A Prairie Thanksgiving

Tomorrow, there will be fifty of us, seated around rickety card tables and long plastic tables, borrowed from the Altar Society at St. Ann's. As always, the dinner will held in the unfinished basement in the house on Church Road, the one that wasn't there on a Wednesday but was on a Thursday. (The home had been moved fifty-plus miles, to the acreage settled in 1956 by the Stander boys, newly arrived from Germany.)
If it is cold, which it will most likely be, as winter in Nebraska comes early,  there will be two enormous kerosene heaters placed on each end of the vast concrete basement. I hate the smell, and I will complain four or five times to my husband, who grew up on this very land, and he will tell me to cut it out, that family is more important.
Of course he is right and I will head upstairs to retrieve a couple Tylenol (the smell of the kerosene gives me a headache) after I've stood out on the deck to get new air. Although I am Missouri-born and proud of my Kansas City heritage, I admit that the air in Nebraska out on the farm is unsullied and pure, cleaner. The wind that seems never to cease annoys me, but the air that comes with it is crisp and delicious, like a refrigerated Granny Smith apple.
There will be traditional Thanksgiving fare, only five kinds of stuffing instead of one, and one deep-fried turkey, one baked. Also, a spiral-cut ham and a huge pork loin. Feeding fifty people means lots of meat.

****
To be continued ~

Oh, Johnny ... Oh, Lindsey ...

It was one of those dreams where you wake up, pissed. Pissed because someone or something has awakened you before the dream reached its conclusion; or, in my case, before the dream reached its climax. It was one of those dreams that stays with you – through breakfast, through dinner, into the next day, throughout the week. It was one of those dreams that you must find time to write down, so it is guaranteed a proper shelf life.

Toast. That was what I'd eaten before I lay down on the couch in the hearth room last Sunday morning. I'd gotten up around five at my cocker spaniel's insistence ("Let me out now, or I'm going to pee on you"); I made coffee; I watched CNN; I thumbed through some catalogs; I made toast: two slices of gluten-free bread, slathered with deliciously fattening butter. Savored the simple breakfast, got tired shortly after eating ~ by this time it was probably ten ~ and since it was cold outside and the fireplace was warming the house and I had nowhere to go, I decided to take a nappy on the couch.

What happened next, as I snored softly on the sofa, is bawdy and titillating, and although there is no cursing, the dream is definitely worthy of an R Motion Picture rating. Just so you know.

THE. DREAM

Setting: Near dusk, an open highway, somewhere in Nebraska, maybe Iowa ... October of 2013

I am seated in the back seat of a sedan, nothing fancy, near the rear passenger door. I am wearing a black chiffon dress, Stevie-Nicks style. I am not wearing underwear, which is unusual for me, unless it's summer, bedtime, and I'm airing out my privates.

I am seated next to Johnny Cash ~ yes, THAT Johnny Cash ~ and he is of course wearing black: black-collared dress shirt, unbuttoned mid-chest; black slacks; black belt. I presume he is wearing black shoes but I do not notice this in the dream. Next to Johnny Cash in the backseat of this unremarkable sedan, is Lindsey Buckingham ~ yes, THAT Lindsey Buckingham, he of Fleetwood Mac fame ~ and he is wearing a blousy white shirt, somewhat pirate-y, cut to mid-chest; he is wearing dark denim jeans, some sort of belt. He is beautiful and looks how he looked on the cover of The Dance album (1997). I am placing him, therefore, at around age forty-eight (he was born October 3, 1949). He and I then, sitting in the dream car, are magically the same age: forty-eight. Cash, in the middle, looks very mid-fifties ~ age, not decade. (My husband is fifty-four, and I am highly attracted to him, so it is neither bizarre nor disgusting that I would find a mid-fifties Johnny Cash sexy and desirable.)
It is important to note that I dream realistically when concerning Self: I am overweight in my dream; I have cheese-grater hairy legs (Day Five of no shaving); I am cognizant of my ever-burgeoning upper abdominal fat roll. My bikini line is a laughable thought: I have not worn a bikini since I was ten; I have made no attempt at pubic grooming since July 4 of this year. In this dream, I am very much Who I Am right now, this very day, and although some would think I might have low self-esteem and hate my body and am embarrassed by its saggy boobs and stretch marks, the opposite is true. In my dream, I am sexy as hell. Cash knows it; Buckingham knows it. They both want me.
Most important, I know they want me, and so when I launch into reporter mode and begin asking Cash 95,000 questions, I am well aware of his attraction to me. I am well aware of Buckingham's faux interest in the leather notebook he is holding: I know he is listening to every word coming from my Revlon Champagne Ice frosted lips. I feel beautiful. I feel powerful.
My questions to Cash come quickly: “When did you know you had talent? What is your song-writing process? Any regrets in this life? Did you ever feel worthy in your father's eyes? Did the money and fame mean much? Was June Carter the musical love of your life, or the all-time love of your life? Why? What was it about June that got you all twitterpated and divorced from your first wife?”
Suddenly, there's a new voice: Reese Witherspoon pipes in. Reese, who's been sitting, silent, in the front passenger seat, turns her blonde head around, styled like she wore it in Walk the Line, and she shushes me. “Ssssshhhhh, Kathleen,” she admonishes. “Do not ask Johnny about his June. Girl, what is wrong with you?” Instantly, I stop my interview and pivot in my seat, where I stare forlornly out the window. (Have you ever been hushed by Reese Witherspoon?) Cornfields newly harvested stare back at me. I am annoyed; I turn my attention next to the driver, who on this day, featured in this dream, is James Taylor ~ yes, THAT James Taylor ~ and I notice the bald spot on the back of his head and wonder if the balding started while he was still married to Carly Simon. Taylor is driving at a snail's pace, and I am ready to ask him to please speed up when all of a sudden I feel Cash's big man hand reach up my skirt, where it settles softly into the warmth of my parted legs (my without-underwear parted legs). As I am processing what is happening to me (Ohmygod Johnny Cash is engaging in sexual activity with me!), Cash then takes my left hand and places it onto his crotch, the parts of which are now exposed, the rim of whitey-tighties apparent in the pinkish sun-setting light of the sedan. Apparently, while I was sulking in my corner, he had unbuckled his belt, untucked his shirt, unzipped his slacks, and ousted his junk. Without conversation, I turn in my seat for better positioning (his and mine), place both hands on his swollen and ENORMOUS appendage, and proceed to give him a rousing hand job, while Buckingham watches and squirms sensually in his seat. While Buckingham watches and squirms sensually in his seat: OMG. Best. Dream. Ever.
As I hold Cash in my hands, my palms are burning, as though there are a hundred fire ants consuming the flesh. (I am fairly certain that Ring of Fire is not about friction.) I am just about to freak out when Cash lets loose. What spouts forth is bubbly and frothy and the temperature of near-boiling water. I retract my hands – in amazement, not fear – and as I watch Buckingham unloose himself from the tangle of denim and boxers (navy blue; an unidentifiable print), I sense a tug on my shoulder. Johnny, no! I scream-think in my dream mind: You've had your turn, but the tugging turns to squeezing, and then annoying and rude prodding, and before I can switch positions with Johnny Cash in the now remarkable sedan, I am … awake. There stands my husband, dressed in his Kansas City Chiefs jersey and paint-splattered jeans. “Get up, Kathleen. The game's about to start.”

I could have killed him. I had come this close to engaging in sexual activity with my longtime celebrity crush, my all-time favorite guitarist and contemporary male vocalist, Lindsey Buckingham, who, if I were to meet today, I would fall at his feet, pledge undying love, and kiss his calves. Also, I might try to undress him, but apparently that's another dream.

Immediately, I felt compelled to tell someone about this delicious dream. I don't know about you, but when something this exciting happens to me (real or imagined), my first inclination is to go forth and share. My husband, nearest in proximity, was first to hear. I told him exactly what happened, only I used real words, like penis and ejaculate. I might as well have recited my grocery list: My spouse didn't care that I committed an act of adultery with a dead country legend. He was not at all intrigued. What he did care about on this Sunday afternoon was the fact that the Chiefs were 7-0 and the kickoff was forthcoming. Next, I phoned my sister, but she didn't answer her cell. My adult daughter was home, but she certainly did not want to hear about her mother giving anyone a hand job, particularly a deceased person who sang country music, which she does not consider music at all. I have lots of friends, but none close enough to divulge every single detail. Thus, I was left with Facebook, but I had to be G-rated. Also, terse:

“Up too early, then fell asleep on the couch. Dreamed I was in the backseat of a car with Lindsey Buckingham and Johnny Cash (yes, I know he has passed on, but this was a dream). James Taylor was driving, and Reese Witherspoon was in the front passenger seat. I was annoying the hell out of Johnny asking him 95,000 questions, when all of a sudden he got a little randy. As FB is a family-friendly site, I will stop with the rest of the dream. Cash, however, did not stop. (Happy-face emoticon)”

What happened next was pleasantly surprising. A FB friend, one Jo Jacobs Self, of Boone, Iowa, is, wouldn't you know, in addition to being a life coach, a skilled dream analyst. She and I went to high school together in Kansas City thirty years ago. She was trustworthy, intelligent, beautiful, creative, and popular when I knew her then. Also, she had THE BEST feathered hair in the Class of '83. She must know what she's talking about now, right?

“I'm an amateur dream interpreter,” she wrote in the comment section of my FB post. “If you're interested it might be fun to see what your subconscious has to say to you in this one. (Happy-face emoticon).”

Was I interested? Yes.

“Jo: Yes, do tell!” I wrote back. “I will have to message you some of the (lurid) details!”

And so I did, and then we exchanged cell numbers and emails and before I fell asleep Sunday night, I had extraordinary knowledge as to why I gave Johnny Cash an explosive orgasm.

Disclaimer: At this point, I find it necessary to apologize profusely to any member of Cash's family who might stumble upon this blog post and feel unsettled, or angry, or litigious. I mean no harm; I am not making fun of Cash; there is no libel, really, as this is a dream, and is identified as a dream; I have never met Cash or anyone in his family; I have no ulterior motives; to the contrary, I have huge respect and admiration for the Man in Black's musical legacy. Which is, after all, why it is so cool to dream about him.

Up Next: The Analysis

Damn you, gluten

I am one of those gluten-sensitive people that you read about. One of those special needs people you probably loathe, especially if you're in the service industry and have to take my picky-ass order. "There's no gluten in this, right?" I will ask, even as I order from the gluten-free menu. "You're absolutely positive, yes?" At this, you will suppress the urge to roll your eyes. "Yep, free of gluten," you will say. "We can guarantee that if you order from this gluten-free menu that your meal will be gluten free." (Still. Although you purport your grilled chicken/rice/broccoli entrée is wheat-free, I am fairly certain that someone named LaRon back in the kitchen is going to gleefully sprinkle wheat germ on my food before you bring it out to me.)
I wasn't always a gluten-free person. For forty-seven years, I ate whatever I wanted, generally stuffing any kind of bread down the old pie hole. Croissants, bagels, dinner rolls. My favorite breakfast was biscuits and gravy. If I got to Corner Café too late for the gravy, I ordered instead an omelet with  a side of wheat toast. Wheat toast, for the uninitiated, is made of wheat. Pasta, which is also engineered from wheat, was a dinner favorite. Lasagna, spaghetti, fettuccine, I ate it all. A Hot Naked was my go-to meal whenever I needed a quick supper. (Sounds exotic, but hot naked pasta is simply cooked pasta that's been buttered, salt and peppered, and doused so heavily with processed parmesan cheese that the concoction takes on a cheesecake quality.)
For forty-seven years, I was one of those irritable-bowel people that you read about. One of those special needs people you probably loathe, especially if you're in the travel industry, or simply driving a car in which I'm a passenger. For the uninitiated, irritable-bowel people are folks who poop a lot. Alternately, there can exist profound constipation. (The expression "shit a brick" was coined by a person with an irritable bowel.) The irritable-bowel sufferer ~ and there is suffering, let me tell you ~ tries to lead a peaceful existence, even when his or her intestines are roiling or cramping or complaining or settling into a mass o' concrete. We must make necessary life accommodations: It is imperative that we know ahead of time where bathrooms are located. Specifically, it's the toilet we're after: Sometimes there's explosive diarrhea involved.
Needless to say, I was not a good travel companion. For a four-hour trip to Omaha up I-29 from Kansas City, I would ask my husband no fewer than six times to stop. I knew where all the rest stops were and which Interstate truck stop had the cleanest bathrooms. Because he loved me and because he didn't want a (profound) mess in the car, he would veer off the interstate and catch a snooze or get caught up on his email whilst I traipsed into Hilltop or the Welcome Center at Rock Port. So as not to arouse suspicion (she's just here to shit), I always bought something before I left: a Diet Coke, a bag of Funyuns, a Good Housekeeping magazine. Through the years, I became particularly good at evacuating the lower colon in a relatively quiet manner (there was coughing, sneezing, and humming involved); I always carried a sample-sized perfume spray to spritz the stall so the next woman in wouldn't suffer explosive vomiting. (I'm a considerate shitter.)
For years, I tried to figure out which foods made me cramp, which foods made me constipated, which foods caused violent diarrhea. Sometimes I kept a daily food log, but that proved exhausting: 8 a.m.- glass of orange juice/oatmeal/black coffee; 10:30 - spoon of peanut butter; 1/2 Diet Coke; 1 p.m.- large salad: romaine, spinach, cabbage, carrots, egg, mushrooms, croutons ... and so on an so forth.
I used to joke with my sister, who became increasingly annoyed with me: My God, Kathleen, wear a fucking diaper why don't you? And what the hell are you eating, anyway?  and I would tell her that it was the strangest thing, that I could snarf a No. 8 Mexican Platter (enchilada, taco, beans and rice) and be fine, yet a half-cup of Cream of Wheat gave me intestinal spasms so intense I had to use Lamaze breathing to get through the cramping.
Look. We're both intelligent women. My sis has a genius IQ. I've occasionally demonstrated superb problem-solving capabilities, but for twenty years of my adult life I couldn't fucking figure out why sometimes the food I ate made me especially ill and in immediate need of a porcelain receptacle. My sis was equally flummoxed. Her ultimate response: See a doctor.
Which I did. A lot. Upper GI scans, lower GI scans. Nothing was wrong with me. Yeah, I have a hiatal hernia, but that's probably from all the vomiting I've done through the years. Forgot to mention the shit-and-spits. Sometimes my intestines got so confused that the upper and lower units didn't communicate well, and before I knew what was happening, both ends forcefully expelled gut contents. I was a mess physically and emotionally. Not only was my bowel irritable, but so was I.
And then. And then one day my 26-year old daughter, who generally has something wrong with her, came home from her doctor and proclaimed, as I was eating a bologna sandwich (on wheat bread), that she would no longer be the consumer of Anything Gluten. No gluten products from here on out, she said, and no products that had come into contact with any gluten-containing products. That's cross-contamination, she told me. Wheat-free from now on, I am, she sang, in a joyful way that confused me. (Gluten? Is she mispronouncing glutton?) She then went to the grocery and spent $769 on multiple flours, none of which contained wheat, and then she went to another store and spent $283 on various glass containers to hold the many wheatless flours. At some point, while she was clearing out the pantry (she lives with me and her dad because she has an English degree and is therefore a barista), I worked up the nerve to ask: So what is this gluten thing you speak of?
The rest is history. I am happy to report that since I have eliminated gluten from my diet I have also eliminated the need to evacuate my intestines at inconvenient times. And I'll take this new way of eating, even though it means giving up bread and pasta, the wheat-filled kind. Our kitchen is now completely stocked with gluten-free pastas, gluten-free cookies, gluten-free breads. Our food bill is much higher, but I'll take a bigger grocery bill if it means I can get to Nebraska without stopping half a dozen times.

On government shutdowns, lack of money, bologna, and MacDowell

It's Day Two of the government shutdown and I am feeling pissy and sad and emotional. Very PMS-y, I might say. Part of me wants to log on to Facebook and rant and rave and call Republicans Retardicans or Repugnacans, because it is the GOP that I (and much of America, including our fine president) blame for the mess that is in Washington. Congress schmongress. Let's fire them all and get new idiots in there. Let's start with the Tea Partiers.
My husband, who's been with the Federal Aviation Administration for twenty-five years, went to work yesterday, and today, and he will go tomorrow and the next day, but he isn't getting paid right away. Government-issued IOUs. So of course I have a pony in this race, which makes me (somewhat) worthless because I bring in a whopping $275 weekly from my nanny jobs. (I love my morning and afternoon gigs; I am torn. Don't want to leave my families; might have to leave my families and get a 9-5 desk job, which is necessary at this stage in the race because my foot is still semi-broken and throbs ten hours a day. But then there's my adorable children, and a verbal promise that I will stay with them throughout the school year. As I said before, I am torn. Oh, and broke.)
My default plan, whenever the pissiness and sadness and OhmigodIneedtomakemoney sets in, I turn to my writing. Specifically, I am trying very, very, very hard to corral my ADD and focus on my Bologna book. I am particularly in support of this plan because it has been one year since I was at MacDowell, holed up in my cozy stone cottage in the woods of New Hampshire. It was ONE YEAR ago that I was at my laptop working on Bologna With the Red String, and now 365 days have gone by, and I am still not finished.
Not finished.
Getting closer, but ...
NOT FINISHED.
What to do?
Pretend I'm at MacDowell. Head to my writing room, which my dear husband helped make possible (the man I'm disappointing financially); spray Indigo Wild's Frankincense & Myrrh Zum Mist -- that's the scent I sprayed inside Mixter Studio; listen to Tony Bennett's Duets II album --that's the music I listened to on my iPod as I wrote, outlined, edited and cursed at the simple desk adjacent to the stone fireplace; set myself to a schedule: 9 a.m. to noon, write; break for lunch; write from 12:30 to 3 p.m. And yet ... I am missing (son of a bitch, oh, how I am missing) the screened-in porch and wooded surroundings of Mixter studio; I am missing the electric hotpot that I used four, five, six times a day to make decaf coffee or tea; I am missing the glorious absence of housekeeping; I am missing the wonderful Plunk! of my lunch basket hitting the porch; I am missing naptime. (At MacDowell, I napped from 3 to 5 each day, waking to shower and prepare for dinner.)

To encourage my focus and discipline, I tell myself that I will to return to MacDowell once I publish the food memoir. You will go back, Kathleen, you will get there.

It will happen for you. Now sit your ass down in that chair. Finish the fucking book.

'Tis the season to get your read on

It's almost October. Which means November is right around the corner. And then my favorite month: December. Duh. Christmas trees, Christmas cookies, Christmas carols, Christmas sweaters, Christmas presents.
The 'Ber months are always good for my writing, for my reading. Temps have finally dropped to agreeable numbers (I would much rather be cold than hot.) Summer recipes have given way to crockpot meals and soups and stews. Pumpkins and gourds and magnificient fall colors delight the eyes and simmering pans of cinnamon and cloves tickle the nose.
I am more inside the house than out, so let's just say that I get a lot of page work done. Typically, I blog more frequently, write more often, and read with feverish intensity, trying to reach my fifty-book goal before January One arrives. Typically, I re-read several favorites. In October, I reach for Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird. Fall reminds me of Scout and Jem, who finally find courage to peek into mysterious windows,  and thus begin stalking Boo Radley. ("Inside the house lived a malevolent phantom. ...) Fall is when mysterious gifts begin appearing in the knot-hole of a nearby tree standing tall in the Finches sleepy Southern neighborhood: "That fall was a long one, hardly cool enough for a light jacket. Jem and I were trotting in our orbit one mild October afternoon when our knot-hole stopped us again. Something white was inside this time." I won't tell you what the secret and sacred item is; I want you to read the story. I believe strongly that every single human being in the world needs to read To Kill A Mockingbird. It teaches you never to judge books by covers; it teaches you to stand up for what you believe in; it teaches you that you must walk a mile in another person's shoes before you can truly understand him or her. When I still taught high school English, I always began teaching Mockingbird when October arrived. It was fun to tell students that Dill, in the book, is based off Lee's real-life neighborhood pal, Truman Capote, who came to Maycomb, Alabama, several months out of the year to live with his Auntie.
Speaking of Capote, who is my favorite dead writer ...Once mid-November rolls around, I head to A Christmas Memory, which is the most bittersweet short story I have ever read. It makes me smile; it makes me weep. Although it's about a Christmas memory (hence the title), the story opens with this line: "Imagine a morning in late November. A coming of winter morning more than twenty years ago. Consider the kitchen of a spreading old house in a country town. ... A woman with shorn white hair is standing at the kitchen window. She is wearing tennis shoes and a shapeless gray sweater over a summery calico dress. ... 'Oh my,' she exclaims, her breath smoking the windowpane, 'it's fruitcake weather!'"
Well, fruitcake. Yes, fruitcake! There's much maligning of the lowly fruitcake, which, to me, is an extraordinary dessert chock full of nuts and diced stained-glass fruits. I love me some fruitcake. My best childhood friend, Michelle, for years sent me a delectable fruitcake each holiday season, all the way from Santa Clara, California, from a beloved recipe her sweet mother-in-law employed in her own sunny kitchen. Probably I wasn't thankful enough; those (fragrant) cakes, dowsed in strong brandy, ceased arriving several seasons ago. I tell you: If you too enjoy fruitcake and reading about imaginative children, you need to get your hands upon Capote's coming-of-age story.
And then there's December, my favorite month. Time to revisit David Sedaris's hysterical Holidays on Ice, which is an accounting of the lovably neurotic essayist's experience working as a department store Christmas elf. This holiday collection of essays opens with this: "I was in a coffee shop looking through the want ads when I read, 'Macy's Herald Square, the largest store in the world, has big opportunities for outgoing, fun-loving people of all shapes and sized who want more than just a holiday job! Working as an elf in Macy's SantaLand means being at the center of the excitement' ... ."
This opening paragraph gives little clue to the hilarity that is forthcoming: "... I am a thirty-three-year-old man applying for a job as an elf. ... I am trying to look on the bright side. ... In order to become an elf I filled out ten pages' worth of forms, took a multiple choice personality test, underwent two interviews, and submitted urine for a drug test. The first interview was general, designed to eliminate the obvious sociopaths. ... I am certain that I failed my drug test. My urine had roaches and stems floating in it, but they still hired me because I am short, five feet five inches. Almost everyone they hired is short. One is a dwarf." Sedaris does not disappoint. When I read him, I have to be at home, alone, so that when I laugh and snort and say lines out loud and gesticulate wildly, no one pulls her kids closer and whispers into their ears: Children, there's something wrong with that woman.
Sedaris does not know this about me, but I will state it here, publicly. If I ever have a terminal illness and death is approaching and hospice nurses are setting up a final life request for me, I am going to tell them (through the wheezing and approaching death rattle), that I must get a chance to Skype with Sedaris. I want him to be talking to me and making me laugh as I go gently into my good night, which, hopefully, will also feature my children and grand children gathered around my hospital bed that's been set up in the hearth room of the family home.
Also on my December reading list is a collection of Christmas poems, essays, and short stories (Capote's Christmas Memory is here, too), selected and introduced by Caroline Kennedy (yes, that Caroline Kennedy). The hardcover book, red and dressed up with a silver bow as though it is a present in an of itself, is simply called A Family Christmas. The book contains nine chapters, and though each is rather boringly titled ("Deck the Halls," "Santa Claus is Comin' to Town," and "Joy to the World,") there's a nostalgic familiarity within that will lead you to the grocery store, where you will plunk down approximately $200 for holiday baking supplies; you will play Christmas music when you get back from the store to unload your flours and sugars and various chocolate chip pieces.  In addition to reveling in feel-good holiday sentiments, you will also learn what the exact words are to certain Christmas songs -- you know the ones, where only the chorus is obvious and you simply hum along to other parts. For example, I offer this educationally fulfilling musical nugget. (If you start studying now and commit to memory the hard parts, you'll be singing the loudest at church in a few short months.)
                                                           O Come, All Ye Faithful
             (Translated by Frederick Oakeley & William Thomas Brooke; Music by John Francis Wade)

O come, all ye faithful, Joyful and triumphant,
O come ye, O come ye to Bethlehem;
Come and behold him, Born the King of angels:
O come, let us adore him; O come, let us adore him,
O come, let us adore him, Christ the Lord.

      (This is the part you already know. Get ready for the lesson.)

God of God, light of light,
Lo! he abhors not the Virgin's womb;
Very God, Begotten not created:
O come, let us adore him, O come, let us adore him,
O come, let us adore him, Christ the Lord.

       (I know, I know, you already know the last two lines there ... ).

Sing, choirs of angels, Sing in exultation,
Sing, all ye citizens of heav'n above;
Glory to God, In the highest:
O come, let us adore him, O come, let us adore him,
O come, let us adore him, Christ the Lord.

Yea, Lord, we greet thee, Born this happy morning,
Jesus, to thee be glory giv'n;
Word of the Father, Now in flesh appearing:
O come, let us ....
            
          (You know the rest.)

Happy Halloween! Have a blessed Thanksgiving! Merry Christmas!

I thought nervous breakdowns weren't real

Is the entire world going crazy? Children, gunned down in American classrooms; children, gassed in their homes in Syria; children, slaughtered inside a mall in Kenya. Here in the U.S., Congress can't make a decision and President Obama looks like he's going to lose his shit every time he stands behind a podium. Here in my home in suburban Kansas City, two adult children, both college-educated, are pulling in eight bucks an hour pulling espresso shots at the local Starbucks. Groceries are costing thirty dollars a bag and gas is $3.40 a gallon. Our electric bill last month was $360. My husband wants to retire in eight years, only it's looking like he won't be golfing five days a week anytime soon. Since leaving the classroom, it's been damned near impossible to find full-time work for me: I'm pushing fifty, and outside of knowing how to diagram a sentence and explain plot structure, my career skills are behind the times. Luckily, I have several nanny gigs that pay well and I go to work each morning delighted to be in the presence of children, sweet and innocent kids who board the school bus daily and plan on arriving home, alive, later that day.
Two of my friends currently are undergoing treatment for breast cancer. Another continues to grieve the loss of her eighteen-year-old son (the worst loss of all); my sis just got slammed with child support and wage garnishment because her ex had a better lawyer than she did; my parents are both dead (I continue to feel orphaned); cute little Hannah Montana has morphed into a stripper; my 21-year-old is fawning over that pot-smoking loser Wiz Khalifa; my MacDowell days are behind me and my bologna book is still unfinished; somehow I ended up in a Republican Bunco group; my dogs won't stop barking; I haven't been to Mass in almost a year; my computer has a virus and typing this post is taking me nine hundred times longer than it should.
I told myself today that I would not turn on the television because the news is so distressing; I told myself today that I would eat five servings of fruits and vegetables; I told myself today that I would get a big poster board and plan out my book's structure. (I am a visual person and if I can't see something directly it doesn't exist.) I told myself I would try to walk the dogs and even if my right foot began throbbing I had to at least circle two cul de sacs.
It's a plan. I'll keep you posted.

Regrets? I've had a few, but fall at MacDowell is not one of them

It's been a summer of reflection. The heat here in the Midwest is oppressive, and as such I avoid going outside. I become delirious with rage when I have to venture out. Friends know not to request pool visits, or even porch talks; a movie invite is accepted, or perhaps a dinner in a highly air conditioned restaurant, but only if the parking is close, or I am dropped off at the door. Every August I ask myself, Why the hell do I live in Missouri? I am not blooming where I have been planted; I am withering on a hellish summer vine.
I want to go back to New Hampshire. I was preparing my suitcase this time last year, to head to the MacDowell Colony in Peterborough. At MacDowell, the grounds were beautiful, decked in fall foliage; the New England air was crisp and lacked humidity. When evening came, I opened my studio windows inside Mixter and reveled at the keyboard as my fingers cramped from the cold. I slept with the windows open and awakened at seven to cold tile in the bathroom and fresh excitement as I powered on the Asus. When temps dropped into the forties at night, I went into town one morning to purchase fingerless gloves that some enterprising soul had knitted.
Bliss, bliss, bliss, writing in a quiet and cold studio.
And here I am, not writing and unable, even, to finish reading books I have begun because I'm cranky all the damned time because it's so fucking hot in Kansas City. Normally I would use a more polite modifier, but when I am miserable in the heat, fuck is my favorite word: It is so fucking hot in this car I am going to fucking lose my fucking mind. Please turn on the fucking air conditioner right fucking now.

I have other regrets. Inside time spent in front of a fan, a cold washcloth in hand, offers time for reflection, and my rambling regrets have boiled down to this: My life has not turned out like I had planned. When I was a fourth grade girl sitting crossed-legged on my chenille bedspread, mapping out my future, which was a color-coded virtual map/timeline, brought to life with colored pencils that I sharpened frequently, that future did not include sweating my way through a grocery store half a million times, anxiety building at the register that I wouldn't have enough money to pay for meat and produce and dairy; that future did not involve barking dogs who demanded to be let inside and out, inside and out; that future did not once account for being consistently broke and forced to use inferior bath soap and generic laundry detergent; and most certainly, that future did not feature being married to a man who rarely talks. Also, I had not planned on having a menopot and wiry chin hairs.
My hopes were grand, and chief among them was being famous. When one is told repeatedly by elementary teachers that one is different and exceptional and talented and filled with creativity, one does not accept easily a struggling middle-class existence featuring four-door sedans and too much month at the end of the money.
I thought I would be a famous writer who went on extensive book tours and slumbered in fancy-schmancy hotels. I thought I would be wealthy enough to own purebred dogs that hired help would take outside for the pooping and the peeing; I thought I would have someone to cook for me and ensure that I was consuming green leafy vegetables and delectable fruit plated on china dishes that were drizzled with high-quality chocolate sauce imported from Switzerland. I thought I would live in a high-rise apartment building in New York City or possibly LA; I thought I would marry a witty man who wore argyled sweater vests and corduroys and sported an attractive five o'clock shadow. This professorial gentleman would buy me expensive jewelry, read to me aloud in the evenings as he puffed on a highly scented cigar, and compose love poetry on the fly. (Alternately, I thought I might never marry and instead compulsively date compulsively charming men who held important positions with banking or architectural firms.)
I have none of this. I have a dusty and hot house situated on a concrete cul de sac in a middle-class suburban neighborhood; I have a husband who gets excited about football season and a sale on bratwursts; I have some spare bucks in my coin purse now only because I hocked my class ring last week.
Like I said, I have some regrets.

Here's where things started to unravel: College.
I invited boys into my door room and fornicated. (There was alcohol involved.)
I got pregnant before I became a Missus and got married at nineteen because my parents made me. I wore a marked-down wedding dress from Penney's Outlet, which my mother bought without my knowledge or approval.
I became a mother at twenty and promptly changed my major from journalism to education, thinking that June, July, and August would be good for the baby, that I would be home for those extended weeks to cut up grapes and hot dogs so the wee one wouldn't die before she started preschool.
Soon, two more children followed, and before I knew what was happening to me, domestic life took over. I became Mommy and the little fourth-grade girl with stars in her eyes crawled into the dark recesses of a closet and stayed there for the next twenty-eight years.
Like I said, I have some regrets.

Now what?
I'm forty-eight, dumpy-fat, virtually unemployed save for part-time nanny gigs (which I do, really do enjoy, because it turns out I'm fantastic working with children), I'm married to a non-talking man, and, and this is the kicker, I am very, very EXTREMELY not famous.