you going to try it on now?" he asked, suddenly eager. So I hadn't lost my touch.

I weighed the package in my hands.  I knew that it was really the book I'd ordered as my birthday gift.  "Well," I drawled.  "Maybe later.  Right now I have some vacuuming to do.  Unless, you'd like to come in and vacuum while I change...."

I shut off the vacuum and went to the door.  A package rested against the porch railing.  I looked up and waved to the UPS driver who was swinging up into his seat.  He gave me a wave and put the van in gear to drive away.  I reached up and patted the satin horns.

Live honestly, eat slowly, lie about your age.

I try to live honestly, but there's always room for improvement in that department.  I will dedicate myself to slower eating and savor the flavors of the birthday cake MathMan will pick up on his way home. And as for that last one, remember how I said I was half way to ninety?  A lie.

Thanks to all who've wished me a happy birthday already today.  It's a great day to turn 29!

Party games are over here at Black Magpie Theory.  No gifts, please.

Please Put Your Fire On Hold While We Check Your Account

This post was written a couple of days ago and I sat on it, wondering if it was appropriate.  This morning, I decided I don't care about appropriate so here goes....

I sat in my lawn chair, my ancient laptop balanced on my knees and watched, mouth open in stupefied horror, as Gene Cranick described to Keith Olbermann how firefighters refused to put the fire out as and watched as his house burned to the ground, taking with it all the Cranick's possessions and killing a cat and three dogs.  Because Cranick hadn't paid his $75 fire fighting subscription fee.

"What does that remind me of?" I asked Keith who reflected my horror. Keith didn't answer even though I tweeted the question to him.  I know he had a lot going on at that point so I forgive him.

Then it came to me.  When we lived in Des Plaines, Illinois, there was a controversial area between Des Plaines and Park Ridge that was commonly referred to as Unincorporated Des Plaines.  If memory serves, the residents who lived there had to pay extra fees for things like 911 and trash pickup.  The kinds of things we take for granted when we pay our property taxes, for example.

In the twelve years we lived in Des Plaines, I don't ever remember hearing about someone's house being left to burn because the residents hadn't paid the "subscription fee."

I felt a certain kinship to Mr. Cranick as he sat there before the TV cameras and lights in his own lawnchair.  My heart ached for his loss and for the eye-opening reality that his despair is a shared on no doubt.  His just made the news.

When you move from a metropolitan or suburban area to a more rural area, you learn that services you took for granted are no longer available without a fee.  In Des Plaines, we paid a tax for our trash collection.  Here, you have to hire a private company or haul the trash to the dump/recycling center yourself.  Once a week, I fill Roxannes's trunk with trash bags and recycling and go say hi to the nice people who work at the dump.  I understand the people who rented this place before us didn't hire the private company nor did they haul off their trash.  Instead, they piled it onto the deck until it was waist high.  The neighbors complained of the smell and the growing rat problem, but there was precious little they could do.  It's every man for himself out here, right?

As bluegal points out in this really fantastic post (that's me saying be sure to open this link), this story also highlights the disconnect between what's available to rural folks versus city folks.

The internets are full of righteous indignation about Cranick's story.  For good reason, I might add.  Some of us are pointing out that what happened to the Cranicks is just the beginning.  It is the thing that Ayn Rand wrought.  Others are saying that society's sponges like Mr. Cranick get what they deserve.  In this case, you don't pay for the service, then you have no right to expect the services.  And you're an asshole if you think your neighbors should pay for you. It's every person for themselves, personal responsibility reigns!  Their thinking can be boiled down to this - if the firefighters make one exception for a deadbeat, then everyone will become deadbeats.

These are the same "thinkers" who believe it's fine to charge fees to individuals for a possibly needed service, but we should cut taxes for the wealthy and corporations who use our common good resources every day.  I tell you, I do not get it.

As I listened to the second installment of Mr. Cranick's Fiery Adventure last night, I wondered a couple of things.

First - is Mr. Cranick a Republican?  Has he, like so many of my neighbors here in Georgia, fallen for the current Republican claptrap that government is bad, taxes are evil, that every person should only have what they can afford and the hell with the common good?  Or does he go to a church where the pastor equates being a good Christian with voting Republican?  Or is he an R because, like so many old Southern Democrats, he switched parties after the Civil Rights era?

And when the county proposed to raise property taxes by 0.13 per $100 of property value, was Mr. Cranick one of the farmers who didn't like the plan?

Does it matter?  Well, it doesn't mean that Mr. Cranick deserves to have lost his home or to have had his animals perish, but it does point out that your vote does have consequences.  Follow the money.  As Republicans have taken over states' legislatures and local governments, they've cut taxes especially for the wealthy and corporations.  Cutting taxes and tax subsidies are a centerpiece of any campaign to bring new business to a state or a municipality.  Meanwhile, those same Republicans have pushed for and passed Balanced Budget Amendments for their states.  To offset tax cuts and the resulting reduced revenue, services must be cut to balance the budget. It's the law.

Therefore services are reduced, become fee for service or go away altogether.

People who think we can have nice, safe, clean communities with good educational systems, and up to date infrastructure without having to pay the taxes to support it are simply idiotic.  Someone has to pay for it.  That's why we have the common good and the tax structure.  We all contribute and if we don't, our houses may not burn to the ground, but the taxing body has some kind of legal way of getting the money from you.

Being opposed to the common good and the taxes that support it seems just fine until your house is on fire or you get hit with a bunch of new fees (shifted from taxes to fees) when you go to renew your license plate or your kids are now in classes with thirty kids or more or you flatten your tire because the road debris on I75 is left to lay because budget cuts mean road maintenance has been reduced to next to nothing.

I also wondered about the insurance implications of this huge national news story.  Will insurance companies now write into their policies that if you live in a fee for service area and you don't pay the fee, they won't cover your losses?  What about renters?  Would I be responsible for the fire subscription fee or would my landlord handle that?  If it's the landlord's responsibility, what happens to us if he doesn't pay it, just forgets, for example?

These are things to think about as some of our fellow Americans continue to promote the ideas of immature Libertarianism masquerading as Conservatism.  This idea that you don't owe anything to anybody, that you should not participate in the common good is akin to being an ideological adolescent.  You want all the rights of citizenship, but none of the responsibilities.  And equally bad is this crazy libertarian scheme of privatizing everything.  You really think that companies can provide better services while making a profit is sustainable?  And the accountability in such matters is for shit.  Just look at what's been done in Iraq by military contractors.

I want to ask this:  You don't want government?  Fine. Go a day without using the common good.  When you're finished emptying your chamber pot in your backyard, let us know how you liked it.  And while you're at it, imagine all your neighbors carrying their chamber pots looking for a place to dump, too.  That guy who lives in the house on your left?  He eats mostly cabbage and drinks lots of beer.

Hooked

One of the things I really like about social networking is that it gives you the opportunity to interact with people with whom you might never have had the chance to interact with for reasons ranging from geography to the constructs we create to keep people separate.  Celebrity/fan, politician/voter, leader/follower.

Just yesterday, I responded to a Tweet put out by Ayelet Waldman, author of Bad Mother and Red Hook Road.  She'd asked for readers to resend their Tweets about typos they'd found in the hardcopy of Red Hook Road.  So I did:

And she responded without calling me a goon.

I'll never wash my twitter again.

Tell us about your brushes with greatness, celebrity, the law.

The S Is Silent

A random sampling of what's happening and not happening here.

I'm still losing weight.  An hour on the elliptical each day absolves a multitude of sins including a supper consisting of one Sonic small chocolate malted inhaled on the fly between kid activities and a quarter bag of Brachs Candy Corn.  Please note that I'm keeping track now.  It's not a whole bag or even a half.  That quarter is significant.

And most days, I'm still eating whole grain, beans, lean protein and wearing a somewhat surly, sugar deprived expression.

MathMan's job has changed some.  He's stopped screaming in his sleep so that's nice.

Nathan and his baseball buddies have been doing things suggested by Tosh.0 involving Icy Hot.  I'm convinced that hearing about group testosterone activities makes life worth living.

Sophie, who isn't the least bit interested in the typical tween definition of cool, is in both the middle school band and an active member of its Academic Team.  Her siblings are worried that she's committing social suicide.

"Mom, don't let her do it." Comes the plea from Nate.  He's afraid of  being tainted with Nerdism by association.

"I hardly think that anyone willing to smear Icy Hot on his butt before running in a pack of fools around the ball field is an arbiter of good social sense," I bite out at him.  He shakes his head and limps away.

"But, Mother, it's going to follow her," moans Chloe who had to endure her younger bother's near undoing of her perfect student legacy.

I cluck my tongue at her.  "Seriously?  You link arms with other girls and sing sorority songs and you think Sophie's on the wrong track?" I huff.  "When I was in college, I would have thought you were a total loser.  And so would all of my artsy fartsy punky friends."

MathMan hung with a crowd who mocked the Greek system by calling themselves the Pi Rhos.  In between drinking beer straight from the pitcher and cleverly seducing him hours after I met him (slurring I'd do you in a second into his ear), I obtained clarification on his status vis a vis the Greek system.  I may have been slutty, but I did not fuck frat boys.  I had my standards.

But I digress.  In fact, I rethink.  Maybe if I'd married one of those frat boys, I wouldn't be Brokey McBrokenstein today.  Nope.  I'd have a nice alimony settlement, the condo, a plastic surgeon on speed dial, my half of the Country Club membership and a sporty little convertible. Damn it.  Hoisted by my own reverse snobby petard.  Pretty in Pink indeed.

Cripes. Where was I?  Oh, right. Sophie.  So she's on the Academic Team and those kids are kicking butt and rocking those team polo shirts.  Yesterday I attended the meet and got a little frustrated and stabby (hence the comfort malted later).  The person reading the questions and giving out correct answers when necessary was didn't know how to pronounce some key words like almondine.   Yes I'm an elitist snob.  So what?  At least I didn't elbow my way over to the desk, rip the question sheets from the woman's hands and yell "For goodness sake, let someone who knows how to pronounce bas relief do this, okay?"

No, I just sat fidgeting in my seat, fantasizing about doing that and checking Twitter on my phone.

I think I've paralyzed myself again with too much information about the publishing world.  Every time I pick up the manuscript to work on it, I get all itchy and nervous sweaty.  As an antidote, I've been reading a lot.  I've got two books I'm reading, one that I'm listening to the audio version of when I'm in the car and two in the queue to read.  I scored Jonathan Franzen's Freedom at the library and put it on my To Read stack.  The thing is so dang huge, though, so I picked the audio version up at the library and have decided to give it a listen because I'm such a slow reader, but a fast listener.

I'm enjoying the audio book of Water for Elephants so far except the parts narrated by the ninety-something Jacob Jankowski freak me out a little bit.  That could have something to do with the fact that my birthday is hurtling toward me and I'm going to be half-way to ninety.  When I consider how quickly this forty-five years has gone and then remember that as you age, time seems to go even more quickly (something to do with percentages), well, it sets my brain spinning. Plus it reminds me that I need to reiterate to my children that I would prefer to be taken to a field and shot and left to become part of the circle of life rather than put into a nursing home should I not be able to care for myself.  I am not of the prolong my life at any cost crowd.  Once my quality of life is gone, just end it.  I'll leave a permission slip to placate the authorities.

Well, that took a rather macabre turn, didn't it?  Sorry about that.  Let's have a song and dance on out of here. Before you go, please tell us how's your Wednesday? What's new? What are you reading these days?  Does my butt look smaller?

Black Magpie Theory: Better

Do you know what a drum line sounds like at 5:30 a.m.?

I do.

So I survived the Friday night Lock-In at Sophie's middle school.  To be  honest with you, except for the mind-numbing effects of being awake for more than 24 hours straight, it wasn't bad.  I spent a lot of time just standing around making sure that the kids didn't get hurt.  I must hand it to the organizers of the event.  They did a great job and made the volunteer role pretty dang easy.  The event had a schedule including free play time, contests, games, lots of food and a talent show.  The thing flowed.

Sophie had a blast.  I kept my distance, letting her come to me if she needed something. It was kind of nice to see her in that new setting, running coltishly with her friends from one thing to the next.  They're all limbs at this  stage, aren't they?

During the evening, I did have the opportunity to do something specific.  You can read more about it here.

So I guess I take it back, Middle Schoolers.  You weren't so bad.  You weren't bad at all.  I witnessed genuine kindness passing between them.  Taking turns, helping each other out, not Eddie Haskell polite, but polite enough.  I held plenty of eyeglasses for kids who were doing something physical and every single one of them thanked me.

The downside is that my tail is still dragging a bit.  Instead of sleeping all day Saturday, I tried to stay on a more normal schedule.  I slept some, but my sleep deficit remains significant.  I had to drive to town to run some errands and had one of the moments where you think "Man, I don't remember driving that last stretch of road...."

Lack of sleep turned out to be a small price to pay to get back some of my hope for the future, though. I'm glad I volunteered.

How was your weekend?

Adventures in Real Parenting: To Boldly Go Where This Parent Has Never Gone Before

In a fit of uncharacteristic do-gooderism, I responded positively to an emailed plea for volunteers for tonight's band lock-in at the middle school. (Did you just hear that eerie music or was it just me?)

When I told MathMan what I'd done, he thought I was joking.  Then he reminded me that I must have forgotten that approximately one third of tonight's attendees will be seventh graders.  Anyone who's raised kids through the middle years just gasped. Seventh grade, at least at our house, is the year that we wish our kids went to boarding school.

So yeah, tonight.  All night.  From 9:00 until 7 a.m. ish tomorrow, it will be a glassy-eyed crew of parents riding herd over a bunch of raging hormones dressed in the obligatory event tee shirt and pajama pants.

In preparation, I've been watching iCarly and boning up on the difference between Ke$ha and Katy Perry, Justin Beiber and the Jonas Brothers.  I'll be doing some stretching, deep knee bends and squats just in case I'm called upon to race across the gymnasium to rescue some eighth grade percussionist from a swarming hoard of sixth grade worshippers glittering with flavored lip gloss and offering up their last stick of React gum.

I stopped in the toiletry aisle at the grocery store this afternoon with the express purpose of sniffing every available bottle of Axe.  I figure it's kind of like an olfactory inoculation.  My brain still feels a little twangy in spots, numb in others, but at least I managed to drive home with my mandatory 12-pack of soda intact.  Grape Crush.  It was on sale.

I've checked the duty roster.  I'm going to be manning the inflatables.  I wondered why the band boosters thought blow up dolls were a good idea.

"Mom, that's the blow up playground stuff.  The slide.  You know?"  Sophie rolled her eyes, puffed up her cheeks and sized me up.  I knew she was wondering just how often and how severely I might embarrass her tonight.

"Oh."  I  still thought blow up dolls sounded like more fun.  It must have been all that Axe sniffing.

She circled around me.  She's so antsy I want to get her with one of those darts loaded with sedatives. "By the way," she purred, "You're going to let me and Leah go down the slide head first, right?"

My Mom Thing kicked in.  That little red flag like on a mailbox popped up.  Except it didn't mean I had mail.  It meant that there was the potential for danger.  "Absolutely not," I snapped.

"But!"

"No way, sister."

She wanted to know why, of course.  Kids always want to know why when you say no, but isn't it funny how they never ask why when you say yes?

"If I let you and Leah skirt the rules, then I'll have a whole army of band geeks* wanting to break their necks. It'll be chaos.  It'll be anarchy!"  The Breakfast Club reference flew right over her shaking head, but she held her tongue.

"Well, don't forget to take a nap.  You better stop screwing around on your computer and sleep so you're not cranky tonight."  That was her speaking to me, not the other way around.

"Hey, I've got my speed.  That should keep me going all night," I harrumphed as I reached for the Lock-In Fact Sheet.  I hate it when she calls blogging "screwing around."  I shook the photocopied sheet full of text.  What to bring, what to not bring.  "So I see here that we can't bring our guns or knives or our dangerous substances or chemicals."

"Obviously, Mother."  The sound of rolling eyes echoed off the walls.

"Well, they won't be searching the parents, right?" I glanced again at the paper.  "Because I'm bringing my Star Trek U.S.S. Enterprise bottle opener just in case.  It's my major award, you know."

She stared at me without speaking.

It's true.  I won the bottle opener for my caption in a contest at Anna Lefler's blog Life Just Keeps Getting Weirder.  To be honest with you, I haven't not had it somewhere on my person since it arrived by special delivery yesterday.  Which proved tricky last night given the way I sleep nearly au naturelle these days.  

Finally, Sophie spoke.  "What do you plan to do with the bottle opener, Mother?"

"The way I see it, it's a versatile tool.  It's a weapon, if needed.  And who knows, maybe some adult will smuggle in some beverages that require an opener."  In my mind, a blurry image formed.  It was me on one of those metal folding chairs, tossing back a couple of Shock Tops while overtired and punch-drunk children tumbled headfirst down the inflatable slide.....

Listen up, my insomniac friends.  Feel free to text me tonight to make sure I'm awake and sober and not trapped in some tuba locker, okay?  Those of you who are friends with me on Facebook can find my mobile number on my profile.

I'll also be tweeting the event, in case you want to be part of the action.  If you have a Twitter account, you can follow me here for all the witticisms that are bound to be produced tonight.

There's nothing left to do now.  I've got my mom jeans and my Band Boosters Are The Real Players embroidered sweatshirt.  I'm ready to rock this thing.

See you tomorrow.  I hope.

*No offense to those of you who were Band Geeks.  I was one, too, until I gave up my trumpet to twirl a flag.  And let us not forget I married a guy who plays the bassoon.