The second year that Bobby and I were dating, he bought me a Valentine’s Card that said on the front “what do I love about you the most?” and on the inside “butt, of course!” He thought this was hilarious because, you know, he’s a boy and all.
I’ve been thinking about that card at lot the last week because suddenly thoughts and conversations about butts are something I just can’t get away from.
Last week Bobby was out of town, and I choose to use that time to watch a sad movie because when he’s home Bobby is the sad movie police and keeps me from making such horrible decisions. Like an addict, as soon as he leaves the house for a few days, I start trolling the cable stations for showings of “Terms of Endearment” or “Steel Magnolias”. So last week I decided I’d watch “Nights in Rodanthe”, a movie based on a Nicholas Sparks book so you know it’s just going to be brutal going in. And it was. I sat in the dark on my bed sobbing when it was over.
And then I remembered about Richard Gere and the gerbils. You know, how he puts them up his butt? And that made me stop crying because, come on, what kind of dumb ass sobs over a guy who willingly puts rodents in his butt?
I mentioned this at a bbq over the weekend at my friend Holly’s house and everyone, including her dad, nodded in agreement about Gere and the gerbils, but there was one girl there, an FBI agent no less, who was clueless about it. She asked us questions like “when did this happen?” and “was it on the news?” and “are you sure it’s true?” and while none of us could come up with any concrete proof, there was no denying it was absolutely true. Gere and the gerbils is something you just believe in. We take it on faith that it happened and we’re at once disgusted and fascinated by it. On his tombstone I’m sure it will say “Actor, Buddist, Guy who loved gerbils in his butt” cause that is just who Gere is. No question. And those gerbils in his butt saved me from a Sparks induced death spiral so thanks little Zhu Zhu pets.
Later in the week, I was chatting with one of my close friends about how her boss is kind of a dick. I asked for an example and she told me that he often blows up and gets super mad but then apologizes in a less than favorable way. Like when he showed his remorse to her by presenting her with a DVD set of the television show “Mad Men” so she could watch and see what working for an actual “bad boss” is like and then appreciate him more. Really? So, you’re some kind of temper challenged crazy person and she’s supposed to be psyched that you’re not trying to grab her butt like Jon Hamm? Hamm is pretty hot and I’m pretty sure my friend’s boss is not. Plus he’s playing a boss from the 1960’s not 2010 so the argument/apology here is pretty weak. It’d take the butt grabbing over the insane manic personality any day.
On Friday we went to the pool for Mac’s swimming lesson. After the lesson all the kids were playing in the pool when a little girl who is new to the pool crowd came over to me and said “Um, Mac’s mom, your son is trying to grab my tush.” I thought this sounded odd, but I assured the little girl that I’d talk to him so I called Mac over and said “Buddy, were you trying to grab that little girl’s butt, because she doesn’t like it” to which he responded “Mom, I wasn’t trying to grab her butt – I was just playing a simple game of grab ass”
Um, excuse me? Did my 4 year old just tell me he was playing a simple game of grab ass? I had no idea how to respond to that so I just said “well, don’t touch anyone’s butt – EVER” and then thought about how great it was that I was going to end up being the mother of the next generation's Sir Mix A Lot.
So, here it is another week and I’m hoping to get through it without any talk about rear ends. Butt, of course, I think we all know that won’t happen.
Monday, July 26, 2010
Monday, July 19, 2010
I know what Boys like
As the mother of two boys, I am often asked if Bobby and I are going to “try for a girl”.
I understand why people ask this – the ideal family has both and I’m a pretty girly-girl so it seems like something I would want to “try for”. The thing if I tried, I’d probably end up with a third boy and which would make the male female ratio in my house 4-1 and there’s already way too much testosterone in my house.
The other thing is, I never really wanted a girl. Don’t get me wrong. I love being a girl. And I’m totally a girls’ girl. I’ve always had a million girlfriends and I just couldn’t live without a single one of them. And I absolutely adore my nieces, Brooke and Bella, and my friends’ daughters and Mac and Charlie’s many girlfriends. And, oh how I want to go for manicures, and shop for hair accessories, and do princess stuff. I love princess stuff and there isn’t one princess in my house full of superheroes. Well, if you don’t count me, of course.
The thing is because I am a girl who had a rough, often traumatic relationship with her own mother, as soon as I was pregnant I worried “what if it’s a girl and I make her feel awful her whole life the way my mom did to me?” The thought consumed me. I HAD to have a boy because I was not fit to raise a girl. These fears were hard for people I confided in to understand. They thought that because I was so aware of how my mom made me feel, I would never do the same thing to my own daughter. And they were probably right. But what always got me is that my mom wasn’t a bad mom. She was a GREAT mom. Maybe the best mom. And when she was tearing me down and making me feel awful, she had no idea that she was doing it. She thought by saying things like “why can’t you be as pretty as Anne?” that she was inspiring me to diet when really she was just making me feel like “crap, I’m the fugly side kick”. I know now that she never ever meant to hurt me and that from her spot in heaven she regrets it and I completely forgive her. But I still can’t risk living through that again.
So during both pregnancies I said “I just want a healthy baby” but I secretly prayed and prayed for boys who I could love and not ruin and both times I got my wish. Not just my wish but better because if you’ve never met my boys they are hands down the cutest, most hilarious, charming little devils you will ever meet. And I wouldn’t trade either of them for the world, but more often then I’d like to admit I wonder what “my girl” would be like and if maybe I sold myself short by “ending the cycle”. Maybe I could have handled it and my girl would have rocked. Probably. Definitely.
Luckily for me, these moments are fleeting because then I go to the party store and see all the super sexed up costumes for girls. And I see pictures of my four year old niece in a bikini posing like she’s a Victoria Secret Angel. And I watch the old 90210’s and see what poor Brenda Walsh’s parents went through.
Last week I watched two of Mac and Charlie’s friends for full day which doubled the number of kids I usually watch for more than an hour or two. God bless all my friends with four or more kids because it was hard! Getting four children under six to walk through a parking lot and keeping everyone alive was maybe the hardest thing I’ve ever done.
Then throw in the fact that one of them is a very pretty 3 year old girl and you’ve got problems. See my little pal Ella is pretty, but she’s not just normal 3 year old pretty. She’s 3 year old with two really gorgeous teenage sisters pretty which means she knows how to work it like no one else her age (well, except my previously mentioned bikini model niece). So anyhow, the day is going fine, all the kids are playing in the basement when all of a sudden Mac, Ella and her brother Matthew come running up stairs at varying levels of hysteria. See it seems that Ella decided she wanted to marry Mac and Mac was cool with that if “marry” meant “chase around” so he was playing a game of chase with her. Matthew, though, apparently unaware that he does not come from some sort of crazy Appalachian hillbilly family (his family is really quite lovely and normal) was brought to tears because he “loves Ella more than anything in the world and thought they were gonna get married”. You’d think Ella, his adoring sister, would feel bad that her brother was crying but instead she flipped her hair and hung onto Mac’s shoulder and taunted Matthew until he finally got so frustrated that he spit on Mac which made Mac feel the need to “crush” Matthew by grabbing his chest and twisting the skin until it was red. My child is a real prize, too. And then they all came running upstairs and expected me to deal with it.
So what did I do? First I put them all in time out in different parts of the kitchen. Then I sat Charlie, who had done nothing wrong, up on the counter in front of them and let him eat an entire candy bar by himself. Yes, I am super mature.
And then I walked from child to child and said “Matthew – we don’t spit on our friends”, “Mac – we don’t ‘crush’ our friends”, “Ella – we don’t use our good looks to make others feel bad”.
And as that ridiculous statement came out of my mouth and the pretty 3 year old starred at me like I was a space alien, suddenly all the reasons why I was happy not having just boys seemed clear.
Boys are so simple. Spitting and “crushing”, I can deal with. Bring it on!
All the girl bullshit, I will watch with amusement from the sidelines.
And I’m pretty sure I’ll never feel like I missed anything.
I understand why people ask this – the ideal family has both and I’m a pretty girly-girl so it seems like something I would want to “try for”. The thing if I tried, I’d probably end up with a third boy and which would make the male female ratio in my house 4-1 and there’s already way too much testosterone in my house.
The other thing is, I never really wanted a girl. Don’t get me wrong. I love being a girl. And I’m totally a girls’ girl. I’ve always had a million girlfriends and I just couldn’t live without a single one of them. And I absolutely adore my nieces, Brooke and Bella, and my friends’ daughters and Mac and Charlie’s many girlfriends. And, oh how I want to go for manicures, and shop for hair accessories, and do princess stuff. I love princess stuff and there isn’t one princess in my house full of superheroes. Well, if you don’t count me, of course.
The thing is because I am a girl who had a rough, often traumatic relationship with her own mother, as soon as I was pregnant I worried “what if it’s a girl and I make her feel awful her whole life the way my mom did to me?” The thought consumed me. I HAD to have a boy because I was not fit to raise a girl. These fears were hard for people I confided in to understand. They thought that because I was so aware of how my mom made me feel, I would never do the same thing to my own daughter. And they were probably right. But what always got me is that my mom wasn’t a bad mom. She was a GREAT mom. Maybe the best mom. And when she was tearing me down and making me feel awful, she had no idea that she was doing it. She thought by saying things like “why can’t you be as pretty as Anne?” that she was inspiring me to diet when really she was just making me feel like “crap, I’m the fugly side kick”. I know now that she never ever meant to hurt me and that from her spot in heaven she regrets it and I completely forgive her. But I still can’t risk living through that again.
So during both pregnancies I said “I just want a healthy baby” but I secretly prayed and prayed for boys who I could love and not ruin and both times I got my wish. Not just my wish but better because if you’ve never met my boys they are hands down the cutest, most hilarious, charming little devils you will ever meet. And I wouldn’t trade either of them for the world, but more often then I’d like to admit I wonder what “my girl” would be like and if maybe I sold myself short by “ending the cycle”. Maybe I could have handled it and my girl would have rocked. Probably. Definitely.
Luckily for me, these moments are fleeting because then I go to the party store and see all the super sexed up costumes for girls. And I see pictures of my four year old niece in a bikini posing like she’s a Victoria Secret Angel. And I watch the old 90210’s and see what poor Brenda Walsh’s parents went through.
Last week I watched two of Mac and Charlie’s friends for full day which doubled the number of kids I usually watch for more than an hour or two. God bless all my friends with four or more kids because it was hard! Getting four children under six to walk through a parking lot and keeping everyone alive was maybe the hardest thing I’ve ever done.
Then throw in the fact that one of them is a very pretty 3 year old girl and you’ve got problems. See my little pal Ella is pretty, but she’s not just normal 3 year old pretty. She’s 3 year old with two really gorgeous teenage sisters pretty which means she knows how to work it like no one else her age (well, except my previously mentioned bikini model niece). So anyhow, the day is going fine, all the kids are playing in the basement when all of a sudden Mac, Ella and her brother Matthew come running up stairs at varying levels of hysteria. See it seems that Ella decided she wanted to marry Mac and Mac was cool with that if “marry” meant “chase around” so he was playing a game of chase with her. Matthew, though, apparently unaware that he does not come from some sort of crazy Appalachian hillbilly family (his family is really quite lovely and normal) was brought to tears because he “loves Ella more than anything in the world and thought they were gonna get married”. You’d think Ella, his adoring sister, would feel bad that her brother was crying but instead she flipped her hair and hung onto Mac’s shoulder and taunted Matthew until he finally got so frustrated that he spit on Mac which made Mac feel the need to “crush” Matthew by grabbing his chest and twisting the skin until it was red. My child is a real prize, too. And then they all came running upstairs and expected me to deal with it.
So what did I do? First I put them all in time out in different parts of the kitchen. Then I sat Charlie, who had done nothing wrong, up on the counter in front of them and let him eat an entire candy bar by himself. Yes, I am super mature.
And then I walked from child to child and said “Matthew – we don’t spit on our friends”, “Mac – we don’t ‘crush’ our friends”, “Ella – we don’t use our good looks to make others feel bad”.
And as that ridiculous statement came out of my mouth and the pretty 3 year old starred at me like I was a space alien, suddenly all the reasons why I was happy not having just boys seemed clear.
Boys are so simple. Spitting and “crushing”, I can deal with. Bring it on!
All the girl bullshit, I will watch with amusement from the sidelines.
And I’m pretty sure I’ll never feel like I missed anything.
Monday, July 12, 2010
The Wisdom of Zuckerman
While I was cooking dinner tonight, I watched the high school graduation episode of the original 90210. In her valedictorian speech, Andrea Zuckerman says “what we’ve learned about the value of friendship will not be diminished just because we may not end up together. The memories that we have shared will not go away, simply because we do”. Zuckerman, always so wise beyond her years. Or maybe age appropriately wise since she was like 32 when they graduated high school.
Her speech got me thinking about my earlier post on continuity. I talked about how great it is to have people in your life for the long haul because your shared memories help you remember who you were in the beginning and hopefully hang on to some of that person as your life inevitably changes and with it you change as well.
My second child was 6 months old when my friend Pat Noel got married and I hadn’t been away from home overnight with just Bobby in over 3 years. When we got to the Eastern Shore for his wedding, we immediately met my pal Fissy for a drinking lunch which lasted all afternoon and by the time the wedding reception started I was hands down the drunkest person there. Partly because after so much time home with kids, I was sort of like a caged animal. And partly because the majority of the people I knew at the wedding were people I used to party with in my younger days so when I saw them I just went right back to being that person. People kept saying to Bobby “wow, she hasn’t changed at all” and he had to explain that “no, really, she has – she just doesn’t get out much anymore”. Needless to say I had the best time ever and regret nothing. My point is that we all do change – but when you get back together with people who knew you in another form, you return to that form which as long as your past life wasn’t as a serial killer or something is pretty awesome.
When you watch TV as much as I do, there is always this image of what true friendships are like. If me and my very first friend Nancy were TV friends, we’d live in the same neighborhood now and our lives would be completely intertwined. In real life, we see each other a couple times a year if we’re lucky. She’s got two kids and two dogs and is Supermom doing twenty five volunteer jobs at a time and staying in stick thin shape running marathons and climbing mountains on the side. I’ve got the boys and school and still really enjoying sleeping drinking beer, and making out with Bobby more than just about anything. Oh, and there’s that river between Maryland and Virginia that keeps us apart. Yada, yada, yada. We don’t see each other nearly enough but that’s okay because what’s between us withstands time and distance and change. When I do see Nancy, it doesn’t matter how long it’s been, it’s always like it was yesterday because she’s a such a big part of who I am. That’s what real friendship is like.
And I’m lucky because I have lots of friendships like that. I rarely see half the people I love. Jobs, kids, distance, there are millions of things that keep us apart. Thank God for email and facebook or I might forget what some of my friends look like. But out of sight doesn’t mean out of mind.
Recently I found out that someone I thought was a friend, not a super close friend, but definitely a friend, has been talking smack about me and some other friends. We had all been pals a few years back because we had a commonality – babies the same age. Then those babies got bigger and we didn’t see each other as much. Second kids came along. First kids went to different schools. Life just took us in different directions. But there was certainly no falling out, no hard feelings. At least that’s what I thought. And then I hear through the neighborhood rumor mill that it’s being said my friends and I only want to hang out with parents from our kids’ school and we’re in some sort of cult. Yes, the word cult was actually used. About me. And I don’t even think I was the leader. That’s some serious bullshit, right? I mean, I know Catholic School has been called a lot of things but it’s not a cult. You must have us confused with Scientology. Oh, and I’m friends with plenty of people whose children go to other schools. I’m friends with people who don’t even have children. Or jobs. Or their own apartments. Sure I spend more time with the parents of kids my son is in school with because of carpooling and going to the same events and that’s just life. It’s not some kind of grand plan to leave certain people out. I honestly don’t have the time or energy to devise evil plans these days. Wish I did. Kidding.
The thing is, a lot of people expect too much from friends – and these same people don’t necessarily feel the need to give you what they expect in return. It befuddles me. I mean if you don’t feel like you see me enough, then call me and make plans. Maybe even in a way that would be convenient for me. I have a friend who is always giving me a hard time about not seeing her but she’s never once offered to come the 45 minutes to an hour to visit me. It’s always about when can I drive during rush hour across three counties to catch up. And I apologize again and again cause I don’t want to be the bad friend – but damn it, I’m not a bad friend. And these people are not as good as they think either.
Good friends don’t need to see each other all the time. Sure they want to but they understand about life and scheduling and traffic and kids. And they’re happy with whatever time they get you for. I mentioned my friend Aileen in my earlier post and one of the things I love about her is we really never spend time together. I wasn’t exaggerating when I said we’ve seen each other maybe twice in 20 years. But there’s no pressure, no judging, no complaining about why don’t we ever see each other (partly cause she lives in Tennessee). We just appreciate the connection we’re lucky enough to still have and the fact that texting lets us enjoy it. That’s friendship.
Friends aren’t the people who guilt you into going out when you don’t feel like it. Friends are the people who send you a birthday card in the mail. Friends are the people who you have lunch with a couple times a year and laugh your ass off and then don’t talk for four months and it’s okay. Friends are the people who walk in unexpectantly at your mom’s funeral and make you remember why you loved them in the first place. Friends know your strengths and your limitations and they accept that. And just because friends aren’t living in the apartment across the hall and barging in to eat breakfast with you before work every morning like they do on TV, doesn’t mean they aren’t still part of your everyday. Because as Zuckerman said to the West Beverly High School class of 1993: the memories that we have shared will not go away simply because we do. I wish that all friends were as wise as Andrea Zuckerman. And I’m thankful that so many of mine are. To friends. Together and Apart.
Her speech got me thinking about my earlier post on continuity. I talked about how great it is to have people in your life for the long haul because your shared memories help you remember who you were in the beginning and hopefully hang on to some of that person as your life inevitably changes and with it you change as well.
My second child was 6 months old when my friend Pat Noel got married and I hadn’t been away from home overnight with just Bobby in over 3 years. When we got to the Eastern Shore for his wedding, we immediately met my pal Fissy for a drinking lunch which lasted all afternoon and by the time the wedding reception started I was hands down the drunkest person there. Partly because after so much time home with kids, I was sort of like a caged animal. And partly because the majority of the people I knew at the wedding were people I used to party with in my younger days so when I saw them I just went right back to being that person. People kept saying to Bobby “wow, she hasn’t changed at all” and he had to explain that “no, really, she has – she just doesn’t get out much anymore”. Needless to say I had the best time ever and regret nothing. My point is that we all do change – but when you get back together with people who knew you in another form, you return to that form which as long as your past life wasn’t as a serial killer or something is pretty awesome.
When you watch TV as much as I do, there is always this image of what true friendships are like. If me and my very first friend Nancy were TV friends, we’d live in the same neighborhood now and our lives would be completely intertwined. In real life, we see each other a couple times a year if we’re lucky. She’s got two kids and two dogs and is Supermom doing twenty five volunteer jobs at a time and staying in stick thin shape running marathons and climbing mountains on the side. I’ve got the boys and school and still really enjoying sleeping drinking beer, and making out with Bobby more than just about anything. Oh, and there’s that river between Maryland and Virginia that keeps us apart. Yada, yada, yada. We don’t see each other nearly enough but that’s okay because what’s between us withstands time and distance and change. When I do see Nancy, it doesn’t matter how long it’s been, it’s always like it was yesterday because she’s a such a big part of who I am. That’s what real friendship is like.
And I’m lucky because I have lots of friendships like that. I rarely see half the people I love. Jobs, kids, distance, there are millions of things that keep us apart. Thank God for email and facebook or I might forget what some of my friends look like. But out of sight doesn’t mean out of mind.
Recently I found out that someone I thought was a friend, not a super close friend, but definitely a friend, has been talking smack about me and some other friends. We had all been pals a few years back because we had a commonality – babies the same age. Then those babies got bigger and we didn’t see each other as much. Second kids came along. First kids went to different schools. Life just took us in different directions. But there was certainly no falling out, no hard feelings. At least that’s what I thought. And then I hear through the neighborhood rumor mill that it’s being said my friends and I only want to hang out with parents from our kids’ school and we’re in some sort of cult. Yes, the word cult was actually used. About me. And I don’t even think I was the leader. That’s some serious bullshit, right? I mean, I know Catholic School has been called a lot of things but it’s not a cult. You must have us confused with Scientology. Oh, and I’m friends with plenty of people whose children go to other schools. I’m friends with people who don’t even have children. Or jobs. Or their own apartments. Sure I spend more time with the parents of kids my son is in school with because of carpooling and going to the same events and that’s just life. It’s not some kind of grand plan to leave certain people out. I honestly don’t have the time or energy to devise evil plans these days. Wish I did. Kidding.
The thing is, a lot of people expect too much from friends – and these same people don’t necessarily feel the need to give you what they expect in return. It befuddles me. I mean if you don’t feel like you see me enough, then call me and make plans. Maybe even in a way that would be convenient for me. I have a friend who is always giving me a hard time about not seeing her but she’s never once offered to come the 45 minutes to an hour to visit me. It’s always about when can I drive during rush hour across three counties to catch up. And I apologize again and again cause I don’t want to be the bad friend – but damn it, I’m not a bad friend. And these people are not as good as they think either.
Good friends don’t need to see each other all the time. Sure they want to but they understand about life and scheduling and traffic and kids. And they’re happy with whatever time they get you for. I mentioned my friend Aileen in my earlier post and one of the things I love about her is we really never spend time together. I wasn’t exaggerating when I said we’ve seen each other maybe twice in 20 years. But there’s no pressure, no judging, no complaining about why don’t we ever see each other (partly cause she lives in Tennessee). We just appreciate the connection we’re lucky enough to still have and the fact that texting lets us enjoy it. That’s friendship.
Friends aren’t the people who guilt you into going out when you don’t feel like it. Friends are the people who send you a birthday card in the mail. Friends are the people who you have lunch with a couple times a year and laugh your ass off and then don’t talk for four months and it’s okay. Friends are the people who walk in unexpectantly at your mom’s funeral and make you remember why you loved them in the first place. Friends know your strengths and your limitations and they accept that. And just because friends aren’t living in the apartment across the hall and barging in to eat breakfast with you before work every morning like they do on TV, doesn’t mean they aren’t still part of your everyday. Because as Zuckerman said to the West Beverly High School class of 1993: the memories that we have shared will not go away simply because we do. I wish that all friends were as wise as Andrea Zuckerman. And I’m thankful that so many of mine are. To friends. Together and Apart.
Continuity
In Hollywood, movie producers have someone called a “Script Supervisor” who is on set at all times making sure that when scenes are shot out of order they don’t lose continuity. In my real life, that’s what my friends are for. Coming from a family that is fractured and spread out, sometimes I feel like it’s my job to remember every detail of my childhood in order to keep it, and the people who starred in it, from disappearing. My memories and stories keep my past alive. And the people who were there with me validate it.
Over the weekend my baby Charlie stepped on a bee and got stung. The first thing I thought was “crap – I hope he’s not allergic”. The second thing I thought was “well, at least it’s only one sting” because as a child my brothers and our friends the Ratti girls and I stepped on a nest of ground bees in the woods and were chased by a swarm into the south river. I haven’t seen the Ratti girls in decades. But when I posted something about Charlie’s sting on facebook, I almost immediately got a message from Jacqueline saying “remember that time we stepped on the bee’s nest and got chased”. And knowing someone else shared that memory with me made it more real. It made a childhood that seems so far away seem closer. And it made even kind of a bad memory, a good one because it was shared and everything is better when you share it.
Saturday night Bobby and I watched Hot Tub Time Machine again. If you haven’t seen it, get yourself to that red box in the Safeway pronto and rent it because it rocks. Watching it got me thinking, if I could go back in a hot tub time machine who would go with me? It’s a hard question because you can only fit so many people in a hot tub so you’d want to choose wisely. My friend Nancy was a no brainer because I’ve known her since I was five and we met John Cusack (star of Hot Tub Time Machine) together.
My friend from middle school, Anne, would have to come, too, because she grew up to be this super smart, responsible, do-gooder who I totally love but when I met her she was a roller skating rink loving, hair feathering, making out with Bob Ekstrand on the back of the bus to Kings Dominion and then smoking in the sky lift rebel and seeing that version of Anne again would give me a huge laugh.
From high school I’d bring my friend Aileen because even though we’ve only seen each other maybe twice in the last twenty years, when I text her she’s still the same teen movie quoting, snarky comment making, ready to laugh at anyone ball of fun she was in the 80’s. Plus I would love the chance to engage in crazy hijinks and have her earnestly tell me to “Blame it on Rio” even though I’ve still never been to Rio.
And finally, I’d need my friend Fissy, who I saw the movie with in the theater, there. Fissy and I weren’t friends till the very end of the 80’s but we made up for lost time by spending a year wearing matching outfits and tooling around in my convertible. When I hear Fergie sing “sippin', reminiscing on days when I had a Mustang” I think of me and Fissy and I get all giddy. When Fissy moved to California, it was like the day the music died. Some people from Bowie have actually asked me in rather accusatory tones “how did you let her go?” People from Bowie sometimes have a hard time letting go of the past. Trust me, I was born there. Oh, and she came back so get over it guys.
So I’ve put together my passenger list and now I’m just waiting for Chevy Chase to show up with my can of Chernobly. But if my hot tub time machine never shows up, and sadly I think the chances are pretty slim, it’s still pretty fantastic to have so many classic, recurring characters in my life. Without them I might forget who I was before “Mac and Charlie’s mom”, and that would be a shame because if continuity is correct, I was always pretty awesome.
Over the weekend my baby Charlie stepped on a bee and got stung. The first thing I thought was “crap – I hope he’s not allergic”. The second thing I thought was “well, at least it’s only one sting” because as a child my brothers and our friends the Ratti girls and I stepped on a nest of ground bees in the woods and were chased by a swarm into the south river. I haven’t seen the Ratti girls in decades. But when I posted something about Charlie’s sting on facebook, I almost immediately got a message from Jacqueline saying “remember that time we stepped on the bee’s nest and got chased”. And knowing someone else shared that memory with me made it more real. It made a childhood that seems so far away seem closer. And it made even kind of a bad memory, a good one because it was shared and everything is better when you share it.
Saturday night Bobby and I watched Hot Tub Time Machine again. If you haven’t seen it, get yourself to that red box in the Safeway pronto and rent it because it rocks. Watching it got me thinking, if I could go back in a hot tub time machine who would go with me? It’s a hard question because you can only fit so many people in a hot tub so you’d want to choose wisely. My friend Nancy was a no brainer because I’ve known her since I was five and we met John Cusack (star of Hot Tub Time Machine) together.
My friend from middle school, Anne, would have to come, too, because she grew up to be this super smart, responsible, do-gooder who I totally love but when I met her she was a roller skating rink loving, hair feathering, making out with Bob Ekstrand on the back of the bus to Kings Dominion and then smoking in the sky lift rebel and seeing that version of Anne again would give me a huge laugh.
From high school I’d bring my friend Aileen because even though we’ve only seen each other maybe twice in the last twenty years, when I text her she’s still the same teen movie quoting, snarky comment making, ready to laugh at anyone ball of fun she was in the 80’s. Plus I would love the chance to engage in crazy hijinks and have her earnestly tell me to “Blame it on Rio” even though I’ve still never been to Rio.
And finally, I’d need my friend Fissy, who I saw the movie with in the theater, there. Fissy and I weren’t friends till the very end of the 80’s but we made up for lost time by spending a year wearing matching outfits and tooling around in my convertible. When I hear Fergie sing “sippin', reminiscing on days when I had a Mustang” I think of me and Fissy and I get all giddy. When Fissy moved to California, it was like the day the music died. Some people from Bowie have actually asked me in rather accusatory tones “how did you let her go?” People from Bowie sometimes have a hard time letting go of the past. Trust me, I was born there. Oh, and she came back so get over it guys.
So I’ve put together my passenger list and now I’m just waiting for Chevy Chase to show up with my can of Chernobly. But if my hot tub time machine never shows up, and sadly I think the chances are pretty slim, it’s still pretty fantastic to have so many classic, recurring characters in my life. Without them I might forget who I was before “Mac and Charlie’s mom”, and that would be a shame because if continuity is correct, I was always pretty awesome.
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