Two events in the past week caused me to ponder the profession of hairbanging (or being a stylist, for those of the cosmopolitan persuasion) -- a viewing of "Steel Magnolias" with my 13-year-old daughter, and a trip to the local salon to get my son's hair cut.
I love the movie, smarmy as it is, mainly because of the Ouisa character, and also because it's set in Louisiana, the home of fabulous Cajun food and good times. I should have been born a Southern girl. I would've made a killer Southern librarian, all dried-up books and glasses and earnest discussions of Tennessee Williams and Truman Capote, while going hog-sausage-wild at night, hopped up on gumbo with extra hot sauce and gallons of planter's punch. Plus, my nails are ALWAYS done.
My goal in life is to become Ouisa Boudreaux. Rich, pushy, foul-mouthed, blunt, and sarcastic. I'm halfway there, but I'm not telling which half. Suffice to say I haven't gotten up the nerve to act as bitchy as I think.
The bitchiness would have come in handy as I was taking my son to get his hair cut. It is a chore I dread, because he is now 10 years old and is beginning to take himself very seriously. He loves to wear his hair long and shaggy, and it doesn't really get to me until it's grown down over his ears and neck and past his eyes so that he's always flipping it out of his face. The flip side of his ten-year-old-ness is that he hates taking showers or generally cleaning himself, so as he does his little boy stuff like jumping in creeks and throwing gravel at his friends he tends to come into the house looking like Bigfoot's midget brother. Chunks of dirt have fallen off his head before without his notice.
I made a deal with him that he could let his hair stay long until spring break was over, and then he'd have to get it cut. D-Day was yesterday. We grimly drove to the salon, one of those walk-in places (I KNOW, I KNOW) and a gnarly-looking guy with a ring in his nose and horrible teeth took my baby boy back to do the deed.
I told the guy, just take most of it off the sides and back. The bangs I can deal with, as he can usually manage not to get food or other effluvia stuck in them. But the sides and back were so long and shaggy they made him look like he'd lost his ears in a tragic earmuff accident. So the guy started cutting -- excuse me, HACKING. Once he cut off the first inch of hair there wasn't really anything I could say or do but hope he evened it out.
Ten minutes later, he's done. My son is red-faced and crying. The guy is very nice, but my son is having none of it. Even his older sister, the monster 13-year-old, is trying to tell him that he looks fine. He scowls his way out the door as I pay. All the stylists in the salon are looking at me and shaking their heads sadly, "uh uh uh, he gonna be in a bad mood allllll day now Mom....." as I brace myself for the emotional onslaught.
It comes with breathtaking fury. He is crying and moaning and telling me that he will NOT GO TO SCHOOL ever again, that he looks like a DORK, that it's HIS HAIR and why do I make him cut it when it's just fine when it's long, that everyone he knows will make fun of him and no he will NOT GO IN to the store while I shop, and when I force him to get out of the car he screams "I HATE YOU MOM!" The dagger has been unsheathed.
It's then that I wish I could be bitchy. Bitchy and blunt to the guy who cut his hair, so as to absolve myself of the blame, or at least bitchy enough to tell my son to shut up and deal with the haircut before I get out the razor and shave his head, or even a teensy bit bitchy enough to say "I hate you TOO" to my son. But I just can't. I will never be Ouisa Boudreaux.
Anyway, before the day was over, my son sidled up to me and put his arms around me. He said he was sorry. I told him I forgave him. He said "I love you Mom, I don't really hate you ever," and I assured him that I loved him too. Whew, drama over. But I'm never going back to gnarly nose-ring guy. Hmmmm, does anyone know a good hairbanger that makes house calls in Indiana?
Monday, April 7, 2008
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
April is for fools
Today is my 4th wedding anniversary. I thought it was awfully appropriate to get married for the second time on April Fool's Day. My husband and I have both lived through Spouse Version 1.0 and the resulting system failure, and to get married again and start on a whole new operating system is a celebration of hope over experience, as they say.
There are days when he irritates me to the point I want to pack up his shit and kick him out the door. Really. I keep trying to quantify what exactly our differences are that cause so much irritation, as I'm sure there must be something about me that annoys him equally. Ahem. Being the nit-picky word-nerd Virgo that I am, I keep questioning various underlying philosophies about personality. Is it because he's a Libra and therefore his answer to every question, from "should we go to the store today" to "do you believe in the vast eternity of the universe" is "Yes and no?" Is it because I'm an INFJ and therefore one of the pathetic 2% of the population who are apparently too sensitive to live? Is it because he's an extrovert and I'm an introvert? Because he's loud and funny and I'm quiet and wonky? Because he's a male being from planet Bizarro and I'm a female being from planet Shut the Fuck Up I'm Trying to Read?
The worst thing about living together is that you immediately become accustomed to all the good stuff, and all the bad stuff just annoys the hell out of you. Stacey thinks that men and women should live in separate apartments, possibly connected by a breezeway or maybe a dungeon, and I think I agree. I know I'm much happer and more tolerant of everyone's behavior when I've had a chance to be away from them for awhile. My husband, thank Buddha, knows this and does his best to accommodate me. Although if we were both animals, my husband would be a frisky dog, while I am a lazy, bed-hogging cat. He even drives with his head out the window, while I curl up in the passenger side with my coat around me, trying to stay awake on the long trip from point A to point B. I can't help it. My only true talent is sleep.
Anyway, my dear puppy dog of a husband version 2.0 took me on a little getaway for our anniversary, where I was as pampered and fed and groomed as any spoiled little Persian kitty could be. And just this afternoon I was treated to an enormous bouquet of lavender roses, sent to my desk at work.
For my part, I am taking him out tonight to one of his favorite red-meat restaurants, and this time instead of seething with annoyance while he takes 37 minutes to decide between creamed spinach or grilled asparagus, and then between prime rib and filet, and then asks the waiter to hold the tomatoes on his salad, and wraps up his order by asking for extra horseradish sauce "instead of au jus, and could you put it on the side" while requesting a Heineken "extra-cold," I will patiently remind myself that dogs, while yappy, frisky, and stupid enough to roll in goose shit, are also the most loyal and loving pets. And they're always happy to see you, which for the parents of three teenagers, is a minor miracle in itself. Happily ever after, 2.0.
There are days when he irritates me to the point I want to pack up his shit and kick him out the door. Really. I keep trying to quantify what exactly our differences are that cause so much irritation, as I'm sure there must be something about me that annoys him equally. Ahem. Being the nit-picky word-nerd Virgo that I am, I keep questioning various underlying philosophies about personality. Is it because he's a Libra and therefore his answer to every question, from "should we go to the store today" to "do you believe in the vast eternity of the universe" is "Yes and no?" Is it because I'm an INFJ and therefore one of the pathetic 2% of the population who are apparently too sensitive to live? Is it because he's an extrovert and I'm an introvert? Because he's loud and funny and I'm quiet and wonky? Because he's a male being from planet Bizarro and I'm a female being from planet Shut the Fuck Up I'm Trying to Read?
The worst thing about living together is that you immediately become accustomed to all the good stuff, and all the bad stuff just annoys the hell out of you. Stacey thinks that men and women should live in separate apartments, possibly connected by a breezeway or maybe a dungeon, and I think I agree. I know I'm much happer and more tolerant of everyone's behavior when I've had a chance to be away from them for awhile. My husband, thank Buddha, knows this and does his best to accommodate me. Although if we were both animals, my husband would be a frisky dog, while I am a lazy, bed-hogging cat. He even drives with his head out the window, while I curl up in the passenger side with my coat around me, trying to stay awake on the long trip from point A to point B. I can't help it. My only true talent is sleep.
Anyway, my dear puppy dog of a husband version 2.0 took me on a little getaway for our anniversary, where I was as pampered and fed and groomed as any spoiled little Persian kitty could be. And just this afternoon I was treated to an enormous bouquet of lavender roses, sent to my desk at work.
For my part, I am taking him out tonight to one of his favorite red-meat restaurants, and this time instead of seething with annoyance while he takes 37 minutes to decide between creamed spinach or grilled asparagus, and then between prime rib and filet, and then asks the waiter to hold the tomatoes on his salad, and wraps up his order by asking for extra horseradish sauce "instead of au jus, and could you put it on the side" while requesting a Heineken "extra-cold," I will patiently remind myself that dogs, while yappy, frisky, and stupid enough to roll in goose shit, are also the most loyal and loving pets. And they're always happy to see you, which for the parents of three teenagers, is a minor miracle in itself. Happily ever after, 2.0.
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Only connect
Over the Easter weekend, my mind wandered over to the bad side of the tracks. Holidays and family-oriented events tend to spook me sometimes -- I often feel as if I'm trapped in a bubble or a dream, waiting to emerge into some other reality. But my reality is...strange and sad, and often I'm plunged into despair over what I see when I look at other families and make the mistake of comparing them to my own.
What started it was taking time off while my kids were on spring break from school. I took a few days off work to spend with them, and we did some random running around town, seeing a couple of movies, trying restaurants, and ended up spending Easter Sunday taking my 83-year-old dad to visit his wife (my stepmother) in the rehab facility where she is staying while she recovers from pneumonia.
The truth is I am jealous of people with normal families. Yes, I know lots of people come from dysfunctional families and that hardly anyone has a perfect or ideal relationship with parents, siblings, whatever. But I get a pang of loss when other people talk about what they do on holidays -- going to their parents' or aunt's house, seeing cousins and siblings, and kids getting to know their extended family. Family reunions, family vacations together, etc. -- I've never had any of that, and never will.
I was adopted as a baby, and I have an older brother who was also adopted. He lives in a group home because he is schizophrenic and pretty much unable to work or care for himself. My dad is 83 and has suffered from degenerative arthritis and hip pain for about 30 years, and can't get around without a wheelchair, or a walker on his good days. My dad's family has passed away, mostly. My mother died about 15 years ago after ten years of illness, and since she was an only child, I don't have aunts or uncles or cousins on her side either. When I was visiting my dad on Easter, it occurred to me that most of the time I've spent with my immediate family since I've been an adult is when I'm taking them to the hospital, visiting them in the hospital, or picking them up from the hospital. There has never been a time in my life when I wasn't taking care of someone -- starting from the time I was 21 and started getting the phone calls from my brother who was descending into his illness, to last week when I was driving my dad back to the assisted-living facility where he lives.
This sounds suspiciously like self-pity, doesn't it?
Maybe it is. Maybe I'm whining. But these are the facts, and the truth is I wish it was all different. I wish I had a sibling who could remember the childhood we shared, who could share the present and the future with my children and his, if he'd been able to marry and have a family of his own. I wish my parents hadn't been sick for my entire adulthood -- I have visited every hospital in this city and even a few outside the city and can still remember where to park and where the information desk is, and which elevators are big enough for wheelchairs.
Is this disgusting? I ask you. I'm the healthy one -- I should be bowing down to karma with gratitude for having good health all my life and only the merest episodes of panic attacks and depression, pretty garden-variety stuff for a working mother. I DO fall to my knees to thank the universe for the beautiful healthy children I have and hope desperately that they never have to go through what I've been through.
But goddamn, I'm tired. And peevish.
A couple days before Easter I watched the movie Into the Wild with the kids, and I loved it. I could totally identify with the kid's desire to dump the baggage of modern life and roam off into the wilderness to connect with nature. When my first child was born and I was slogging through the days and nights, grey with fatigue and stained with baby puke, I used to have dreams constantly that I moved away to another city, changed my name, and got a different job. I still have those dreams.
But the peevish side of my mind perked up during the last part of the movie because the kid never contacted his parents or his sister. Inwardly I was pissed. Dude! You have actual parents, who are alive and want to buy you a car, and a normal loving sister who wants to hang out with you, and you ditch them all to go eat moose and wild roots in Alaska? And you can't even send them a fucking postcard? And the final tweak, the black cloud that sent me down that Bad Road into the Neighborhood of Envious Thoughts, was the realization that all he had to do was show up and his family would be ecstatic. Forgiven! He actually had people who were his immediate birth family who were anxious about where he was and if he was OK! Didn't he get that? Who was this snotty kid who so casually threw away what I can never have?
If you've ever seen Intervention, you know it's a series on Bravo that follows seriously self-destructive people who are going to be part of a surprise intervention by their families and friends. It's like a terrible accident you can't stop watching. I watch until I get to the part where the family pops out from behind a hotel room door to confront the addict and beg them to get help. They sit around the room, crying, reading letters to their loved one, begging them to get help and telling them how much they love and support them, and I just grit my teeth and flip off the TV because I am so fucking angry. Angry because of their selfishness, angry because of their irresponsibility, but angry mostly because I don't have ten family members in the world who would save me from stubbing my toe, let alone a serious addiction.
Like I said, the Bad Neighborhood. Go three blocks down Angry Street, and take a left on Envy. Park. Jump off bridge.
Of course, what brings me back to reality are my own children. My son kept asking why I was sad during the end of the movie, and I told him that I felt sorry for the parents. No matter how much they fucked up, they still loved their son, and it must have been torture for them not to know where he was and if he was OK. I completely identified with that. I made the kids promise me that no matter how old they were or how much they hated me, they'd always let me know they were OK. They both solemnly stuck out their pinkies for a pinky-promise.
So, I backed out of the Bad Neighborhood of my mind on Easter Sunday, picked up some toilet paper and an African violet for my stepmother, and made the kids help my feeble old dad into the car for a visit to the rehab hospital. After we left, we stopped at Taco Bell for takeout so my dad could have a bean burrito and the kids could have quesadillas. It wasn't exactly communion, but it's the best I could do.
What started it was taking time off while my kids were on spring break from school. I took a few days off work to spend with them, and we did some random running around town, seeing a couple of movies, trying restaurants, and ended up spending Easter Sunday taking my 83-year-old dad to visit his wife (my stepmother) in the rehab facility where she is staying while she recovers from pneumonia.
The truth is I am jealous of people with normal families. Yes, I know lots of people come from dysfunctional families and that hardly anyone has a perfect or ideal relationship with parents, siblings, whatever. But I get a pang of loss when other people talk about what they do on holidays -- going to their parents' or aunt's house, seeing cousins and siblings, and kids getting to know their extended family. Family reunions, family vacations together, etc. -- I've never had any of that, and never will.
I was adopted as a baby, and I have an older brother who was also adopted. He lives in a group home because he is schizophrenic and pretty much unable to work or care for himself. My dad is 83 and has suffered from degenerative arthritis and hip pain for about 30 years, and can't get around without a wheelchair, or a walker on his good days. My dad's family has passed away, mostly. My mother died about 15 years ago after ten years of illness, and since she was an only child, I don't have aunts or uncles or cousins on her side either. When I was visiting my dad on Easter, it occurred to me that most of the time I've spent with my immediate family since I've been an adult is when I'm taking them to the hospital, visiting them in the hospital, or picking them up from the hospital. There has never been a time in my life when I wasn't taking care of someone -- starting from the time I was 21 and started getting the phone calls from my brother who was descending into his illness, to last week when I was driving my dad back to the assisted-living facility where he lives.
This sounds suspiciously like self-pity, doesn't it?
Maybe it is. Maybe I'm whining. But these are the facts, and the truth is I wish it was all different. I wish I had a sibling who could remember the childhood we shared, who could share the present and the future with my children and his, if he'd been able to marry and have a family of his own. I wish my parents hadn't been sick for my entire adulthood -- I have visited every hospital in this city and even a few outside the city and can still remember where to park and where the information desk is, and which elevators are big enough for wheelchairs.
Is this disgusting? I ask you. I'm the healthy one -- I should be bowing down to karma with gratitude for having good health all my life and only the merest episodes of panic attacks and depression, pretty garden-variety stuff for a working mother. I DO fall to my knees to thank the universe for the beautiful healthy children I have and hope desperately that they never have to go through what I've been through.
But goddamn, I'm tired. And peevish.
A couple days before Easter I watched the movie Into the Wild with the kids, and I loved it. I could totally identify with the kid's desire to dump the baggage of modern life and roam off into the wilderness to connect with nature. When my first child was born and I was slogging through the days and nights, grey with fatigue and stained with baby puke, I used to have dreams constantly that I moved away to another city, changed my name, and got a different job. I still have those dreams.
But the peevish side of my mind perked up during the last part of the movie because the kid never contacted his parents or his sister. Inwardly I was pissed. Dude! You have actual parents, who are alive and want to buy you a car, and a normal loving sister who wants to hang out with you, and you ditch them all to go eat moose and wild roots in Alaska? And you can't even send them a fucking postcard? And the final tweak, the black cloud that sent me down that Bad Road into the Neighborhood of Envious Thoughts, was the realization that all he had to do was show up and his family would be ecstatic. Forgiven! He actually had people who were his immediate birth family who were anxious about where he was and if he was OK! Didn't he get that? Who was this snotty kid who so casually threw away what I can never have?
If you've ever seen Intervention, you know it's a series on Bravo that follows seriously self-destructive people who are going to be part of a surprise intervention by their families and friends. It's like a terrible accident you can't stop watching. I watch until I get to the part where the family pops out from behind a hotel room door to confront the addict and beg them to get help. They sit around the room, crying, reading letters to their loved one, begging them to get help and telling them how much they love and support them, and I just grit my teeth and flip off the TV because I am so fucking angry. Angry because of their selfishness, angry because of their irresponsibility, but angry mostly because I don't have ten family members in the world who would save me from stubbing my toe, let alone a serious addiction.
Like I said, the Bad Neighborhood. Go three blocks down Angry Street, and take a left on Envy. Park. Jump off bridge.
Of course, what brings me back to reality are my own children. My son kept asking why I was sad during the end of the movie, and I told him that I felt sorry for the parents. No matter how much they fucked up, they still loved their son, and it must have been torture for them not to know where he was and if he was OK. I completely identified with that. I made the kids promise me that no matter how old they were or how much they hated me, they'd always let me know they were OK. They both solemnly stuck out their pinkies for a pinky-promise.
So, I backed out of the Bad Neighborhood of my mind on Easter Sunday, picked up some toilet paper and an African violet for my stepmother, and made the kids help my feeble old dad into the car for a visit to the rehab hospital. After we left, we stopped at Taco Bell for takeout so my dad could have a bean burrito and the kids could have quesadillas. It wasn't exactly communion, but it's the best I could do.
Back now
Hello! I guess I didn't go away for that long after all. I did learn how to change my title bar -- whoopee for me. Baby steps.
I'm working on a post and will publish soon. Pretty soon I'll even learn how to post pictures!
I'm working on a post and will publish soon. Pretty soon I'll even learn how to post pictures!
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Going away
To anyone who may still be reading this, I am going away for a bit. I will probably come back, but as a different entity. This blog allowed me to test my writing, but it's not the real me and I find myself censoring my topics in favor of keeping everything "light." The truth is, I'm not light, and I never was. I need to make more art, I need to incorporate it into my life and work, and I need to write about everything surrounding me and affecting me in my tiny world, and I'm not doing that now because of fear.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Other people are noticing
GAAAAAHhhhhaaaaaahhhhhhh!!!!!!
This is the actual fucking conversation OVER IN HER CUBE:
Another cow-orker: "Whatchoo eatin'?"
Barnyard yahoo: "Aw, Ah'm a muncher. I munch, I got ta be eatin' on somethin' all day. Munch, munch, munch ha ha !!! They got them sweet n' spicy snack bags, uh, Archer Farm or somethin', got 'em at Targit."
Cow-orker: "Well ya sure is LOUD about it!"
Barnyard yahoo: "HA HA HA HAAAAA, Ah know!!! Ah'm just settin' here jammin' on mah iPod and munchin'! HAAAAA!"
Me: CLANK *sound of hammer* *sound of Bucketz sloshing onto dead body* *sound of iPod being torn apart by pliers* *blessed silence*
OK, everything but the hammer. For the love a Pete. Somebody save me.
This is the actual fucking conversation OVER IN HER CUBE:
Another cow-orker: "Whatchoo eatin'?"
Barnyard yahoo: "Aw, Ah'm a muncher. I munch, I got ta be eatin' on somethin' all day. Munch, munch, munch ha ha !!! They got them sweet n' spicy snack bags, uh, Archer Farm or somethin', got 'em at Targit."
Cow-orker: "Well ya sure is LOUD about it!"
Barnyard yahoo: "HA HA HA HAAAAA, Ah know!!! Ah'm just settin' here jammin' on mah iPod and munchin'! HAAAAA!"
Me: CLANK *sound of hammer* *sound of Bucketz sloshing onto dead body* *sound of iPod being torn apart by pliers* *blessed silence*
OK, everything but the hammer. For the love a Pete. Somebody save me.
She's doing it AGAIN
The yahoo in the next cube is doing it AGAIN. Screeching in her barnyard voice with her jaw flapping down like she's got an anchor hanging off it while listening to twangy music blasting on her iPod. And now she just shoveled in a handful of pretzels MUNCH MUNCH MUNCH *slurp* as she reaches for one of her VP Bucketz o' Pop. I can hear the ice sloshing around the bucket like bergs off the Titanic as she yanks on the straw. GAHHHHHHH!!!!
What did I do to the universe? Why am I being tortured like this? Or am I just too sensitive to live?
Oh my God, if she burps or farts again I'm going to hit her with a hammer.
What did I do to the universe? Why am I being tortured like this? Or am I just too sensitive to live?
Oh my God, if she burps or farts again I'm going to hit her with a hammer.
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