Lightningbolt

Why is it that I don't say the "F" word around Rollie, and then all of a sudden, about ten minutes before we arrive at the Methodist church where he will be attending Mommies Morning Out, and where we are meeting his teacher for the first time, he asks me from the backseat:

"Mama? What you fucking doing?"

Okay, i really don't think that this is what he was really saying, but that is what it sounded like, and it is definitely what his teacher would have thought he was saying. Luckily, it was a one-time deal, but needless to say, i was waiting for a lightning bolt to strike me dead sitting in the little kiddie chairs at the parent teacher conference.

Megadeth Jamie

1. James Alexander Malcolm Mackenzie Fraser
Ah, I know you have all been waiting with baited breath for this follow-up to Friday's top five post. . . without further ado, my number one:

I mentioned my love for the Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series in a post about recent enjoyable reads. The series combines so many elements that draw me to a book - history, dose of sci-fi, living close to nature, time-travel, sorrow and loss, joy and love, adventure, violence, pirates, witches and the paranormal, the triumph of good over evil, the most creepy, topsy-turvy villain I've seen in ages, a truly smart/funny/intelligent/self-deprecating heroine, and a fallible, but unbelievable hero, all drawn in so much detail that I feel like I know them all. Gabaldon turns a number of genres and archetypal characters on their ears, surprising me again and again.

I wait impatiently for the next installment in the series, and then when it is released, I devour it in a 24-48 hour reading fest, resulting in a weeks-long withdrawal and depression. I sit around and wonder why I was born in the wrong century, and wishing that I was more in touch with the natural world. What would happen if I could time-travel? I wonder how modern life can be so vastly different from the lives of thousands of years of people before us. Is the world ending? Are we doomed? Did every generation have this feeling, or is this the dawn of an entirely new age for humanity?

I once had a conversation with Todd's friend Adria, wherein we discovered and discussed our mutual admiration for the books and for Jamie Fraser, and she posed the question: Would you leave Todd for Jamie? Luckily, i don't have to answer that, but dear God, what if? It would be tempting. Jamie has all of the qualities that I love in Todd, plus a whole lot more that no modern man could possibly have: Todd probably doesn't even know what a dirk is, much less how to use one to silently kill someone. Yep, there does seem to be a little "knight in shining armor" to my infatuation with Jamie. There's the whole man-in-skirt thing. Intelligence. Height. Loyalty. Red hair? Well, actually, this is about my only red-haired crush ever. Just adds to the uniqueness of the character. I think that there is something to the ruthlessness of him that I like. His loyalty, justice, and strength and his vengefulness and martyrdom. I love his wit, learnedness, and devotion to his wife. Okay, this is totally embarrassing. Must stop now.

Jamie does have an unfair advantage in this whole "Top Five Fictional Crushes" battle. My crush on him is inextricably entwined in my love and adoration of the Outlander series, and the world it creates. I don't just crush on Jamie; I also have a girlcrush on his wife, Claire. I want to BE Claire. I think I am a little Claire, actually. It is hard to explain this one, and there is a pretty interesting article on Salon.com about one man's love affair with the novels and he does a much better job of describing what makes Gabaldon's novels so unique.

To sum it up, people, I have a problem. Evidently, I am not the only one; there are a kajillion fan fiction sites for Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series. There is also much discussion of who would be cast in an Outlander movie, which I personally don't ever want to see come to pass; The whole thing would be turned into some crap t.v. miniseries, with bad acting, and butchering of the complex and convoluted storylines that make the novels so wonderful. There is no way film could do this world justice, so i would rather let it live in my imagination.

That being said, I have thought about who should be cast as Claire, who would be Jamie. In my mind, the forerunner for Claire would be a Julia Ormond type, but preferably an unknown. She would have to be a Brit. The only actor i have ever thought would come close to being a good Jamie would be Damian Lewis, of Band of Brothers fame. He's a Brit, but he convincingly pulled off the American accent for the BOB Winters character. If he can pull that off, I'm sure he could do the Scots accent for Fraser. There is something earnest about his Winters that would translate well to the Jamie character.

Wondering about the possibility of an Outlander t.v. or film project, I turned to the Gabaldon page and came across this gem. This will no doubt be humorous only to Outlander fans, but it is a gallery of photos of actors that readers have suggested to play the Outlander characters. The funny part is that, while some of the suggestions are really good (someone else had suggested Damian Lewis! Other good suggestions: Steven Waddington [had to look this guy up, but he was a British soldier in The Last of the Mohicans,] some of the suggestions are downright ludicrous, including various soap stars, Paul Walker, and Joe Lando. Did these people READ the books? My favorite suggestion by far: Dave "Megadeth" Mustaine. I am not kidding. Someone actually suggested that. If you haven't read the books, i doubt you have made it this far in my post. If you have read the books, you should go change your underwear, because you no doubt just pissed your pants laughing.

This is War!

There is a game, little-known but in parenting circles, of entering a toy store with a particular goal in mind: To seek out and purchase the most annoying toy in creation. My personal best? Probably this purple dancing Boohbah. We purchased it for Jason's daughter Elle, and it is still the topic of much discussion over a year later. Let's just say that we are marked for revenge acts . . . .

Congratulations to second runner up, Camille, for bestowing upon us that charming yellow and black front loader, complete with heavy metal music button and remote control cord that wraps around the front loader when it does donuts, ending in a crescendo of Rollie's crying when it must be extricated from its lifeline by Mama approximately once every five minutes.

Folks, we have a winner! Yesterday, August 27th, 2006, my son Rollie opened up a gift that was so brash, so annoying, so . . . loud, that Todd and I thought we (in our sleep-deprived, slightly hung over state - Thank you, Jason P. and Allison for a lovely evening!) would never make it past the kids' bedtime and into our own beds. Dear God, how can anything be this annoying? First of all, it is a PT Cruiser - I find PT Cruiser owners kind of annoying, and I am not sure why that is, except that I always wonder just what message the owner of a PT Cruiser is trying to send to the public. I mean, what do they think that the car says about them? Anyway, the car just irks me. Add to that the fact that this particular incarnation of the PT Cruiser has buttons on it that make it:

• Flash its lights
• Beep repeatedly in a warning-like sound, as if to say, "Be forewarned, this is going to make your mother start popping the little pills."
• Rev its engine.
• Peel out in a forward direction, complete with screeching tires.
• Proceed at full throttle until it hits something, wherein it repeats the beeping warning signal, before repeating the whole process in reverse, like a terrible, mind-obliterating boomerang.
• When it has been idling for a few seconds, it prompts the child to "Press forward or reverse, NOW!" in what can only be described as a WWF wrestling announcer's voice. It continues to repeat this, over and over, until the child pushes a button (any button, for God's sake! Just push one! Make it stop!) or, if they have become distracted by . . . oh, I don't know, the fucking 500 other beeping, screeching, talking, music-playing remote control toys that said child received for his birthday, then it gives one final warning that it is "Shutting down now! Shutting down now!"

Oh, did I fail to mention that the toy workshop of Satan has also given it a button that when pushed plays LIVING fucking LA VIDA LOCA? People, I can't make this shit up. Location of said PT Cruiser at this moment? Hidden high on a shelf in the coat closet, safe from the little man's eyes. Parenting rule #1: Out of sight, out of mind.

Our deepest congratulations to Harmony and Paul for winning the World Series of Evil Present-Giving. See you in April for Gabe's birthday, bitches. Payback is hell.

His Rollieness

Three years ago today, Rollie, you came into my life. It was 5:30 on a Wednesday afternoon. Looking back, I'm glad I didn't immediately realize that your lack of crying wasn't a good thing. The doctors whisked you off to the nursery to keep an eye on you and everything happened so quickly. Three years later, if you were so near to death, nothing could have kept me calm or kept me from your side. But in those first few hours, I didn't know yet that your being in my life would become my life so fully.

So much has happened in the last year. The transition from two-year old to three-year old is drastic. On your last birthday you were still a baby, and on this one, you are a boy. In the last year, you have started running and playing and jumping like a boy. You have kicking a ball down, and are grasping the pedaling concept. Your play is imaginative and magical. You startle me with the connections you make between seemingly unlike objects - the shadow cast on the wall by a lamp is a Thomas the Tank Engine. To you, a globe is just a ball; so is a scoop of ice cream.

This year, you became a big brother. I am so happy with the way that you have weathered a new sibling. Matilda can be a pest, no matter how much she is bothering you out of adoration, and you usually take it with a sense of humor and with gentleness. Sure, there have been some incidents of you sitting on her until she turned blue, but those have been few and far between.

You bestow us with verbal gifts of love, sprinkled with liberal hugs and kisses. We share Eskimo and butterfly kisses at bedtime. Since Matilda has graced us with her presence, you and Daddy have only strengthened your friendship. My heart swells to bursting sometimes, watching the two of you at bedtime, wrestling and laughing, or watching you attempt to follow in his footsteps. He puts you down to bed more often than not, and I smile to myself as I feed and put Matilda down, listening to your whispers and giggles as you read bedtime stories. Your favorite this year, far and away, is Shel Silverstein's "The Giving Tree." You call it "apple book" and pretend to eat the apples right off the page. Other favorite books include "The Country Mouse and The City Mouse," "The Three Bears," "Sleepytime Bunny," "Green Eggs and Ham," and "Hop on Pop." You pretty much destroyed your copy of "Goodnight Moon," but Matilda received a copy. Sometimes we read that, but more often, I just recite it to you from memory. With a little prompting, you will even finish my sentences for me. We still say goodnight to everything in creation, and you always end it with "doggy and the cat."

Your speech is astounding. You have gone from one and two word phrases to complete, complex, multi-part sentences. You speak with feeling and animation. You grasp meanings. Daily, you wow me with some new word that you have picked up, and it is often something I never even say. Sometimes, it is something i have said. Why is it that "crap" seems so innocuous until it is uttered by a three-year old? Hopefully, you will not say it again until you reach adulthood, but you have even uttered your own version of the F word, echoing my reaction at a particularly harrowing near-miss in the car. Having you in my life is like a constant litmus test for my behavior, a mirror held up to my speech, attitude, and outward self. It scares me to see myself in you so often, and to know that I wield such power to shape you into the person you will be. It seems so elementary, but watching you achieve these things is like watching a flower bloom; it seems so small and it happens every day, in such small steps, but the magnificence of it is there, if I just take the time to watch.

Baby, I am proud of the little boy you are becoming. You have your moments of selfishness, your problems with sharing, your inability to hear reason, but all in all, I am amazed at your thoughtfulness, the way you have learned so much about courtesy and respect. I like to think that your father and I are partially responsible for teaching you these life lessons, but there is a little part of me that knows it is also a huge part of the person you are.

I am awed by your insatiable curiosity about your world, and in a million years, i never imagined one little boy could ask so many questions, and so many relevant questions at that. Sometimes I think that if I have to answer another question, i will start beating my head against a wall and not stop until blood runs out of my ears. Then you will ask a question so smart, or funny that I will bust out laughing, and you will start laughing with me, and I realize that this . . .this . . . is what life is all about. Thank you for teaching me what it is to be a better person, less selfish, and someone who stops to think about and ask the questions that matter.

This morning, as your father and I were getting ready for your party, you climbed up on the couch with Grandma ("Ammaw"). You sat down next to her, and you put your hand on her arm, and you said, "I love you, Grandma." She was bewitched; You could have committed murder on her watch and gotten away with it after that.

But we are all bewitched by you - your joy, and humor, and loving nature. Your Rollieness.

I love you,
Mama

p.s. Now that I've buttered you up a little, are you ready to start pooping on the potty yet?

Colby Proclaims Woman Suffrage

On this date, back in 1920, women were given the right to vote. (You can see the New York Times coverage of the story in 1920 here.) 86 years seems so long ago, and yet it is just a blink of an eye. I feel like I take for granted things like my simple right to cast a vote, or to talk about PMS on Dogwood Girl. Disenfranchisement doesn't seem quite so long ago, though, when i think that my Grandma Smith was only 13. (My Grandma Palmer was only four years old in 1920; like me, she was lucky enough to never know what it was like to be disenfranchised.) I wonder if she remembers anything about it. Did she follow the fight for enfranchisement? Or was she more interested in the boys down the street or fixing her hair? I wonder what her own father thought of women gaining the right to vote. I wonder what my great-grandmothers thought of their newfound rights. Daddy's grandma Butler would have been right around my age. She was about 32 years old in 1920. I wonder if the thought of voting excited or frightened her? What was it like to spend almost half of her life without that basic right? Her father died the year before, in 1919. What would he have thought of women voting? And what did her husband think? Was he supportive, or did she have to stand up to him just to go vote?

Just another of a million questions I wish I had thought to ask the women that came before me. What a huge debt I owe to them and to the Suffragists of the early 1900's. If you know someone who actually remembers women's enfranchisement, i would love to hear their their story.

Yes. I am like, TOTALLY thirteen.

So, Todd has been watching Digging for the Truth on History Channel. I, on the other hand, am watching its host, Josh Bernstein (a.k.a. The Jewish Indy,) the real-life embodiment of my fictional crush, Indiana Jones. Which got me to thinking about my fictional crushes. Come on, you know you have them, too. They're fun, highly unlikely to come to fruition, and not off-limits to the married. Just for kicks, I will now reveal to you the frighteningly dark reaches of my mind. I present to you my top five fictional crushes*:

5. Han Solo
Han Solo appeals to the teenager in me wanting to piss off Daddy. What better way than to hop into the Millenium Falcon with a dashing, leather-clad, good-looking renegade smuggler with a scathing wit, whose best friend is a long-haired . . er. . . Wookie. Added plus: Keeps well on ice.

4. Bruce Wayne
A.k.a. Batman. I have always liked the darkness and sadness of the Batman character, but dear God, when Christian Bale (star of my Top Five Celebrity Fucks list) was cast as Bruce for the Batman Begins, well, the crush was set in stone. Doesn't hurt that Wayne is on Forbes Fictional Fifteen list.

3. Atticus Finch
Okay, this one is a little weird, I agree, but seems that even AFI voted Finch number one hero in it's list of Top 100 Heroes and Villians of film. Maybe I am not alone. My crush has little to nothing to do with Gregory Peck as Atticus in the movie, although he was the embodiment of the literary Atticus Finch. It is more the all-knowing father figure portrayed in my favorite novel (To Kill a Mockingbird, you dumbass), a man that I can really respect. Respect = love for me? I think so. Appeals to my extreme desire to see justice served, to be honest and truthful in all things. Atticus was on my initial list of name ideas for Rollie. Side note: Seems that Superman's favorite book is also To Kill a Mockingbird. Hmm. . . I sense a theme coming together here.

2. Indiana Jones
Um, wears leather, bullwhip, self-deprecating and nerdy, loves old shit and travel, hates snakes. Need I say more?

1. James Alexander Malcolm Mackenzie Fraser
Ah, Jamie. You have no fucking clue who this is, do you? At least, not unless you know my reading habits fairly well, or unless you share my love for a particular series of novels. Guess you'll have to wait till tomorrow. Gotta keep the reader hanging, eh?

Yes. I am totally 13.
*All crushes subject to change at any time on the whim of the author.

A couple of things . . .

First of all, has anyone else noticed that one of the little musical interludes on Noggin sounds scarily like the Six Feet Under theme? (I know that this is not that likely, as the audience overlap is probably slim to none. You can hear the SFU theme here.)

Secondly, Oh. My. God. I have been sitting around feeling guilty and inadequate, ever since having baby number two and realizing that I will never be able to keep up with music in the manner to which I have become accustomed. Then, today, like a bolt of lightning, I realize that there exists an ultimate purpose for RSS feeds. Drop that baby right over from Pitchfork into my reader. Fuck yeah! I might not have time to listen to any of this shit, but I sure as hell can read about it.

I'm all riled up again

I have been feeling guilty about not updating Dogwood Girl regularly this month. I have been busy, sick, out of town, blahblahblah. Or maybe it is just that i haven't been really, really angry in a while. It seems that anger is what usually compels me to blog, and boy did I ever this morning on Atlanta Metblogs.

It is kind of scary, though: As soon as I clicked Save, I became nervous. Sure, I wrote what i believe, and I am not ashamed of it, but I am really curious to see if my words anger a lot of people. I mean, is a writer in Atlanta allowed to call Andrew Young a bigot? What about telling the Lt. Gov. that he needs to grow a pair. We'll see . . . .

One thing I do know - I will not be issuing any apologies.

Creekers: The Next Generation

Wow. I have not posted in a while, and i feel guilty. Just what I need in my life: More guilt. I am off to the Lake until Friday, but here is a little something to tie you over and to assuage my guilt, at least somewhat.

On Saturday, Todd, the kids, and I went to a cookout with friends from my old neighborhood. Most of us have kids now, and it was, well . . . kind of strange. We have hung out before with the children, but most of the babies are now little kids. At one point, I went to check on the older kids playing upstairs in Jake's (son of hosts Dan and Wendy) room. I walked in to find my 5th grade "boyfriend's" (his older sister actually asked for him if I would "go" with him) son playing a video game on the t.v., just like his father and aunt and I had played Warlords and Pitfall on Atari in 1982. Rollie was climbing the ladder to the second bunk with a couple trucks under his arm. Jake and Elliott (another son of the ex) yelled at me to "get out! No adults." And the little girls in the group, Elle and Charla, were fighting over some kind of wagon.

It made me feel a little old, but oddly comforted to see my son playing with the children of my old friends. The funny part is that when we are together, the friends seem just as young as they ever did. I am always reminded of the Designing Women where former beauty queen Suzanne is voted "most changed" (she has put on a few pounds) at her high school reunion and she gracefully puts them all in their places by telling them that even under they beer bellies and bald heads and double chins, she still sees the boys who tried to kiss her on the porch and the girls she passed notes with in English. (I am paraphrasing a bit there; I don't actually memorize dialogue from the show.)

Anyway, here's to old friends, and to the new generation. God help us all in about ten years. . . .
(Side note: Not all attendees are Creekers or descendents of Creekers, but are considered, "Honorary Creekers.")

p.s. Big congratulations to Owen on his selection as a 2006 Recipient of an International Teacher Position in the Galapagos Islands, from Toyota USA and The Institute of International Education. Very cool.

Wendy, the fearless hostess


















The next generation. (From left, Elliott, Julianne, Jake, Andrew [on back of couch], Ian, Noah, Elle, Rollie, and Matilda.)












Let's try this again. (Elliott, Jake, Charla, Ian, Noah, Andrew, Elle, Rollie, and Matilda.)











One more time. (Elliott, Julianne, Charla, Ian, Noah, Andrew, Elle, Rollie, and Matilda.)










Matilda, Lady Liberty.


















Jason and Camille.
















Elle and Jason














Rebekah and Dan


















Jason and Andrew
















Scott, Andrew, and Megan














Elle and Rollie hug it out


















Class Inseparables: Owen and Jason.

Why?

Why is it that the following happens the morning after I drank a bottle of wine and stayed up until midnight?

• I have a sleepless night after the alcohol dies on me (to quote my batty late Aunt Dot).
• I get an upset stomach at 5:30 a.m., can't fall back asleep, but make a vain attempt anyway.
• Matilda wakes up her usual cheerful self, but then it becomes apparent that she isn't quite her self today. She whines for the whole morning until naptime.
• I put Matilda down for a nap (which only lasts 40 minutes) and meanwhile, Rollie has decided he wants to fly without a net (wear undies only) today. I haven't been able to coax him to do the underwear in days, but then he decides he wants to on the day that I least want to clean up poop.
• At about this point, upset tummy starts to go away, so I lay down on couch while Tiller finishes nap. I wake to Rollie spitting his water out on me. At this point, we are on about the fifth timeout of the morning.
• Tiller wakes up, screaming bloody murder.
• We come down, feed her, then put her down on the floor where she usually keeps herself occupied for a good 30 minutes to an hour. Not today. She sits and cries and screams. I figure she is either sick or teething, so I feel her. No fever. No other signs of sickness. I give her a cold teething ring. She continues to cry for the next 30 minutes while I make lunch.
• I feed both kids, and she cries the entire time.
• I finally sit down to eat lunch, and then Rollie says, "poop," and attempts to get to the bathroom in time but doesn't make it. I put my lunch on the counter and go to check out the damage and he has his underwear off one leg, with one foot planted in the poop. There are other poop piles trailing to him from his mad dash. He then decides he still needs to go, so climbs up on the toilet and smears poop all over it as he does so.
• He flushes toilet and hose inside toilet breaks and i have water spewing out of the back of the toilet, all over the wall, the baseboard, the floor, and the toilet itself.
  
• I clean up poop from floor and toilet, then put a diaper back on Rollie, and clean him up.
• I clean up water around toilet.
  
• I wash my hands, then go back to my lunch in the kitchen to find the fucking cat eating my tuna sandwich. (For those of you who know my cats, i bet you can guess which one it was. The little fucker. The little pork chop carryin' fucker.)

Anyway, the kids are napping now, and I am just waiting for the next wave.

Oh, great. Dinner is burning. Gotta run.

BUI - Bloggin' Under the Influence

Is there a better scene in recent film than the "Russel gets on the bus after tripping acid and everyone sings 'Tiny Dancer'"scene in Almost Famous? Makes you feel real good after a crappy day of terrorism. And a bottle of wine.

I guess I should get used to this workout of the subconscious

I have always had really vivid dreams, and i tend to remember them well after having them. The most memorable and strange ones are usually the ones i have when the world around me is in uproar. I guess my subconscious is trying to work out the problems of the world in my head at night.

My first recollection of my wild dreams were the week after the Challenger explosion. I was in 8th grade and we were home for a snow day. I remember my sister walking in the bathroom and telling me that the Challenger had exploded and I remember how unfathomable it was. For many people my age, i think that was the first realization that humans, and technology, and the United States as a superpower were not untouchable. More personally, I think it dawned on me that adults were just people, like kids are just people. I thought to myself, "wow, adults can miscalculate, and people get blown to smithereens while their families look on." It was my first realization that I wasn't bulletproof, that really fucked up things happen, and there is not a damn thing one can do about it except stand and stare, jaw dropped open, and thanking the heavens that there but for the Grace of God go I. Okay, I didn't use the work "fuck" yet in 8th grade, but i definitely sensed that meaning of the word before I knew the word itself.

In the week after the Challenger tragedy, I had five nights in a row of the same nightmare. Mrs. Sparrow's science class was being held in my front yard. We were sitting around in a circle and it was a beautiful, sunny cloudless day. The sun glinted off the silver of ever-increasing numbers of airplanes that were circling overhead. The circle became tighter and tighter, an eddy of airliners, the sky became grey and the wind stirred the leaves in the trees as if a storm was coming up, the leaves turning their undersides for the world to see. A black hole opened up in the center of the sky over our heads and the planes were increasingly sucked towards the drain it created, and then the whirlpool began sending them into the hole, and we all watched in horror and silence until the last plane was gone. The hole closed up on itself and the silence was broken by the sound of a large metal door clanging shut. And then I wake. Five nights in a row, I woke up in a sweat, frightened and breathless, and no longer a child.

I often think of that feeling of helplessness, in the face of something unimaginable taking place in front of one's eyes, as what it might be like to have been present in New York for 9/11. Mostly, I try not to think about it at all. Lately, though, with the Middle East in turmoil, i think of those other events, of the horror and the feeling of helplessness, and the sense that things are uncontrollable and rolling towards certain destruction. I sense the same thing these days. And so I dream.

This morning, I awoke to Rollie climbing in bed with us, and realized that it was real and not the dream i had been having, where I frantically tried to find cover for him, Todd, matilda, and myself. In my dream, we were at Lenox Mall, in the parking deck where i usually park, the one on Lenox road, nearest the elevators, where they put the Pink Pig at Christmas. It was some kind of shelter, as if we were under attack, in the same way people must be in shelters in Israel and Lebanon right now. We were in our car (okay, we drive a van) and a man with a bullhorn was walking around giving directions about where to go and what to do. He was sarcastic in the face of danger, and I think he may have been David Spade. A woman in another car was telling me that she knew tons of people in the military, and they never miss their mark, and they never do things that aren't necessary. Dream me was doubtful. David Spade started yelling on the bullhorn at a blonde, outrageously-dressed woman who was singing near the entrance to a stairwell and when she turned around, he said, "Pink! Get outta there! They are sending one right in here in minutes!" Pink took off running and her thighs were impressive and shapely in her miniskirt.

People became panicky, and cars were trapped in traffic and people started leaving their cars and then i realized that Rollie wasn't in the car at all, that he was still with the rest of the kids in the nursery, and that they had gone to see the puppet show upstairs. I left Matilda with Todd and raced to find them. The children and their caretakers had heard of the incoming attack also and the children were being shuffled downstairs to the basment of the parking deck, down the very stairwell by which Pink was singing, the one that was going to take an impending hit. I raced down and found Rollie. I grabbed his hand and dragged him, scared and crying, to meet Todd and Matilda in the basement. People were coming towards us in a rush, like a river that we must swim against, and then I saw Todd under a dingy light bulb, and he was naked, and trying to wrap a dirty, wet rug around his waist to cover himself. He and Matilda had to desert the car and so he had her in the stroller, but as he used his hands to wrap the rug around himself, the throng of people carried her stroller along with them. I managed to grab the handle, as Todd's eyes met mine, and I still held rollie's hand, but when I woke up, i was losing my grip on both.

P.s. Mom. I'm fine. Promise.

Or Maybe

I was just a little pre-menstrual. . . .

What the Middle East and I Need, or The Solution According to Rollie

I have been kind of down the last couple of days. I do get depressed sometimes, but have realized that my depression is usually situational, not chemical, although I do tend to get it a little worse around that time of the month. Most often, though, when I am depressed it seems to be the result of stress of some sort, or something sad happening in my life. The other thing that seems to effect me is boredom and monotony. I have had a little of that the last few weeks, too. The hot weather and our attempts to curb family spending have left me with a decidedly "rainy summer day, age eight" feeling. You know the one. The one where it is raining and you are bored (so much so that you have already built a fort out of chairs, tables, and blankets) and your mom keeps suggesting activities and NONE.OF.THEM.SOUND.AT.ALL.FUN. In fact, the only thing that would make you feel better is to be in someone else's skin, and so you actually wiggle around and flail and try to get out of your skin, and it only results in you feeling worse and more trapped.

So, part of my depression is the boredom I am feeling right now, and part of it is the stress of keeping a house clean, day after day, while trying to sell said house, but then nobody ever comes until the one day when you DO leave it in disarray. So, I have been depressed and thought it might be the usual. As I usually do, when i feel a little down, I made it to the gym. Seems like sweating always puts things into perspective somehow - I guess it just makes me feel better being present in my own skin (and maybe a little endorphin boost is responsible, too). Oddly, though, today I ran a mile and was still just . . . blue. I actually felt, while running, that I could cry. Usually by the time i make it to a mile, I am already feeling better and thinking about how much farther i want to run. Today, though, I just realized that i needed to get the kids home to meet Todd for lunch, and I quit at a mile. (Okay, there was some chatting about the depression with Vanessa, which took a good fifteen minutes up before i ever started running. I can't blame it all on the depression. I'll blame Vanessa and the kids, too for taking so long that I didn't have time to run.)

So, i was still feeling down, and then i was talking to my friend Harmony (yes, I was late as fuck for lunch), and she said that she was kind of down after hearing the news this morning and I realized that is the source of the blues. More than anything, I am depressed because no matter how good or bad my life is, it is still better at its worst than all the SHIT that is going on in the world today. Hell, I'm not depressed, so much as I am world weary.

Too bad that Rollie doesn't run things. He was reading after his nap, and opened up to a torn page, and said:

"Mama, it's broken. Rollie broke it."
[He looks thoughtful and then something dawns on him.]
"Let's get some new ba-err-ies [batteries] to fix it."

Ah, if only things were that easy. If only everything that was broken could be fixed with new batteries, the way that Rollie thinks they can.

Little Miss Serious

This is our little miss serious. She does smile, but it isn't quite as frequent as Rollie. It seems that she wants to check everything out first, before she gives it her okay. She's not a pessimist, just a realist! Much like her mother.

Playgroup Goes to the Zoo

Matilda, Rollie and I invited our friends Camille and Tara and their kids to the zoo yesterday. It was hot as Hades, but pregnant Tara was a trooper, and it really wore the kids out. (Always a good thing.)

Tiller and Julianne, keeping cool in the shade

Charla and Rollie in the gorilla house

Chase looks on the Willie B statue with suspicion

Charla says, "I wouldn't take the picture if i were you."
Charla and Rollie with Willie B statue

This pretty much sums up what everyone looks like when they get hungry

Long Live the Streak!

The last year or so, I have been lamenting the fact that nothing I have read or listened to has really lit a fire under me. I have to say that still holds true for the listening part - I am not sure if it is because I don't have the free time for true listening immersion that I once had, or if it is that my persepective has changed so radically after having children. (I actually like it when REM does "Shiny Happy Monsters" or Goo Goo Dolls do "Pride" on Sesame Street; I even think the beginning of the Go, Diego, Go song "Rescue Pack" sounds like the beginning of Janes Addiction's Had a Dad. I am sure you see how this is problematic?) Or maybe the music is just totally sucking. It seems that I used to have a love affair with a book or CD every month or so. To be fair, I must say that I am liking Band of Horses and Kings of Leon a lot right now. But am I in love with them? Not really. Anyway, if anyone has been blown away by something they listened to lately, for God's sake, drop me a line and let me know what the fuck it was.

Then, suddenly, I read Ecology of a Cracker Childhood. Magic! I had not been so excited over a book in years. (Well, excepting the Diana Gabaldon Outlander series, which is more of a crack-like addiction than something that sings in my soul. Okay, actually, that is not a fair comparison, but i will have to blog about Outlander some other day. Suffice to say, Gabaldon herself says that the best Outlander description she has read was by Salon.com:

"The smartest historical sci-fi adventure-romance story ever written by a science Ph.D. with a background in scripting 'Scrooge McDuck' comics."

Well said. Check them out. Fun reads.

Whoa. Tangent. Okay, as I was saying, Ecology of a Cracker Childhood excited me in a way no book had in years! I even blogged about it here. My sister and husband were not quite as thrilled with it as I was, but their tastes simply aren't as refined as mine. Todd and I often share books with one another, because while we both have our own interests (I like redemption, he likes the dregs of society stories), there is a common ground where those interests overlap. Todd picked up a used copy of Ferrol Sams' Run with the Horsemen at our local independent bookstore, Bound to Be Read. After he finished it, he mentioned that I might like it. I opened it, and a streak was born!

Run with the Horsemen was like reading Mark Twain for the first time. The protagonist, Porter Osborne, Jr. is as puckish as Huck and as smart as Holden Caulfield. Did I mention that he is laugh-out-loud funny? I may be in love with a fictional character. (Wouldn't be the first time.) Porter struggles with adolescence, and education, race, and the realization that his parents might not be as perfect as he thought they were. And it all takes place in 1930s Depression-era Georgia, so it is close to my heart. Todd and I both couldn't believe that we had never heard of it before, and wondered why it was never taught in literature classes. (This would have to take place at the college level, though, because Porter is quite preoccupied with breasts, wet dreams, and penis size.) For the second time in months, I was sad to see a book end.

Then, when I visited my friends James and Dana (a voracious reader herself), I looked up at their bookshelf to see Run with the Horsemen, and come to find out that they also love Ferrol Sams' Porter trilogy. Trilogy? Trilogy!? Praise the Lord! There are more of them! We have purchased the second book, The Whisper of the River, and if it is half as good as the first, I will write about it here, I am sure

I picked up The Secret Life of Bees, with not a lot of hope for a repeat of the pleaurable reading experienced during Run with the Horsemen, but I was wrong. Sue Monk Kidd's novel is smart, beautifully written and echoes with the emptiness an absent mother could leave in a daughter. It deals with being Southern, and with race, but also with the universal theme of love and finding it in the most unexpected places. Kind of like the way that the riches of a good read are found in the most unexpected places. Long live the streak!