One of those days

It's been one of those days. Not a horrible day. Not a tragic day, thank you, grilled cheesus. If I were to be honest instead of whiny, I'd have to say some good things happened today. But it was still one of those days.

You know those days. right? I fired up the grill to cook some salmon and corn on the cob for Coraline and me, and just as it got hot, the skies opened up. Of course I overcooked the salmon because I couldn't keep a good eye on it unless I stood out in the rain.

And I've chased several big, loud black flies around my house all day. They defy me by never landing. Just fucking buzzing .... buzzing ..... buzzing .....

And fruit flies.

And a smelly dead blue jay on my sidewalk that's too far gone to pick up.

I started this morning by running to the grocery store for soup ingredients. When I do big shopping, I go back to the nice Kroger in the nice suburb I lived in for 20 years even though it's a longer drive. When I just need a few things, I go to the closer Kroger that looks nice enough from the outside, but doesn't live up to its veneer. The one where the employees all act like they hate the customers -- or would if they were to crawl out of their own dead-eyed apathy long enough to feel anything. Zombies are more courteous. Where the check-out conveyors are so dirty I'm reluctant to put my food down on them. Where the bedding plants and hanging baskets are kept inside the entryway instead of along the side of the building where they can be stolen. It's a little rougher in the close Kroger. 

And where a woman with three kids found it necessary, after yelling, "I said, 'Fucking keep up!'," to slap her 3-year-old across the face on their way to the pharmacy. And then a few minutes later to yell at her to "get her shit because [her] sister left [her] shit on a chair." Note: a child who is close enough to slap is probably keeping up as well as she can, but probably wants to stay out of arm's reach because she might fucking get slapped.

Jesus. And please. I don't need anybody to tell me I should have called CPS. What she did is loving and kind compared to what they have to deal with. It's not abuse. I have a degree in social work. I know when to call.

And don't tell me I should have said something to Mom. What I wanted to do was stand up to my full super-hero height of 10 feet, slap her, and say, "Bitch, I guess you don't remember what it feels like to be little and helpless and to have somebody enormous slap you up the side of your head in the grocery store. Well, I'm your guardian angel because I'm here to remind you so you don't raise yet another generation of child slappers. Are you keeping up with me or do I need to remind you again?" Because I would bet everything I own she already knows what it's like to be little and feel that slap coming down. And I also know anything I said would only make things worse for the little girl later on.

I couldn't wait to get home and make some soup.

Late, toward evening, my granddaughter Coraline and I took a walk down to the art museum where she likes to visit a giant black steel lion sculpture named Yee-oh (Leo), who gazes with royal imperiousness over the river, which Coraline calls earth juice. We go down there almost every Tuesday now.

Sitting under Yee-oh

When two other little girls about 5 years old showed up, she was delighted and ran over to play with them. They said "hi" and then ignored her like older kids often do toddlers. Shortly after, someone who might have been their mother followed behind them with an older girl and a boy who was maybe 3. The mother was bone thin, blonde and tan, in barely shorts and 5-inch platform wedges.

The girls sat down on a park bench, and Coraline climbed up beside them, laughing with unrequited delight. The mom, who hadn't said "hi" or even made eye contact with either of us, although she was 4 feet away, told the girls to get off the bench. She was obviously uncomfortable. Maybe the rest of her shorts were wedged up her ass with a stick.

They got down and she told them to stay off the stairs, the stone wall, the grass, and the bench again. She seemed to both want them to just stand like statues on the sidewalk and wait with her for someone who was apparently late, and to stay the hell away from her so she didn't have to deal with them. At one point she muttered to herself, "God! I am waiting here with 4 kids. I can't believe this."

She never did make eye contact, but she made sure her kids stayed away from Coraline (and any fun). It reminded me of the "your favorite color is the color of poop" experience I had with Elvira when she was about 3, which I wrote about here.

I suspect this time it was Coraline's many tattoos, her purple toenails and her rock-and-roll t-shirt. Or maybe it was my baggy capris and my utilitarian sneakers, but really, who knows why some people are exceptionally rude?

Also who knows why people do what stick-up-her-ass mom did next. She had been carrying the 3-year-old boy because he kept trying to walk away from her on this wide sidewalk with an acre of grass beside it. Because that's what kids do: they explore. And if you don't want them to because your shoes are too fucking high to follow them around, then you'd better stay home, sit them in front of the TV and put a stop to that running around nonsense. Otherwise, kids are going to play.

I digress. The little boy got about 3 feet from from the woman before she scooped him back up. I didn't see what he did next because I was collecting Coraline and getting her out of there.

As we walked past, the mom grabbed his arm hard and slapped his hand several times. In a low, mean voice she said, "Don't hit. Don't ever hit. Hitting is wrong!" And then she hit him one more time just so he wouldn't forget .... that hitting is wrong.

Again, I did not turn on her. My self-control today has been fucking phenomenal. Also I don't want to have to call my kids to come bail me out of jail. They'd never let me forget it.

However, in a passive-aggressive conversational tone I said to Coraline, who was beside me but ready to take off on the next adventure, "That's the stupidest thing I've heard and seen in a long time. I feel sorry for that little boy." She just ran ahead toward a big orange sculpture and called back, "Orange! Orange!"

I'm glad all she saw today was orange and Yee-oh and a river of earth juice and the wheels on the bus as it passed below on the street and a man walking a dog. And kids who, for all she knew, were her new best friends for a few seconds. That's all she saw. For now. Someday she won't be so innocent, and I'm not ready for that day to come. I don't want her eyes to ever be as jaded as mine are.

And yet, how will she change the world if she doesn't see it as it is?

Orange

Yes, it's been one of those days. Tomorrow night I'll be writing from the beautiful Hocking Hills of southeastern Ohio. I'm sure I'll have an entirely new perspective by then. For now, I'm going to pour a glass of wine and hunt down that last fucking fly that's been buzzing my head the entire time I've been writing this. That's something I can justify smacking.

Brunch is served

When the "MC" standing in the pulpit started calling random table numbers, I apologized to the other three people I was sitting with at a table that could seat ten. I confessed my table is always last to go to the food line at our annual Thanksgiving dinner. This pledge brunch was new, but I expected my luck would hold. It did.

I'd gone to church without breakfast because one of the members of the finance committee promised me the service would be shorter than usual. It wasn't. In fact, it was half an hour longer than usual. By the time 12:30 rolled around and the MC started pulling numbers, I was so fucking hungry I would have signed any number on my pledge card they asked me to. I just wanted to eat.

Long tables were loaded with food: bacon, link sausage, patty sausage, toasted English muffins, potato casseroles, scrambled eggs and cheese, fresh fruit, piles of muffins and bagels. We tried to wait patiently as all the other tables were called to fill their plates, but it got harder and harder to watch everybody else sit down to their full plates of food. Finally the MC called table #8, the last table. We hurried to stand in a long line.

As we inched closer to the food, I noticed most of the serving pans were empty. No more bacon or sausage, a few burnt English muffin halves. People were scraping the bottoms of the egg pans. Do not fucking kid me, I thought. I didn't sit through yet another pledge service just to leave with an empty stomach.

The last dozen people or so in line tried to stretch the remaining food. The potato casserole was holding out so I took some of it, even though I rarely eat potatoes. The eggs were almost gone, so I took only about a tablespoon of those and then scooped out a small bowl of fresh fruit. I don't eat muffins or bagels, so I passed on those. I could hear the disappointed voices behind me as the last of the line scraped the bottom of the egg pan.

One of my besties came up and said their family was just going to leave because all the food was gone. She'd been in the back teaching Sunday school, and her husband had been running sound for the service. They hadn't even made it to the last table. I noticed other people looking at the empty pans and deciding to leave too. I felt guilty for the little that was on my plate.

As I walked through the sanctuary to our table at the front, I tried not to notice how much food other people had taken. It didn't matter. But when I arrived at my seat, I saw that two more people had joined our table, and evidently they hadn't waited for our number to be called. On the table at two of the previously empty place settings were plates and bowls of food that were spilling over onto the table they were so full. On just one of them -- not that I counted -- I saw several English muffin halves, strips of bacon, both kinds of sausage, a huge pile of eggs and potatoes, and several muffins balancing on top. Next to it was a full bowl of fresh fruit with several more muffins and coffee cake clinging on top. The plate next to it was almost as full. I felt a little nugget of resentment start to burn in my empty stomach.

I tried to find a photo of a plate of breakfast to represent, but none of them were as piled up as what I described. Imagine this one, only way more.

As the original four of us settled in, I noticed their plates were scanty, similar to mine. The guy who was sitting on my left offered me some of his muffin, but I didn't want the empty calories. The two men who had brought the loaded plates were standing at other tables, laughing and talking. We started eating, and eventually they came over, said hi, and plowed into their big plates of breakfast. I tried not to watch with envy. I will confess I failed.

As I ate, the words "one percent" kept floating up in my mind. Something about the amount of food two people at our table had on their plates compared to what the rest of us had seemed so familiar, but in a much larger context. I tried to push that thought away. I pushed away the thought that we'd all eat well if we took those six plates of food and split them up equally among us. Not the American way, is it? I tried not to think I'd like to Occupy Brunch. I tried to just accept and let go. Because I'm so fucking good at that, right?

The purpose of the pledge dinner has always been to remind people what a treasure we have in  our church and to encourage them to sign those pledge cards. And, we hope, to increase their pledges from last year so we can pay the mortgage, electric bills and staff. No matter how uncomfortable it makes people to be reminded, all churches need money to run. Not just butts in the chair. Money. This brunch had one purpose: to raise money. If the loading of plates with eggs and bacon would raise that money, then that's the greater good. That's what I told myself.

It didn't take me long to clean my plate, but as I finished I looked out at the food tables and noticed the cooks -- who probably hadn't eaten anything yet -- putting out more eggs. I went out to get more. The woman in charge of the breakfast said, "You were at the last table, right? Here, these fresh eggs are for you guys." I let her put a spoonful on my plate. Another of the cooks came out with sausage links, so I took one of those too, and then headed back to the table.

Before long the sausage cook brought her pan to our table and said, "You guys were last and didn't get much food. Who wants a sausage?" The other three I'd sat with took a couple. I already had one so I declined.

What happened next would have made me lose my appetite if I hadn't been so hungry. The two men sitting to my right, the two with  the already loaded plates who hadn't been able to put a dent in the food they'd already taken, laughed at their good fortune and each held their plates up for more sausage. One of them said something like, "Good thing we went last." Har har har. She gave them each a couple more sausages to go with the ones still on their plates.

Now I'll let you imagine a couple of minutes of stunned silence. I didn't dare look at anybody at the table. I was feeling ..... the truth is I was feeling small, mean and angry. Ugly. I didn't want to feel that way. I had food on my fucking plate, damn it. I wasn't going to leave hungry. I just put my head down and forked that food into my mouth. But I could see the friend who was sitting on my left glancing up at me. I looked sideways at him and he shook his head and rolled his eyes. Good. It wasn't just me.

I've thought a lot about that meal, about how some people took as much as they could pile on their plates and then took more. I've been to dozens of those dinners, so I also can guess how much food was thrown away because people took more than they could eat. Probably they were a small number -- not the majority. But they wasted food that could have fed other people.

To be fair, I didn't leave hungry. I didn't fill up, but I ate enough. And a few hours later, when I was hungry, I ate again at home. I know I am blessed to live in this country at this time in history.

But I can't help thinking how a small experience like this can shine a light on how much bigger national and world problems emerge and grow. The people who went first and second and third didn't get their privileged place in line because of their hard work or skill or talents or even, in spite of the fact that this was a pledge dinner, monetary contributions. It was random good fortune.

Those of us who were at the last table didn't eat far less because we lacked time or skills or talent or even money. The four of us who went last have given, or still give, of all of those things more than most people in the church. And those who left hungry .... some of them give as much or more. They didn't eat because they were still busy doing the work of the church.

Random. Not deserved. Random. And yet even in this small microcosm of people who claim to care for each other, some people took way more than they needed while others went hungry. And it wasn't fucking necessary.

Were the resources limited? Yes and no. The people in charge of the brunch brought in limited food, but it was a shitload of food. It was enough to feed everyone in the church so they left satisfied. Limited resources don't mean somebody has to go hungry.

That seems to be the thing a lot of people in this country have forgotten. Limited resources don't mean somebody has to go hungry. It might mean though that some people can't take lots more than they need, way more than they even deserve except by the random chance that they become a CEO of an oil company or a bank instead of a fucking teacher or construction worker or stay-at-home mom.

I sound judgmental as hell, so let me backpedal and say I do it too. We all do it -- take more than we need. In so many ways, our plates are piled high -- you should come to my house for Thanksgiving. No, really. No matter how many read this far, I can feed you. And yet others are going hungry. Maybe it's human nature to grab as much as possible in times of plenty.

But I think we're smarter than that. I think we can do better than that ..... Or I'd like to think so. What I saw at the pledge brunch didn't fill me with either hope or eggs.

Oh, one more thing. All of the original four of us turned in our pledge cards to our table captain. I didn't see either of the men with full plates even take an envelope with a card. Doesn't mean it didn't or won't happen. I just didn't see it before I left. Not my business. It's not a tax, after all.

I'm trying not to judge. Yet as I write this, I think maybe I sound like a whiny bitch who needs to go serve really hungry people in Africa.

Tell me what you think. I can take it. Am I just a whiny bitch who didn't get her bacon? Or do we have a problem that permeates both our small and large social systems? Have you seen examples in your own life?

And am I the only one who feels, during this crazy, long, excruciating election season, that maybe we're just really fucking hopeless?

Dreaming

I don't put much faith in dreams, although I dream every night and usually remember at least one or two. The most logical explanation for them seems to be that they're the unpredictable firing of brain cells while the owner of the brain is unconscious. Often I can tell some movie I watched has shown up mixed up with some other events that happened. More often they don't make sense at all, like they're just experimental stories or mind masturbation. I certainly don't believe in symbolism in dreams. But then there are those times when I have no choice but to believe ..... something--very much like I don't believe in Tarot except when I have no choice. When I dream and within days or weeks the dream turns out to be prophetic, and I can't deny that there's some weird thing that happens with dreams that I can neither predict nor understand.

Tonight I don't want to write about all the times that's happened. Unless I'm really interested in the person, I don't find their dreams all that interesting, so I'll assume the same of you. (Although I'm sure you'd find my dreams fascinating.) I seem to be in a phase of dream predictions the past week or so though, and I have to admit I'm both curious to see what will happen next and, as usual, a little freaked out about what might happen next.

Last week I wrote about a dream. Often I dream about people and they pop up unexpectedly the next day. I've gotten used to that, even if I haven't heard from the person in years. You all do that too, right?

Last night though, I dreamed I was driving on a highway near my hometown. Without warning, the highway ended, and in front of me was nothing but grassy prairie and stands of trees. I wasn't sure why, but it reminded me of a post-apocalyptic movie--only without the apocalypse. In the dream, I continued on foot to where I was going.

After several hours of doing dream stuff in that place, I found myself driving a car, trying to find my way to what was home in the dream. I took a different paved road that eventually and unexpectedly turned into a dirt road. When I looked behind me and couldn't see an alternative, I continued on the back roads. I was obviously lost, and although I kept trying to tell from the sun which direction I should go, I came to a place where I wasn't sure which way to turn. At the corner was an old farm house so I rode my bike--yep, that's how dreams work--up into the yard. There were a bunch of people there but they only stared at me. They knew I was lost, but they didn't want to help. I rode through the yard, past the people, until I came to a head lying on the ground. I was trying to figure out where the rest of his body was -- if maybe it was buried and just his head was sticking out -- when a woman came out on the porch and said, "Don't ask him. He ain't gonna tell you the truth anyway." So I chose a direction and rode away, still lost. The end.

I was telling my son Drake about the dream this afternoon and he had some ideas about relationships that have changed, how it might be about that. I said maybe so, but it felt like one of those prophetic dreams -- which, of course, it couldn't be because we weren't really expecting a fucking apocalypse.

After we talked, I got out my bike and headed off to the post office. I wasn't going to miss taking at least a short ride on a 70-degree, sunny day in March. After I left the post office, I decided to ride down to a nearby neighborhood and look at a house that was for sale there. I wanted to see what the ride was like, how near it was to downtown. I found the street and the house, and then decided to keep riding. City neighborhoods are tricky. A street with huge, lovely old houses, like the one I was on, can butt right up to streets with burned out or boarded up crack houses lined up in a row.

I rode past some nice, old houses and eventually a mix of nice and not-so-nice. So I headed back the way I'd come .... or so I thought. As I rode I realized I was on streets I hadn't been on before, but some of the names seemed familiar so I figured they had to lead back to the main road. I kept riding and turning down streets and sometimes finding the same street but still not finding my way out.

Eventually I was in one of those neighborhoods with the boarded up, burned out houses and the apartments with bars on the windows. Rough, pitted out streets with lots of speed bumps to slow down high-speed chases with cops and broken glass on the sidewalks. And the few people who were out just looked at me without expression, without saying hi as I road by in my sexy, stretchy cycling clothes on my expensive bike ... not saying hi like people do in my neighborhood (which also has boarded up houses, but not like this).

I saw a sign beside an apartment building and realized I was in a really bad part of the city -- a part I would only want to go through in my van with my doors locked. Only I was on my bicycle and I was lost. It was a neighborhood I'd read about just last week, in an article about how the police have failed to control the gang violence there.

I kept riding. I knew I could stop and call a friend to look up a map and give me directions to get out, but I didn't feel safe; I didn't want to stop and I didn't want to look lost. I knew I could call and a friend would fucking leave work and come pick me up. But I also knew I wouldn't feel safe waiting for him to get to me. I felt too vulnerable, too exposed, too obviously out of place. So I kept riding. And riding. As fast as I could given the condition of the streets and the pitch of some of the hills. I rode on streets I'd already been on. On streets I'd never seen before. I tried to think where the main road might be by where the sun was in the sky, but knowing where west was didn't help me because I didn't know where I was. And I also hadn't told anyone else where I was going.

It was ridiculous really. Stupid. I've been lost in cities all over the country. I sometimes take a wrong turn on purpose and get lost -- on fucking purpose -- just in case I find an adventure out there in the unknown. Getting lost doesn't fucking scare me. I always find my way home just fine. My city doesn't scare me. I ride my bike downtown late at night by myself, and I live in a neighborhood where they put in gates in the 90's to stop the high-speed chases. I'm not fucking scared ..... Except today there were times I was really scared and I can't even explain why.

Finally I came to a 4-way stop sign that was pretty busy. I had to stop, so I waited and noted most of the cars were going one direction. I decided to follow them. So I turned and rode with the traffic. Finally I could see a busier street up ahead and sure enough: it was the 4-lane street I needed to take home. As I turned onto the sidewalk, I realized I was a couple of miles north of where I'd turned off, and I was at the top of a huge hill. I didn't care now that I knew where the hell I was -- and some people would consider where I was hell.

I had ridden about half a block when I saw a young man walking toward me on the sidewalk. He was wearing gang colors. He looked up and saw me ... and then he squatted down in the middle of the sidewalk to tie his shoe. Fuck me, I thought. I finally find my way out of the jungle and now I run into a gang banger. Why is he tying his shoe? Nothing to do but keep riding. The traffic was heavy and whizzing by so I couldn't cross the street, and I sure as fuck couldn't turn back. I couldn't ride too fast because he was on the sidewalk. I eased up to him and edged by. He didn't even look up, but I took the brakes off and let the hill take me faster as soon as I was past.

When I could, I crossed to my own side of the road and eventually into my own neighborhood. As I turned down my own street, I was even relieved to see the drug dealer who lives three doors down sitting on his front steps. It all seemed pretty anticlimactic by the time I lifted my bike up my own front steps, but my lungs were burning because I've sat on my lazy, fat ass most of the winter and gotten out of shape and my legs were shakier than a ride of that length warranted.

It wasn't until I'd eaten lunch and was in the shower that I remembered the dream I had last night. The dream about getting lost and trying to find my way by the sun. It's just how these dreams go. The setting isn't the same, but the story is close. I don't really believe in dreams though. They're just the random firing of brain cells. Nothing a logical woman like me would believe in .... except when I have no choice.

Some people think prophetic dreams are a gift. I'm not too sure about that. Mostly it freaks me out because it doesn't make sense, and yet I can't deny that it happens. And I have no fucking control even when I know something is going to happen.

What about you? Do you believe in the prophecy of dreams? Have you ever had a sleeping dream come true in the waking world? If so, doesn't it just scare the ever-lovin' shit out of you?

Coda: Five and a half hours after I published this, I got up and read the following message from TUT in my email:

"Always trust your dreams, [reticula]. They've chosen you, as much as you've chosen them.

Tallyho,
    The Universe...

And it really ticked-off all the other dreams, too, [reticula]." 

Do you know what's stuck to the bottom of your fridge?

So I finished reading and commenting on papers about 12:15 tonight and I admit before I started I watched the last episode of Dexter on Showtime on Demand and wow! he's cooked his shit now (I won't spoil it if you haven't seen it) but he's so fucking hot this season with his big muscles and tight shirts, isn't it about time we saw him naked? Enough with the blood and the little kid already; let's balance Mr. Nice Guy Sociopath out with some sex. Mmmmkay? So anyway I justified the Dexter fix because I wanted to finish crocheting a hot pink bootie for Coraline before I started on the four stacks of papers I needed to read and comment on tonight so I can go out to the theatre tomorrow night. A couple of hours later I finally finished the papers and entered the grades into my Excel grade book. My kids are writing some really hard stuff this quarter--like about rape and suicide and football and the price of pot--so after I read their papers I was finally ready to relax and start the new season of Shame but first I headed to the kitchen and measured out exactly one serving--according to the package--of Lays classic potato chips into a bowl

One serving = 15 chips. The broken ones don't count.

and reached into the fridge to pull out the Black Box so I could pour myself a glass of wine. I pulled and I pulled and I pulled but the box wouldn't come out of the fridge. Shit. It was stuck tight to the bottom shelf so I finally gave an extra hard pull and ripped it away from the glass and of course you know there was some kind of brown, gunky mess all over the shelf which I couldn't ignore because elves don't clean that shit up in the night, so I started digging for whatever was back there turning putrid .... nope, not the lemons, although they were sitting in sticky brown gunk too .... not the celery ..... I  threw those in the sink to wash later ..... kept digging through the milk licker and the baby romaine and the leftover eggnog from Christmas Eve and ah ha, here's the stinking culprit. A bag of spinach that probably wouldn't have gone bad if I'd eat fucking spinach instead of chips but who eats raw spinach with their wine after a long day of teaching and grading? I don't.  I'd probably get thin or something and what would I have to complain about then? So of course the fucking gunk was all over the glass shelf and had crept down into the cracks and crevices and of course I'd gone to Kroger just yesterday so the shelf was full and everything had to be unloaded so I could wipe that nasty shit up even though it literally made me gag and then wash the lemons and celery and put it all back. And the Black Box box is now damaged and certainly not fit to serve to company so now I'll have to drink it all myself but thank god the actual wine is in a plastic bag so I can.

I would not serve this to anyone but myself.

All I wanted was 15 fucking Lays potato chips and a glass of wine after a long day of teaching and grading papers and driving a van that sounds like a giant, fucking electric Hitachi vibrator. Was that too much to ask?