Which has kept me up at nights, uneasy and nauseous. I couldn’t eat much of anything yesterday; I had to practically force myself to eat the leftover cheese sticks, a bowl of soup, and half a chocolate bar (with hazelnuts).

So, I did.

But, I couldn’t bear to go another night with fitful sleep; so last night, to combat this, I took a Phenergan.  It’s a pill prescribed for upset stomachs, etc. We fear I might have IBS. (That’s quite a conversation-starter, there, is it not?)

It took a couple of hours, but it did the trick: it settled my stomach enough and made me drowsy enough to fall asleep and stay that way through most of the night. Though I fell asleep on the couch and as is the usual piper’s fee for that, I woke up with aching hips.

I also fell asleep with the heating pad on, which, the warning tag clearly indicates, is a no-no.

And the dream I had? Well…it was perfectly Joyce-ian, ironically comic and lengthy.  As most of my dreams tend to be. I was, it seems, in my own version of Finnegans Wake, one that I am rightfully going to call, Phenergan’s Wake.

I swear that pun came to me just now.

(And I don’t care if you don’t believe me).

Here’s the dream, in two parts.

PART A: “Keep it down, out there, I’m trying to drink my shower!”

I’m the age I am now, but I’m back in my hometown, and I’m running late to church. I’m supposed to help Nana with the dinner, the setup, etc.

We often would eat dinner at the church, especially if it’s during Revival.

Nana has opted to cook for everyone in the church, by herself, and I have been given the task of setting the tables. Because it is a revival, we have invited everyone in the world. I am responsible for setting what appears to be 1,000 tables. All of which require linens and freeze-dried, hand-painted rose petals.

I have overslept. The only recourse to this is to grab my clothes, which were in the microwave, warming, and to shower at the church.

So, this is what I do.

The shower at the church (a shower which does not exist in real life) is located at the back of the old Fellowship Hall, by the nursery. It is a very tiny shower. And though my body is completely covered by the small shower curtains, my head is not and I am able to talk to all the people who walk by, on their way to the new Fellowship Hall where dinner will be served.

Except, I’m not talking to these people.

I’m yelling at them to “keep it down!” I’m angry at them. They keep asking me to do things, to explain things, to answer questions. I want them to hush because I’m trying to not only take a shower, but to drink it as well from a plastic cup that appeared out of nowhere (and yet that didn’t seem odd because doesn’t everyone take a plastic cup to the shower with them?) because I realized while bathing that I was bathing in holy water.

Which, for the record, has never seen the light of day in a Baptist church.

I somehow put it together that I’m not really in a bathroom, per se, but I’m in a secondary type of Baptistery. I’m showering in a spare, if you will, in case the actual Baptistery in the sanctuary was to break.

I realize I’m shouting to distract the people, the congregation, from noticing that I’m sacrilegiously cleaning myself…with holy water that has found its way in from some Catholic tributary.

They don’t seem to notice, though, or they don’t care…either way, the big problem hasn’t occurred to me yet.

When I’m finished, it hits me: I don’t have a towel.

[NOTE: I wake up in here, somewhere, and go to the bathroom. In a rare event, when I return to the couch, as opposed to my bed because I do not think clearly at night, I continue with the same dream].

PART B: “The turkey isn’t done until the vest matches Diane’s earrings.”

We’re now in the new Fellowship Hall. All the tables are set with linens, rose petals, water glasses, forks. Everyone is in line, and they’re all very excited to eat. It’s as if they’ve not eaten in days.

And they haven’t.

I see a clock on the wall that tells me we’ve been at church for four days. Four solid days. (Of course, some revivals have been known to last even longer – though they allow you time to eat in between sermons).

Nana has truly outdone herself, here. She’s cooked everything known to man: dressing, meatloaf, fried chicken, pies, creamed corn, and for the pièce de résistance, a mammoth turkey.

It’s easily the size of a Tercel.

And it’s wearing a thick, wool vest, stark white…with three marbles for buttons.

She looks at the vest and then shakes her head.  She puts it back in the oven, which is sitting above the sink. As a matter of fact, the knob that turns on the hot water, also sets the temperature for the oven.

Everyone groans. They’re very hungry, and she’s not letting anyone fix their plate until the turkey’s done.

“You know the rule.” She says, “The turkey’s not done until its vest matches Diane’s earrings.”

Diane apologizes. She hasn’t worn any earrings today.

[And this is where I woke up].  

It’s the first dream I’ve had in a long time that I fully remembered the following morning. I’m not saying that Phenergan is the answer to my restless eyes; I have no desire to be a substance abuser…again.

Though the last time I abused any substance to the point of becoming problematic I was ten and the substance was mashed potatoes, insofar as that counts as a substance.

I loved mashed potatoes. (Potatoes in general, really). And once when I was ten, I ate so many that I vomited. Right there at the Sunday dinner table, in front of Nana.

That’s what I thought, at least, that it was the fault of the mashed potatoes.

The truth was that I was in the process of getting the stomach flu. As you might imagine I assumed it was due to the excessive influx of mashed potatoes I’d consumed that caused the illness. The doctor assured me it was not the mashed potatoes.

I think in lieu of a traditional upbringing, rooted as such in the normal definition of a family with a Father, Mother, and 2.5 children, that familial love was sublimated by food and food preparation. I think it’s the reason for my love/hate relationship with cooking to this day.

Or, maybe I was just an ignorant, greedy child.

I couldn’t look at a potato for months without blushing.

***

Though, as you know, that is certainly not the case today.

Not with potatoes…and not, I pray, with the Phenergan.

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I’m holding up four fingers, at this very moment, even though you can’t see them.

But, that’s it: four items. Four, random though purposeful, inconsequential items.

One of those items was a candy bar. A Kit-Kat, actually, and it was easily stolen because I used to run the “candy store” between class periods, at my high school. 

The smart kids got to do everything fun, especially when it involved cash handling.

What do you want from me? The Kit-Kat logo is copyrighted.

I only stole one candy bar and only the one time because I had convinced myself that morning that I was experiencing the onset of premature adult diabetes, which I think is how most people experience it…very suddenly.

I mean, it can’t take, like, what, about twenty minutes, tops?

I had my assumed hypoglycemic attack right before third period (World History), standing behind that booth in my maroon windbreaker and tight-rolled jeans and I didn’t want to walk all the way to my locker to get my money (rather, I couldn’t. Who would run the “candy store?”) so I just took the Kit-Kat and ate it, right then and there.

I never paid for it.

Then there was the time that I thought I’d stolen ice cream. But, it was at a buffet. So, there’s that. Shan dared me to do it, truth be told. We were returning from a church youth trip where we’d done some noble thing like sing hymns to the homeless outside Wal-Mart, something like that, and we’d stopped on the way back to eat at this restaurant called Quincy’s, now gone the way of the dodo. It was a country-style buffet, so naturally everything was included in the price, even the ice cream.

Still, I thought I was being a rebel. I was, let’s face it, not the brightest bulb in the tool box.

Oh, did they laugh at me.

What was I to do to get even except roll their yards.

During my formative years of high school (when most of my five-finger discount days were lived), there was something akin to an unofficial moratorium on rakish youth purchasing more than one package of toilet paper. Honestly. A policeman, Toby (as it was a small town, we all knew each other. Also, he went to my church) would patrol the aisles, but especially on Halloween and Valentine’s Day.

(Far be it from me to tell you why Valentine’s Day was the other hallmark holiday of choice for Those Who Rolled Yards).

This problem then, as you see, was what led to my next stolen item: toilet paper. Now, I wasn’t about to waltz into Piggly Wiggly and try to manhandle a suspicious amount of TP. I couldn’t risk the scorn come Sunday if Toby caught me.

No, I had to plan this out, accordingly. And it began with a sudden rash of sleepovers. I planned this crime spree out over three weeks, with my cousin Mikey’s help. It was a perfect cover. Who didn’t like a sleepover?

Ninth graders in my town, at my school, certainly did.

If you look closely, you can see better.

We all had freshly minted driver’s permits, which meant you could drive to one of three places, without much issue: Piggly Wiggly, Sonic, and the movies (and sometimes if you played your cards right, the First Baptist Church parking lot across from the funeral home…but let’s not push it). 

The sleepover came in handy because we didn’t all have cars.

So, under the guise of liking people I didn’t, I spent several long nights, “hanging out,” driving the “strip” about a million times over for some unknown reason – it always tickled me that I ever did the “strip.” I mean for crying out loud, I saw these people every day, all day, the whole week long.

This must be what they mean when they say that youth is wasted on the young.

Then back at the house of choice, as we all settled in for the night, I’d excuse myself to the bathroom and snatch a roll of their toilet paper; incidentally, you can tell a lot about a family from their choice of toilet paper. Anyway, I’d carefully hide it in my overnight bag, and after a few weekends of drivel and driving, I’d amassed a goodly pile of paper products.

The rest I stole from my own house, which, when all was said and done, was not the best of ideas.

Now…that’s what, like, three items, right?  Well, two, I guess:  the ice cream doesn’t count.

Nor do pens. I’m not sure if you know this or not, but it’s never wrong to steal a pen.

And it’s not always your fault, either, the stealing. I mean, I inadvertently stole one of Matt’s CDs, but it’s only because I borrowed it and forgot to give it back. And that’s been since…well, he moved to DC in 2001, so…oh whatever. Point is: that’s not the same thing as out-right stealing.

This is, though:  I stole a pair of sunglasses, once…again, from a friend. Well, sort of. I didn’t like her all that much.  But she was a friend’s friend, which is the same as being so far removed from my Zone of Concern that she might as well have been missing, and…I don’t know, I guess that’s why I took them.

They were beautiful, large, ovalled, with a beige undertone. I still have them, in my car.

But, here’s the kicker: I can’t even wear sunglasses. I never have. I’d have to spend a fortune to because I require prescription glasswear. However, she got a little too tipsy, one evening as we lay out at the beach, and my being bored coupled with my seeing an opportunity to be aggravating, I took them.

Gas Light (1944). Starring Ingrid Bergman. It's also Angela Landsbury's first film role.

I spent the rest of that week gaslighting her. Making her think she was losing her mind, but trust me, she was no Ingrid Bergman.

To be sure, I am not claiming to be a kleptomaniac; I’m far too anxious a person for that hobby. Though I did know a former preacher’s wife who was one.

For years, I thought a kleptomaniac was someone who stuttered.

And I was amazed that she was being called one by the ladies at church. She spoke crisply and well. When one of these ladies’ purses ended up in the backseat of this woman’s car, though, the picture came a little more into focus for me.

Of course, that particular lady of the church was always losing things, come to think of it. Her keys, her patience, her lipstick, her older daughter. And I don’t really think that the former preacher’s wife stole all of those things. She only drove a Toronado, after all.

All I know for certain is that I didn’t steal them, either. Because that’d make eight items.

And I’ve only ever stolen four, like I told you, but – and here’s where you’ll be disappointed – I cannot for the life of me, right now, remember what that fourth thing was.

Hm.

Imagine that…

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Here comes Christmas!

They’re usually spread all over the airwaves around this time, each year. Because nothing says Christmas quite like the stumble-trap of a miniature railroad system circling hour after hour around the base of your tree.

My grandmother, she’s 93 as of yesterday, and she had this train set that she would year-in-year-out place around the Christmas tree, letting it silently circle on its tracks, beneath the Douglas Fir.  Inevitably, she’d forget that she had put a train set around the Christmas tree and would trip over it, repeatedly, each time remarking how dangerous it was to put such a train set around a Christmas tree, in the first place.

I’m not sure where her insistence on this particular tradition stems from, but it’s as clockwork as the Breaking of the Egg Nog Two-Cup Rule, which happens just as soon as Aunt Rub gets to town, and manages to get all of herself in that brave wheelchair and swaddled into the den, and then parked in the corner between the brick hearth and the game cabinet.  She gives but one gift, each year, “[...] for the family,” she says, and that gift is a new boxcar to add to the impending pitfall that was the train set.

Well, that and her company. So, a gift and a half, I guess.

Despite this, and the thousands of tales that I’ve collected in my lifetime, which continually spring forth from every family holiday, I developed no especial attraction for trains.

Or egg nog.

But, I did, even though I wasn’t aware of it at the time, begin to harbor a slight, festering desire to actually ride a train. A bona fide train.

Which led to my embarking on such a trip with America’s premier railway system known as Amtrak, this time last year. Not to be confused with Amway. Also, by “premier,” I mean, The Only Railway System in America.

First of all, I’d like to point out that trains are expensive. I accepted that, though, because I’d decided if I was going to take a train, I would need a sleeper car. (That’s where the money is made).

Next, I had to settle on a location. It just so happened that a friend of mine, at the time, was debuting a new musical he’d written, at the University of Michigan, and since I’d never been to Michigan (indeed, I wasn’t sure it was even a real place and/or was in Canada), I chose Ann Arbor, phoned ahead and told him I was “on my way. Riding the rails, I am.”

I've got nothing but time.

Enjoy that, he said. I’ll see you at midnight.

That’s another thing I’d like to point out: trains do not like to run on a conveniently timed schedule, especially not when traveling long distances.

If you’re visiting someone far away, they will feel the exact same amount of pain you did while en route because they will have to wait up until your train arrives. Thankfully, my friend was jovial and looking forward to the visit.

So, was I. I was riding a train, for crying out loud. For seventeen hours. For seventeen hours I was riding this train.

Somewhere in Missouri, I decided I needed to take a bath. I had, up to this point, an OK-I-think-I-could-enjoy-first-class-despite-the-claustrophobia attitude, and also Seasons 4 and 5 of The Golden Girls. Bea, Rue, Estelle, Betty, and I could get through just about anything.

Until it dawned on me that I couldn’t take a bath. It’d have to be a shower.

Well, I thought, that’s fine. Hot water is hot water.

Which leads me to another point I’d like to make: trains do not have extensive hot water resources. I have never been and never will be a fan of a cold shower. But, what’s even worse, is waking up from a fitful night of “sleep” (contrary to my popular belief, the rocking of the train does not encourage a good night’s rest), and standing naked in the middle of an already cold, steel box with a thin veneer of plastic on the walls and a large drain in the middle of the floor waiting while the water finally heats up to a Can’t This Do For Now temperature and then immediately loses all warmth and becomes a spray of ice.

This is, as far as I know, the complete and utter opposite of Hot Water.

Add to that, this: the “shower area” consisted of a crawl space totaling perhaps fifteen inches in width, length, and height. It was small, you see. There were no shelves, obviously, and only one small bench, so slick that anytime the train jerked, which was all the time, every piece of dry clothing I had slid off the bench and directly into the cold shower with me.

Plus, the complimentary towel was about the size of a King James. It left nothing to the imagination…and I have a big imagination.

Feel free to use as many as you need.

When I finally tired of my struggle to be clean, another problem reared its ugly, ugly head.

I couldn’t figure out how to turn the shower off.

I tried and tried and tried…I read the diagram they had posted on the shower wall, indicating in large, who-couldn’t-figure-this-out lettering accompanied by those ubiquitous stick figures, who I imagine had hot water, but it was of no use. The water would not be turned off.

I had a handful of dirty clothes, clean boxer briefs (which were wet), a toiletries bag, and an envelope for a towel, basically, so what was one to do?

I slid open the pocket door, stepped out of the shower, and ran like hell all the way back to my cabin, leaving the water running. That’s what one does.

For future reference, though, one should at least take time to dry one’s feet. I left a puddle trail the size of Peoria (which I’m sure we were passing through at the time), all the way from the shower to my cabin door.

Sigh.

In short…I had the time of my life.

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I wish that they didn’t. But they do.

I wake up with such issue with the Day, every single day. It doesn’t matter if I’ve had three hours of sleep or a hundred.

And I don’t settle down until after 2:00, usually…on bad days 4:00.

I think it’s because I’ve lost my mornings. That’s what it feels like.

Imagine what I'd be like if I drank coffee.

I mean, I wake up knowing I have a drive ahead of me just to get to my office, a drive I’m beginning to hate with the heated passion of a thousand burning suns, and it’s caused me to reevaluate what I do when I’m in my car: I’m not driving anymore; I’m working.

And I used to look at driving as a fun thing to do. I promise, I did. I’ve logged many miles on America’s highways.

But, now, the minute my butt hits the seat of the car, I feel like I’m in a mobile office.

I feel that I’m at work as soon as I crank the engine, which might explain why some mornings I hope it won’t.  I have little other choice: I must consider my time on the road to be the same as my work time…like a traveling, irritation-filled office hour (plus five minutes, give or take).

It’s an analogy that I’m about to beat to death in this blog.

Because this morning: my cruise control went out.

Prophetic, eh?

I named my car after my great grandmother, Tigi. And she’s been a very good car for ten, mostly easy years. She’s never given me a great deal of trouble, and aside from regular oil changes, the inopportune Timing Belt Incident of 2004, and the Stranger-Danger Tire Trauma outside Louisville, Kentucky, in 2005, she’s been clean as a whistle.

After all, she’s a Honda. And you can’t kill a Honda unless you’re an 18-wheeler. And although I have managed to avoid taking the Honda quiz on Facebook, I will not hesitate to admit that they’re good cars.

Except when they’re bad.

I’ve never been in a car that decided it no longer appreciated the ease of cruise control. I thought she was about to pull a Flintstone.  It shook and shook and coughed and sputtered, and I had no idea what was going on, but after I’d calmed down, it hit me: this was a sign.

I can’t keep doing this job.

I hate the idea of being stranded anywhere, but especially between Crawford and Scooba, Mississippi(s).  And even worse so in the middle of a steady, mocking rain.

Tigi's almost a shadow of her former self.

Fortunately, Tigi held firm, and I managed to get to my office, but now I’m sitting here dreading the drive back, in case I’m not so lucky.

As I pulled into my trusty old parking spot, I began to correlate my waning desire to work here with the problems my car has been experiencing, over the past few months.

Day One: I drive to Scooba, find my building, park, take my little sack lunch and my satchel with me into my office, and prepare for class. The day goes well, but I’m not really sure I’m a good fit for the environment here, particularly. I try to push that thought away. The gossiping others make this hard to do; I feel a little down. A little stained. But, it’s only the first day, right?

A week or so later, I have my oil changed. Everything OK?, I ask him.

Well, mostly.

Mostly?

Gotta small oil leak, but it’s nothin’ to worry with, for now.

OK, well, thanks, then…

…for now.

Day Forty-Three: (please NOTE – these days are approximate) Tigi cranks and well enough, but she pulls at the stop signs. She manages to get from Point A to Point B, but that tug is aggravating. It’s as if she’s getting a little tired of the drive, too. I worry constantly that she’s about to go dead at the next four-way, or the next traffic light, but she obliges, if grudgingly, all the way to Scooba. The day goes well in class, but I still feel so out-of-place, and I’m not encouraged by the rumor-mongers. I know I’ve got more charm than this, but I don’t feel the need to use it.

That’s never a good sign, FYI.

So, I take her back to the mechanics. I’m putting so many miles on her every two weeks, I’m afraid to wait too long for trained eyes to inspect her.

How’s it looking?, I ask.

Your transmission’s leaking, a little, but it’ll be next week before I can do anything good about it. Should be fine, though. Not to worry…it’s small

…should be fine.

This morning: no cruise control. Tigi might as well have told me herself that she’s nearing done with this day-to-day, slow-to-burn, gradual mercy killing. The road has become a mountain, and she’s no Sherpa. She might as well have thrown up the engine and spit out a spark plug because my foot is just not the type to drive without cruise control. I rely on that cruise control. But what it says to me in figurative terms is far more lethal than what I expect will happen on my way home this afternoon…if I get home.

I’ve been relying on cruise control for far too long in this job, and now comes a decision that will separate the faculty from the football coaches: am I going to be a Man or a Missionary?

See, now I could do this job, real easy.

Because it’s either stop and pray or push the car, at this point.

Who knew that so innocuous a job offer this past summer could become such an unnecessary headache, and in so short a time. It’d be one thing if a) they came through on some of their promises, or at least moved with something even slightly akin to speed, or b) if all this were happening just 10-15 minutes down the road from my house.

But they don’t, or haven’t, done these two things. So, they’re just negatives. And these two negatives do not make a positive, in my case. Especially not when they’re over two hours away, round trip.

It’s never good when you question the worth of a thing. But it’s worse when you do and have trouble finding an answer.

Take it one question at a time, someone told me.

That’s what I’m trying to do.

It’s just unfortunate that the question now is Why.

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This is my family tree, ready for Christmas.

Even though, I don’t really know my “real” nieces and nephews. I’ve seen Millie, once; I’ve seen Auden, once; I’ve never meet Vinnie. So, to make up for this: I give all my grand uncle-ness to a series of young cousins, whose mothers I grew up with, as my nieces, being the baby of the adopted family I claimed with their grandmother, who I took as my—

You know what, let me scratch that.

It’s too confusing.

My family tree, you know, is really just an assortment of random branches that were blown down during a storm, and happend to fall around an exposed root out in the yard. So, we’ll go with that.

Again. Ahem: I like to think I’m a good uncle.

I spend each Sunday afternoon with my current batch of nephews: A.K., 4; Conn, 3; and Wynn, 2. I do everything I can to encourage their imaginations (i.e., taking a puzzle box top and making into a pirate’s hat), but, every now and then they surprise me with their own little internal thinking skills.

For example: A.K. told me once when he grew up he wanted to be either a ninja or a box of crayons. When I asked him Why (for the box of crayons), he said, Well, everybody I know likes crayons.

Brilliant, huh? And somehow poignant.

Sometimes, it’s just plain funny what they say…and do. Last weekend, for instance, we were playing one of their favorite games. It’s called Crazy Bulls. And here’s how you play it: everyone crawls on all fours, making any very loud sound they care to, then they do a “bull run” down the long, long green carpet hallway at Nana’s, and then the Farmer has to give them candy.

This is played in rotation for…oh, let’s say, two hours.

So, last Sunday, we’re playing this game, and I’m the Farmer, and I’m running them down the hall (actually, I sat in the recliner at the east end of Nana’s house, where the family den is – we sit there after dinner and watch some television show about cows, ironically. We have a cattle farm, that’s why; I mostly just read the paper, as I don’t really care for cows as far as prime time viewing is concerned), anyway, I sat in the recliner and just watched them run back and forth, up and down the hall.

I'll read anything that keeps my eyes off a cow.

I was halfway through the Foxtrot comic when I heard Conn say, “Whew!” and then collapse. I jumped up and hoped he was fine (we’re having several medical scares with his health, as of late).

He was completely fine, though. Don’t worry.

I got down the hall, to him, and I said, “Conn, are you OK, buddy?”

He nodded, and looked up and said, “Yeah. Let’s just pretend like I’m a dead bull.”

He’s 3, for crying out loud.  

I can’t remember when I first even knew what death was, let alone want to play dead. I don’t think I started that until I was, at least, in first grade, which would be what six, and I didn’t want to do the May Day school production. I figured Conn must be tired, is all…

So, I started to say No, Conn, no dead bulls today. Let’s just take a break…but A.K. intervened.

“That’s not right, Conn.” (Good, good, A.K. will talk some sense into him, I thought).

“What, AA?” (That’s what Conn calls him).

“That’s not right!” (A.K. was getting a little loud, but I stood by, observing the natives in their natural habitat).

“What is.”

“Bulls don’t die like that! Gosh! They fall on their sides.”

At which point, Conn got up and proceeded to die, time after time, until A.K. pronounced it “good enough to do.” This took quite awhile; I had two pieces of Scotch Chocolate cake in the interim. Wynn, having found his way back to his own dinner plate (and believe me, he eats enough) decided he was through with deviled eggs and brown sugar ham. He was going to die like a real bull, too. Though it came out more like, “Ido wi’AA and Con-Con, me.”

I’m not sure how many minutes passed, in reality, but at some point, Nana came down the hall because “it’d gotten too quiet.” That’s how we bring up all children in our family: by ear. It’s also, incidentally, how one of my sisters learned to play the piano and my patience.

Nana came around the corner, and I’m sure Had She Not Loved and Brought Me Up with U.L., she would have thought I’d killed three children. They were all very silent I must agree, and laying on their sides, their little tongues sticking out. A.K. had been stubbornly insistent that they do this the right way or not at all.

(He is his mother’s son, of course).

He can't even get a Capitol One credit card.

But, what he hadn’t figured on was just how tired they all three were. And as I stood by, ever vigilant, he could have no way of knowing that I was simply allowing them to wear themselves out. I motioned to Nana to walk softly, just in case I was right.

And I was.

By the time she stepped down into the sitting room, where we’d been playing, all three of the boys were completely asleep. They looked dead, I know, but they weren’t. They were in a mad, fast world of dreams, and Wynn, as he usually does when he naps, had a slap-happy grin on his face.

God, I’d love to know what he dreams about.

I also wished I’d had a camera; it was such a sweet picture. All the more so, when you know just how aggravating three boys can be. I’ve got a white hair for each of them, but I learned a valuable lesson, all the same: it’s not always a bad thing to be bull-headed.

Especially not if, in the end, it helps you go to sleep.

Related Posts:

• Gary makes me hungry.
• Phenergan’s Wake
• Yes, Virginia, I am a vegetarian.
• "I hope you're not wadding," she said.
• Five foods that made me who I am.

I have to say, I’m very glad that there are a wealth of good people in the State of Mississippi. It never ceases to amaze me, as long as I’ve lived here, how innately good so many of them are. And get this: I’m talking about the younger generation. Not just my Aunt Zora’s quilting bee.

I'd still watch out for the sting, if I were you.

The human spirit is alive, well, and brilliantly resilient in this state. Key word here: resilient.

That’s important to note because I’m fairly sure I was  the Sword of Damocles from Friday, around 4:16 PM until Sunday evening, just after 8:00, tenderly dangling over old friendships, new ones, and being all around, a constant threat of instability…even if I were the general Funny Man, floating from bar to bar, I taxed a great number of these good people.

But, wait, let me back up and come at this like a drill.

I treated this weekend much like a Jenny Craig reject would a Barnhill’s buffet. I’m not sure when I gave myself permission to become an idiot for the weekend, probably while I was dancing in my office in an attempt to choreograph a number from the musical Godspell - hey, you get through your day, your way, and I’ll get through my day, mine – but the point is, I granted myself permission to treat the “Fri-Sat-Sun” (thank you, Amy Sedaris) as a nubile, 21-year-old.

Young, fresh, and green as a Midori Sour.

I embraced the entire weekend like a support group. “Hi, my name is Kris, and I’d like to sit at your table and talk about everthing that’s ever happened to me.”  I became a Wanderer, a loose-limbed, cocky-grinned, good-looking Wanderer, mind you, but still…a Wanderer.

And I met people.

A lot of people.

I’m also not sure what office I was running for this past weekend, but I guarantee you, I was out to win it. I shook hands, kissed babies, ate communal bread (or whatever that was in the styrofoam), and I smiled. I smiled and flirted and, though I can’t absolutely confirm this, I might well have ruined a friendship, three dates, and what might have been a proposal.

All in all, it was a great weekend…except, well…shocker of shocks, I’m not a 21-year-old.

No, I’m a few months shy of 33.

Ouch, right.

I’d like to say I took full advantage of this past weekend as some sort of rebellion against the mythical, sacred age of 33. Maybe I did, maybe it’s so deeply in my subconscious that it can only be justified by “Yeah, right, sure you did, Kris” criticisms…who knows. But, it certainly rang true on one very conscious level, that cannot be ignored: I don’t entirely want to grow up.

However, rebellion is hardly the way to recapture your Youth.

I was nothing short of a fool, this past weekend. Oh, I didn’t really do anything bad, and I walked home, so no law was broken, but I should be embarrassed by the way I conducted myself, in public, laughter or no, joke or not. No, wait, no, what I should really be upset about is the fact that I felt the need to do this; I convinced myself that this would break the burden of stress I’m under.

Because I must admit: I’m under a lot of stress, as of late.

Wild Turkey, Check. Entire box of Belgian chocolates, Check.

I wonder if that’s a typically American thing to do, enbracing vices? Think about it. Go on and replace binge drinking with something else.  Let’s see, what are common cyclical vices we turn to, time and again? Certainly, people drink…excessive sleeping, that’d be one, right? Overeating, certainly fits the bill. Not eating is one, I know from personal experience. For some, it’s cleaning. Or exercise (you can’t tell it to look at me, now, but this used to be on my list, too)…actually, the list, itself, mine or yours, is, I’m sure, too long, period.

And who cares what’s on it, really, the fact of the matter is we keep that list, we maintain it…and maybe add to it from time to time, because we need a distraction. We need a break. We need something more tangible than stress management classes. I tried to take one, once, and my god, it nearly gave me a panic attack. The ideas of “list maintenance” and “goal setting” were the very things I was stressed out about.

The point of stress management is lovely and on paper, seems admirable, but it wasn’t for me.

On the other hand, I can’t have another weekend like this past one. I don’t have time to engage in that much damage control.

Plus, fun used to be fun. Back in the day, it didn’t result in a headache and an upset stomach.

I’m soothing my nerves by saying, Hey this is a lesson, Kris, you had to learn it. But, I know that’s not true. I know this lesson, already…heck, my mother wrote the preface to the textbook. My father’s in the acknowledgments – I’d rather not tell you who it’s dedicated to.

And, I don’t want to leave you with the impression that I was some sort of misbehaving irritant all weekend. I did have fun, I just didn’t draw any lines, and that, my friends, is never a good idea.

I’ll tell you, though, honestly speaking, I did walk away with two absolute truths, two Lessons (capital “L”) that I learned:

1) I’m really wrestling with some things, right now. Some confusing, aggravating things, and everything’s wrapped up in them, my sexuality, my identity, my faith, my integrity. Sounds fun, right. And, also, I learned that

2) you have to wrestle with some things.

Not run away from them, not ignore them, not drink until they’re funny, not hide out in the church pew and pray them away, but to gear your “guns” up, face them head-on, and tackle them, put them in a chokehold. I know you’d rather punch them in their faces, but I think that’s not allowed in wrestling, according to the WWE.

I was never good at hide-and-seek.

You can check out the official rules, yourself, about that.

But, the analogy still works. Just like Jacob and the Angel, the point of wrestling isn’t just to pin your opponent to the mat, and into submission, it’s to physically dominate your opponent, to give them a visual of surrender: what it feels like, and what it looks like. It’s Nature’s Show & Tell, this need.

And it’s primal – we all want to “take the mountain.” Key word this time: take.

A punch won’t do anything but leave a bruise, and cause a momentary bit of humiliation; wrestling, though, entails defeat…and humility.

Of course, so do six martinis…and a glass of Moscato.

But, who’s counting…

Oh, wait…that’s right, I am; starting…Now.

Related Posts:

• Faith for five dollars…and Tennessee Williams.
• Mistakes make you feel bad. Like Peter Scolari or Mario van Peebles.
• A word about lesbians…
• “That’s not lying,” he said, “That’s good manners.”
• He was called Bear because he looked like a bear.

It's a cabal all right. Against me.

My mind…it often goes into Mach 7 when I attempt to procrastinate (by the way, the word “procrastinate,” itself, is ironic – I mean, by the time you write the word out, you could have done something already – it’s not a word for the lazy), and the only thing I can physically do to make it stop is to sleep (even though my dreams are usually full of anger when I do that – last night, for instance…ouch!), but if I don’t stop it, from time to time, it just runs all days with thought after thought after thought, and so what I’m about to do is a little experiment I engage in, every now and again: I’m going to pause, take a deep breath, and type out every single thought I have in my head right at this moment in an attempt to empty my brain.

Because I really want to take a nap…without feeling guilty about it.

Ok? So, here I go:

How on earth do you wash a Fedora…pancakes…the way Max sleeps with one open, staring…the other day when the tornado siren went off some student in the hall asked if North Korea was attacking and I was impressed because he didn’t seem the type to be that aware of the world around him, his clothes made that suggestion…why a city has the name of Scooba…Old Man Frank came by the house yesterday to tell me I’d left the water hose on and flooded his driveway, he’s an old man with scoliosis but my god he can knock loudly…that time I brushed my teeth with Cortizone-10…my glasses are broken – well the leg fell off but still it’s going to cost money to fix it better than I did with hot glue…apple juice gives me heartburn and so do onions and so do Tums which is ironic since they’re supposed to fix heartburn…I really like sweet potato pie…why can’t I start back working on my new script, I think it has potential, and I sometimes feel guilty doing other types of writing but Gary tells me just write everyday so I do, this blog if nothing else…why won’t I finish this other script I have because I know the deadline is looming…I’ve only once seen an actual loom and the word loom makes me think of a loon…Smoking Loon is a type of red wine…I’m allergic to red wine…how is too much water bad for you…I’ve switched mayonnaise brands, U.L. is shocked…I wish I’d planted those irises deeper in the dirt…where would I put a bicycle if I had one…I hate my cell phone…at some point I’m going to need new tennis shoes…my ankle still hurts…I am still angry because this morning I was almost finished with a new blog and then I hit some button and the whole damn thing was erased…what it would be like if I could magically freeze people and take off their clothes and then move them somewhere else and then unfreeze them and laugh at how embarrassed they’d be…how people can eat warm mayonnaise is beyond me…why I don’t have any pet fish, they’d be so much easier to handle until the cats found them…why some doctors don’t use anesthesia…I’m very glad my dentist did even if now I have a new health concern called synethesia and it feels like ice-cold water is running down my chin and neck several times a day…if people could float indefinitely…what would constitute a magic umbrella…would having sex with a centaur be bestial and illegal…why John Mark Karr would lie about JonBenet Ramsey…how to love through pain, and mean it…how do I manage to memorize all my lines each play I’m in…what would happen if I could disappear…how many people would come to my funeral…why I drink so much…if we’re all hiding something, what then are we all compensating for…why trust is so hard to get and so easy to lose, and doesn’t that imply a serious flaw in the nature of trust…what does God do when he rests…do I have cancer, or West Nile, or Swine Flu, or diabetes, or RLS…why can’t I focus on losing weight…how upset I get when the media overlooks the devastation of Katrina in Mississippi, even now four years later..should I give Olive Garden another chance…why does gorgonzola taste so bad when you melt it…I cannot abide any more of the heat…I cannot stand it when I sweat without purpose…should we build a bigger fence for Max…why can’t I find a handwriting that I approve of…when did I develop this paranoia…will I ever write a good play…how much of your identity is in your name…how many people did I upset this week…what would happen if I always told the truth…why are there so many bad spellers…why don’t people read anymore…what happened to conjugating verbs…how did Latin die…why do I have to have a favorite color, or food, or anything at all really…what will my next car be…why am attached to the name Cutter…I’m still mourning Bea Arthur’s death, but I’m glad we still have Angela Landsbury for now…how can one face death…what is a timing belt and how do I find it…who was the first person to stain glass…why do I have a desire to be famous…I’m not sure there’s such a thing as compromise, one will always retain the power…does anyone ever really forgive…is my first cat, Aristophanes, mad at me for leaving her at U.L.’s…I hate doing laundry…I can’t believe I’m almost 33…I’m afraid I’m losing words…what happens if I go crazy…I don’t like orange Powerade…why don’t I speak better French…why do I always pretend everything…I take back what I thought a minute ago, I think I may be partial to blue and deep reds…I hate the word “cubicles”…a young boy yelled at me one day from across Main Street and said, “It’s raining gayness today!” and I yelled back, “Well, we needed the rain, didn’t we?”…I need to buy more nose strips, for my apnea…what is it about men in uniform…why don’t I approve of steel top roofs, especially green ones…some days are so beautiful I think to myself, if I have to die, let it be on a day like this…I do not want to be put in the ground, though; I want to be in a crypt above it…I’m glad that even in my darkest days, I still believe in God…why can’t I bathe all day…I’d like to thank everyone that I’ve ever met…I can’t stand it when I go to the hair salon and they spritz my hair instead of shampooing it, that is a pet peeve of mine…sometimes I use room spray as cologne…was Jean Harlowe a more tragic case than Jayne Mansfield…

Whew…and just think, I didn’t even get to the part where I’ve invented a new form of poetry that I call a “tri-ku.” It’s a re-constituted, inverted version of a haiku, in three stanzas, each one goes 7-5-7.  I’ll leave you an example of one.  We’ll talk about it later, don’t worry. Each one is based on my belief that there are nine universal truths.

The Ancient Art of the Written Word.

Universal Truth #1: Berth

Other people would have left.
They might have laughed.
No, no they would have, I’m sure.

And not because of your face,
or indifference,
they didn’t care how you were,

All they would care about was
that your smile had flaws
and that your bite had no teeth.

Speaking of teeth…I can’t wait to tell you about Rasputin. The Kitten Who Lived and Had Teeth.

That’ll have to be after my nap, though.

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• I can't die here, not this close to the Mennonite bakery.
• You can’t kill a Honda, unless you’re an 18-Wheeler.
• I was able to order my fish sandwich without incident.
• "I hope you're not wadding," she said.

Again, this is far from an exclusive list.

The original Michelangelo.

Of the things listed above, several have affected me in the last 24 hours.

Last night I dreamed I couldn’t quite get up this rather large hill. It was exhausting, and I couldn’t catch my breath to get further than halfway up it. I was very disappointed in myself, in my dream, as I consider myself to be in rather pristine health. I woke up this morning, and there laying acoss my chest was Max, all 100+ pounds of him.

As a dog, I love him, as someone to sleep with – he may kill me.

I pushed him off my chest so as to ward off the complete suffocation, and he jumped off onto the floor, and vomited.  There are few more unpleasant sounds in this good, green world than that of vomiting. It seems even more tragic when it’s an animal. Even one who has tried to kill you as you slept.  And let’s not overlook what we’re all thinking: had I not woken up in time…(gross, right?)

Of course, the truly awful part is that you know it isn’t going to clean itself. I was less compassionate when I saw it consisted mainly of leaves from the backyard. Why he insists on eating them is beyond me. Ya Ya used to tell me that animals knew when they were sick and they’d traipse off to the woods to find certain leaves to expunge their stomachs.

None of that vital knowledge, though, made the clean-up any faster or easier. In fact, it just aggravated me.  (But god bless, Amanda. But hey, before you say another word - remember – it is her dog, after all).

Then, came the grocery store incident. Which I will recall for you, here, in some detail:

When I’m at the grocery store, which is one of my absolute favorite activities, as you may as well know right out – it’s one of the few pure joys I have in my life. I love to take my time and touch all the products. I’m very haptic, as I’ve pointed out, I’m sure. I like to touch the loaves of bread and the fruit glaze packages (though I’d never, ever allow that to come within 100 feet of my mouth). There’s just something so delicious about the weight of objects.

And, without a doubt, I’m a full-fledged member of the Reads the Complete Ingredients List. I like to know what’s going in my body. I wasted a lot of years on junk food. It’s going to take a long time to clean all of that out.  (Maybe I should go in to the backyard with Max, one afternoon and learn a few things).

But, the real aggravation comes when I’m putting my groceries on the counter/conveyor belt, and I only do this when I’ve got more groceries than I can carry in my arms, and the clerk is with another customer, but she insists on using the belt, you know, that moves your groceries down to her so she can run them across that red sensor light that never ceases to make me think of the End Times and Armageddon, and “check” their bar codes, are you still with me?

And you? What are you doing? Just trying to keep all your groceries together, that’s all.  At least that’s what I do because I’m extremely OCD about holding all of my groceries together. I like to make a little family unit out of them: the mayonnaise is always the Daddy, but I can’t very well do that because she won’t turn the blame thing off…and so before I can help it, my Daddy Mayonnaise is rolling down the other side to the bags (they sit at the end of the conveyor belt), and my onions will not sit still – I should have never expected them to - I can’t even think about what I’m gonna do with the 2-liter Fresca, bubbling up in retaliation right in front of my very face.  

Trust me. She's in no hurry.

It’s a madhouse, and she, this cashier, is completely unconcerned about it…the woman in front of me is just getting Cool Whip and cat litter but now she’s got two of my tomatoes and a loose jar of peanut butter hurtling themselves toward her 10-lb. bag of Purse like they’re old lovers reunited after a lengthy hospital stay due to a specific type of surgery like a bladder retacking that went a little awry (but would fix itself in a matter of 5-6 weeks, tops), and I’m trying to be cool about it, like It’s ok, I’ll get the tomatoes, I’ll fix this in just a few minutes, but you don’t say anything because that would make the entire situation too awkward, but she’s more than ready to announce to the cashier, that, No, these aren’t my items. I’m not paying for these rogue tomatoes. And you’re forced to make a little smile about it, and apologize.

You should never have to apologize at a grocery store, for anything.

You really shouldn’t even have to explain one single, solitary thing, at a grocery store. All you’re wanting is for the clerk to turn the damn belt off so that, unlike everyone else in the world, I, at least, could keep my groceries with me!  Am I on the belt?  Yes.  But, it’s because I can’t hold all my groceries with me. Do I want the belt to move? No, I do not. Not for Cool Whip and cat litter. I can’t help that I’m on the belt, ok.  I have some items that are too fragile for the journey, namely my eggs. Maybe she could switch it to a lower speed? More than anything it’s just embarrassing.

But, she doesn’t care, the clerk.  Nope.  She just flips that little switch and conveys everything to kingdom come.

And that…that is something that irritates me. That aggravates me.

That, and, cheap toilet paper.

Which I purchased day before yesterday at Walgreen’s. The store that you go to when you’re less than perfect. (I still don’t really agree with the concept of that commercial).

A lot of things happened to me as a small child, and they were upsetting and scarring and are now par for the course in my blogging life. Case in point: I was nine years old, and Aunt Ruth had come to stay for a interminably lengthy period at U.L.’s. Several people did that after Tigi died; she was U.L.’s mother and Aunt Ruth’s sister. I suppose it was her turn. I can’t remember that part.

She was a darner, though, that I remember and well. She darned from morning until night. When she finally went back home, the house was littered with plastic five-sided tissue boxes that she’d darned together with bright red yarns and pink shimmer yarns. Tissue boxes for every size of container. They are still at U.L.’s house because to move them would have been to insult her, and now that she, too, has passed on, it would be adding insult to injury (even though, I consider these “darn” tissue boxes to be a great injury), to touch them and move them.

Instead, they sit on the backs of toilets and on bedside tables collecting dust, which yarn does very well. Maybe that was the real gift Aunt Ruth was giving us.

Good at collecting dust.

I can still see this day-in-question as clear as a bell (whatever that actually means); the day I became afraid of bathrooms.

I’d thought Aunt Ruth was asleep, taking a nap the way well-behaved old people should, and I had gone to use the bathroom because my stomach was full. I was a nervous, private child at U.L.’s. It was mostly like living in a museum with Jesus’s kid brother. That kind of intense, reverent ambience. You did things quietly at U.L.’s.

Except Aunt Ruth, on this particular occasion.

Out of a dead sleep, I guess, she rose, and quickly. I was just about to wipe. I had torn several 2-ply pieces of toilet paper to assist me in this process when the bathroom door swung up to reveal my small frame on the procelain toilet to Aunt Ruth and the rest of the house – which was empty, yes, but that’s beside the point.

“I hope you’re not wadding,” she said.

“Ma’am?”

“Never wad. It’s wasteful. Fold, Kris. Tear off a few pieces, at a time, and fold. Like this.”

The demonstration was embarrassing enough. Having to show her that I understood what she meant has so seared itself into my conscience that unless I die in the bathroom, and can somehow alert you to that fact on my “way down”…I always go alone to the bathroom, whether it’s a stomach problem, a shower, or I’m brushing my teeth; I cannot share a bathroom. I am simply too scarred to correct that behavior.

I have no doubt that she did what she did with the best of intentions.

But, it has left me with a complex that I’m not entirely sure the DSM IV has been made aware of; if and when they do become aware of it, I’d be flattered if they named it after her. I’d be the first to sign the petition. I still get anxious in my own bathroom. My hygienic sanity is worn and frail, and barely hangs on by a thin string when I’m at my own house, let alone in public.

God, I can’t even think about public restrooms.

Oh, you know, wait, to be fair, I shouldn’t say it hangs on by a thin string. It’s much more like a piece of yarn.

Yeah, that’s better. Don’t you think?

A nice, red, shimmering piece of yarn.

That’s what I meant.

Related Posts:

• That’s how we bring up all children in our family: by ear.
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• How on earth do you wash a Fedora? [and other random thoughts]…
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• You can’t kill a Honda, unless you’re an 18-Wheeler.