Celebrating, With or Without You

My dad, my giant personality in a giant body Dad, should be celebrating his 80th birthday today, but he's not. We will celebrate, we will raise a glass (and if it was warmer Jack would smoke a cigar but it's freezing outside and that stinky thing is an outdoor activity), and I will tell my girls stories about their grandfather, ones they have most certainly heard but ones that give me comfort and make me laugh and allow me to feel, just for a bit, that he is a part of their lives in a way that is not just stories but real day to day grandfather stuff.

Several nights ago my sister and I went back and forth via text, hashing out dates and years and time frames that all led to the demise of Bill and Sharie's once promising life together. Ashley was 8 (I think), I was 16. Maybe, I know I could drive because all I wanted to do when they told us was leave and go to a friends' house, which they did not allow. I actually thought they were kidding, several of their good friends had recently made the same announcement; I thought it was a Keeping Up with the Neighbors kind of joke. It was not. I realized that the specifics, now over thirty years later, didn't really matter at all. Our lives were changed forever, the ripple effect of their decision still in play today.

Dad moved to an apartment just a few minutes walk from our house. In no time he had married his secretary but just stop right there. Dad's secretary was 10 years his senior, not smoking hot, and a bit bossy, in a matronly kind of unpleasant way. She vehemently disliked both my sister and me; her first direction as the new Mrs. Lang was to change the locks on the apartment that was now theirs. Interesting way to cozy up to the stepchildren, she continued on this charming path for most of their 19 year marriage. When Dad died I think she was genuinely surprised at our grief, and it was clear to me, that even after 19 years, she had no capacity to understand just how much Ashley and I loved our Dad. I felt a tiny bit bad for her. Tiny bit.

The stepmother died a few years ago. I had remained in contact with her as she had been very interested in my children and had, uncharacteristically, been very kind to them, always remembering them at birthdays and Christmas. She said once she was doing what Dad would have wanted and I appreciated that effort, even though I knew that there was little anyone could do to represent what my father might have meant to my children.

Mom and Dad worked hard to maintain a very friendly relationship. My sister, still very young, benefited greatly from their willingness to work together. It wasn't perfect and while I went off to college, she took the brunt of the saga of the divorced parents. It's never easy but I appreciate so much that they tried. They had been friends since high school, and they continued, in a new and unique way, to be friends until Dad died.

Yesterday, on the phone with Mom covering the Mother's Day things, she was quiet for a minute and then said, "your father would be 80 years old tomorrow". The quiet was now on my end. Mom just turned 79, she was a year behind him at Hillcrest High.

"I know Mom, I know."
"Your dad would have done 80 so well."

Sitting at the island in our kitchen, the same island that came from Mom's house, on the phone with my mother while one daughter bakes a Mother's Day cake and the other sets the table for the dinner, I imagine what life might look like if there were two more places set at that table, if our downstairs guest room was full of grandparents and love and laughter.

"I always loved your dad Allyson, I always did."

I know that too Mom. 
Happy birthday Dad, we all miss you so very much.

One is the Loneliest Number

Here we have a picture of my mother, taken by my sister from outside the front door, the required 10 feet away. Mom is quarantined with about 500 old(er) ladies and perhaps 3 senior gentlemen in a retirement home in Kansas City. No visitors, no leaving, temperature checks for all employees entering, no seniors wandering the neighborhood; Sharie is locked down, save the occasional whiskey and brie delivery from her daughter. While not ideal it could be much worse and if this is what is required to keep the old folks healthy then that is what we do; Mom is perfectly happy doing Sudoku and watching reruns of golf tournaments.

For those of you who continue to insist that this is a media driven frenzy may I suggest that you turn off the telly and read a book. In this 24 hour news cycle in which we live it can be too much, and Breaking News is rarely that. Stay informed, don't go batty.

To those who somehow still believe that this is a hoax or a Democratic ploy to win the upcoming election I say "My God, how bad do you think he is?" So bad that thousands of people world wide were willing to sacrifice their life to rid the US of this orange boil? Granted, more than once I have yelled, while watching a speech or a presser or a Rose Garden chat, "He is killing me!" or "I'm dying!" but to be completely honest, I didn't mean I was actually dying. And while I am certain that I am not alone in my over reaction, I hardly think that people in Spain took this literally and were willing to jump on the sword to save the US from the nincompoop quasi leading us into oblivion.

To those upset that the Democratic nominee is almost certain to be Joe Biden (and I am right now speaking to my 15 year old Bernie loving teenagers) just stop. He may not be your first choice, perhaps you think he'd make a better fourth for poker at Sharie's retirement home, but life isn't fair (see Election 2016 results for verification on this) and right now Joe is our way out of this incoherent rambling hate driven failed experiment. I'm not saying that choosing a bankrupt ridden reality television personality was, in and of itself, a terrible idea. Perhaps you really like the idea of hiring people supremely not qualified for the job and to that I say, excellent, have your teeth cleaned next go round by the teenager handing you your burger at the McDonald's drive up window, but this, this didn't go so well.

Let's bring back experience and character. Have you seen Joe's bench? We are going to be fine.

Share the toilet tissue, stay home, help those who need it, do what you can. Treat people with respect and kindness. The best way to beat this is together, and name calling is a very lonely game.

Sorry Mom, but cute picture. Stay safe Sharpie. Stay safe everyone.

The Other Side? Hate, Anger, Contempt, Disdain, Hostility, Deceit

"Take each other's side", she said.

My mother, who generally abstained from political discussion, was suggesting, as she browned hamburger or drained pasta, that we do what?

"Stop arguing your own side and argue the other. It will help, especially if you want to go to law school". Did I want to go to law school?

My mother voted for George Bush because he was handsome. She grew up in Texas,  home to a preponderance of Republicans, and the best reasoning she could dream up in voting for George Bush was his boyish good looks. Politics were not, and have never been, of any interest to her but the woman can argue with a calendar as to what day it is.

My father, a Texas Aggie republican, and his daughter, a burgeoning democrat, were momentarily silenced from the conversation that had been going on for years.

Note both practical conservative and liberal crunchy footwear.

Dad drew me in to politics, bringing home his love of history and debate to dinner every night, at no time more heartily than the summer of 1980, when Jimmy Carter was poised to lose the White House to Ronald Reagan. Reagan was everything Dad wanted him to be, I felt tragically sorry for Carter and all the tragedies of his administration, and John Anderson was an interesting, albeit idealistic, option. My father spent hours explaining to me the insanity of an Anderson vote (twelve years later he quietly cast his vote for Ross Perot unable to take any more of the Bush years). That summer I had knee surgery and spent a week in the hospital, the same week as the Republican National Convention. I remember quite clearly the nurse apologizing when she realized that then, in the days of only three network stations, the only thing to watch on my hospital television, was the convention. My week of bed rest was spent arming myself political ammunition.

Weeks later Sharie shut us both down with this simple idea, "take the other side".

For all the madness that is my mother this idea, her own nod to Atticus Finch, has served me well, not only in political debate, but in the day to day interactions of an adult, a mother, a wife.

And so, in this election, I have tried very hard to argue the other side. I have read countless articles written by people in support of Donald Trump, or in support of those things he propounds to believe. In years past this approach has worked, and ultimately, while I may have not agreed ideologically with candidates, I could find a level of respect for them and their beliefs. Not so this year.

In fact I am challenged to find one piece of good in either the candidate or campaign. Beyond that, I am horrified as I watch the unearthing of hate and anger which, it seems, has been lying dormant for years in a country that extols acceptance and equality as it's virtues. The ongoing rebuttal of fact, the creation of new rules and the lowered standard of behavior is simply mind boggling. No matter how many times I try to argue the other side I find there is simply nothing there to argue. I am at a complete loss as to the dismissal of intelligent thought when faced with this childlike and temperamental behavior. This alone would, and should, disqualify a candidate. It seems in 2016 his lack of moral compass and ongoing disregard for standards of civil conduct seem to only propel him further along. People finding their voice in this candidate scare me far more than the candidate himself.

I question the intelligence and temperament of anyone willing to vote for a man so completely unqualified and unprepared for this job, and I do not understand those that chose to not vote out of disgust for both options. You may not like or agree with one, but you must exercise your precious right to vote. Maintain your politics at the state and legislative level but don't forgo your chance to keep this republican out of the White House.

Dear Mom, I have tried, really I have to argue the other side. The truth is I can't see the policy for the hyperbole. I can't find the truth for the misrepresentation of politics and process. I can't find the good for the abhorrent and repulsive behavior. I have tried.

In my heart I know my dad, the lifetime republican, would do the right thing. Never a democrat but decent and kind and passionately tied to education and truth my father would vote to keep this man and his contempt for women, minorities, and the disabled out of the White House.

Take this opportunity to do the right thing.

Jimmy Carter in the Pantry, Now on the Stage

When you opened the pantry you saw this, green Carter stickers covering every single jar, or so it seemed to my ten year old eyes. For those few months leading up to the 1976 presidential election my family owned more peanut based products than Lillian Carter.

My father was a Republican, a rooting tooting flag waving Texas educated Republican. The candidacy of Jimmy Carter was the greatest gift ever bestowed upon my politically minded and quick witted father; he had dinner party material for years thanks to the peanut farmer from Georgia. He also had peanuts, tons and tons of peanuts.

The son of one of Dad's best friends, a Texan, was a Jimmy Carter loyalist. The boxes began to appear not long after Dad returned from a Houston trip: peanut butter, peanut brittle, spicy Texas peanut barbecue sauce, roasted peanuts, salted peanuts, raw peanuts. There was peanut oil, peanut flavored cereals and peanut butter cookies. And every single one of them was wrapped in a bright green Jimmy Carter bumper sticker.

Disgusted, Dad wanted to toss the peanuts. Not so said Sharie, don't be wasteful, we'll eat it all. And so she set about, cooking skills generally limited to the browning of hamburger, to add a pop of peanut to every thing she created. For months we suffered through a myriad of dinners: goulash, spaghetti, stroganoff, all rooted in hamburger and with a dash of peanut butter. What was once a baseball game treat, roasted peanuts now appeared in every school lunch. My teeth suffered the joy of peanut brittle months before Christmas.  Early impressions of President Carter, because we were still eating peanuts long after inauguration day, were a bit peanut shaped.

Dad mellowed in his resistance, Sharie continued to thaw hamburger and I learned about inflation, energy, hostages and the Panama Canal.  By the time he left office, after four long years and a general creaming by Ronald Reagan, we were out of peanuts. History tells us it was not the most successful presidency, bested by the likes of scandalous Warren Harding and impeached Andrew Johnson. His work as a former President has been far more effective and respected, almost all of which my peanut loving father has missed.

President and Mrs. Carter are speaking Monday in Grand Rapids. We will be there with the girls who will know much more about the former president than I did at their age, but with far less peanut flavor.

Our Little Girl is All Grown Up

It happened on a Saturday. Months in planning: meeting with attorneys and bankers, signing leases and changing addresses, arranging for movers and painters, all leading up to the actual day that my mother moved out of her house, but it wasn't until Saturday, after the movers had come and gone, that it hit me.

"You mean that I am now expected to sleep here?", looking around the living room of her new apartment, as confused as I suppose she might have looked on the day I was born.

As did I, because in that moment I realized that I was no longer the child; never again would I ride in the backseat with my parents in front, directing my life while I sat helplessly staring out the window.

I was homesick. Not for the house from which we had just pried my mother, one that was never my home, but for a time when I wasn't making decisions, when it wasn't my responsibility to see that everyone was fed and dressed appropriately.

This really happened years ago when I was vaulted from daughter to decision maker after my father had a life altering car accident. In the emergency room the questions came at me so rapidly that I didn't have time to think, and the only answer was please, please do everything you can. And they did. Our roles changed that day, but it happened so quickly and without warning I didn't really understand.

"It's like I'm the kid again, my mother and grandmother do all the cooking", explained a mom friend, right before Thanksgiving. That idea is now so far away that I cannot imagine what it might feel like to wake up on Thanksgiving day with nothing to do but watch parades and arrive at dinner with only a bottle of wine.

I'm the oldest in every possible way: I direct, I coordinate, I make decisions. I'm happier in charge and feel lost without direction. But every once in a while, just for fun, I'd like someone else to pick the restaurant.

Last week, while reading a book to the second grade about family, one of the boys in class raised his hand, "Are your parents still alive Mrs. Lang? Because if your parents are still alive then you still get to be a kid."

Oh if only that were true.

Helping Hands

Last December, as I tried to explain one more senseless tragedy to my children, I turned to the good Mr. Rogers and encouraged my girls to look for the helpers. They were there, those that run to help in an otherwise terrible situation. They are always there, if you look.

Wallowing in the self pity that comes with a Thanksgiving spent, not full of glorious friends and food, but as a precursor to a weekend full of struggle, I easily forgot that there are helpers in every situation, the kindness is not reserved for catastrophic events. And while moving my mother from a home she has known for over 20 years to a small senior living apartment might not be a worldwide tragedy, for us it was stressful, for her painfully unpleasant. The actual work compounded by her frustration, and, for those of us moving her, the exhaustion, mental and physical, of dealing with logistics, anger and limited time.

There they were, the helpers: the uncles who swooped in and took Mary and Kate away from the madness, who gave them sanity and bowling when the level of crazy elevated to one step beyond tolerable; and the girls, who made every effort to welcome Grandmommy to her new home, bringing nine year old happiness to a bleak situation, along with a tiny Christmas tree for her new apartment. But there was more, plans hatched in another room while the adults debated the proper placement of living room furniture, notes written by Kate, ten altogether, and distributed by Mary into the mailboxes of new neighbors, all without my knowing, but all to the delight of my worn soul.

There they were, helping Mom, helping me; I am very thankful, and blessed that they are mine.What a wonderful Thanksgiving.

That's No Casper

My mother, an imaginative sort who loves to sew, created wildly elaborate Halloween costumes every year of my childhood, nothing was ever simple. One year I asked to be a ghost. A ghost like Charlie Brown was a ghost, a ghost like my best friend Stephanie was going to be; I envied, like mad, the Casper outfit her mother bought at the Katz drugstore. I loved the smiley Casper face, the crispy plastic mask and the 100% polyester sheath that tied in the back, that is what I wanted. My mother heard ghost and dashed off to buy felt, plenty of white felt. She worked for days, sewing like mad, whipping up what I was assured would be the most amazing ghost costume Kansas City had ever seen.

On Halloween morning I dressed for school and my mother brougth forth The Costume. She slipped it over my head, my small eyes peeking out from the two round holes she created in the front. She and my father stepped back, looked at me, and looked at each other. My father said, "she can't go to school like that". My mother threw her head back and laughed, "she's fine, you're so paranoid, really" and trotted off to sew something. I assumed they were discussing how well I could see from beneath my super ghost outfit.

That afternoon my father recieved a call from my school. My little elementary school in Prarie Village, Kansas, quite likely the most homogeneous and lilly white suburb in all of the country, was calling to confirm that I was simply a ghost and there were no racial undertones to my costume as that simply would not be tolerated.

The Costume was a floor length white column with a very tall and pointy top.

The next year we bought a really horrible Queen outfit at the drugstore. I hated the plastic mask, the polyester sheath and the fact that there were 6 other Queens in my class. Mom was back at the machine the following year, thankfully, although I was never again a ghost.

Happy Halloween!

Re-posted from Halloween, 2008

Critical Thought on Mother's Day

My mother has always been harshly critical of other mothers. She focused her judgemental commentary on three women, all with the same name, but had no problem in lashing out at others when she found it appropriate. In retrospect I see that no one was really safe from her critical eye, the mothers of most of my childhood friends having been targeted at one point.

For reasons never completely understood it was my aunt who faced the worst of her blows. The mother of five children, she was constantly blasted by my mother for the choices she made. Clothing, schools, church and travel were all easy targets; the dynamics of family order a favorite topic for my mother who was convinced that there was no possible way to manage five children. That all five children are grown, amazing people with full lives of their own is the best response. My aunt, also the mother of twins, has supported me mightily for the past 7 years. She cheers me on, tells me I am doing a good job, and hugs me when I am tired. She was there on the day the girls were born; she held my hand, changed a diaper and confirmed what I had hoped to be true: my grandmother would have been very proud of me, and my family. Her love and support, not to mention proven track record, makes my days a little brighter.

Mothering is hard. My two children challenge me, enrage me, thrill me, love me and bring me more happiness than I could have ever expected. The choices I make are difficult; I don't always do what's best but I try to do what is best for us. I'm not immune to criticism; I fault other parents for putting their children in danger, for allowing them to run willy nilly through Trader Joe's and for sending them back to school before they have had time to fully recover from whatever kept them home. It is difficult for me to understand why some people fail to take responsibility for their own children, or why they don't see themselves as role models to children who watch everything they do. When it's my job to set the standard and take actions that support our children as part of a greater world, why isn't that the job of every parent? It's easy to criticize and hard to do the job that maintains the standards in which I believe. But I try, I try not to be critical of others, and I hope that most people are doing the best job they can.

Certainly there are mothers who, simply put, are just not good at this. Mothers who harm their children, or put their needs categorically in front of those of their child; mothers who abandon their children or worse, although that is something that I now, as a mother, cannot even discuss. But in the end, I do believe that we are trying our best. It's from other mothers that I draw encouragement, and occasionally reprieve. My girls know to find Tracy at school if I'm not around, that Kari will teach them to do flips in the pool, Lisa will join them for tea, and Sato will spend hours teaching them to jump rope; but for the influence of these people my children's lives would be far less colorful . We may not do everything the same but we all do what we think our best is, and that is not anything I can ever criticize.

Perhaps the very best present anyone can give their mom on Mother's Day is to grow up and be the very best person they can be. As much as I love the buttons and paintings made in art class, I think the very best gift is to see, even now, two happy and well adjusted children who work hard, have fun, treat others kindly and love their family. Happy Mother's Day to those who help, those who encourage, support and enlighten, those who taught me how to be a mother, and the two children who give me reason to celebrate.

Oh Christmas Tree

There were usually five trees: kitchen, family room, dining room, landing and living room. We were allowed to help decorate the tree on the upstairs landing, which was covered in small wooden toys, and the kitchen tree, full of cookery staples and, when time allowed, popcorn strings. The rest fell to my mother, a woman driven by aesthetics with a love of very well appointed holiday homes. There were no colored lights, anywhere, and ornaments were well scrutinized before they landed on a tree. The living room tree was off limits. The large faux pine was brought upstairs each year, lights still strung from the previous Christmas. She took them all off and started again, from the bottom. With each revolution she stepped back, squinted madly and assessed the light to space ration. Lights were wrapped from bottom to top and front to back on the individual branches, a very serious task no 10 year old could master. One year Mitch, our handy about the house helper man, found that she had taken the lights down and so, in trying to help, put them back up. She took them down immediately. The whole process took weeks and in the end we had a very lovely home, fully outfitted for the Christmas holiday. And that is one of the oddities of growing up, you find that not everyone watched from another room while their mother decorated the tree, some children actually helped.

Like my mother I put the lights on the tree, a task I truly dislike. On my knees I work to circle the beautiful tree with small white lights, weaving in and out and then, when I find myself at the wall, I toss the mangled mess of green to a jumping child on the other side who gleefully catches it, and the process begins again. Around and around we go; occasionally I squint, but for no purpose other than to see just how completely out of line the lights have been strung. Historically there are five times more lights on the bottom half of the tree than the top, I tackle the lower branches with gusto, and wear out once I require a step stool. This year, just as I began to stretch high, I ran out of lights, leaving the top in the dark until Jack dug out a spare strand, and so, unlike most years, the top is aglow with lights from every branch.

Several years ago my mother, who does not often part with things in her home, opened all the ornament boxes and let my sister and me take whatever we wanted. Having two daughters she had diligently bought two of almost everything. That afternoon digging through the past was one of the most enjoyable I had ever had with my mother and sister at Christmas. Jack sat on the opposite sofa, horrified at the amount of things I packed to take home to Chicago. He finds a very similar look each year when the tubs appear from the basement.

The huge ornament box is opened and Mary and Kate set to work. There are ornaments from both of my grandmothers and my mother; there are several things I made as a child including a star, cut from wrapping paper, glued on cardboard and trimmed in red yarn, with"Merry Christmas Mimi and Bopaw" scratched on the back in red crayon. There is a red ball with our names and table 20 written on the side, a truly clever table card from a very fun New Year's wedding. There are ornaments received as gifts from former co-workers, party favors, and those with the very familiar mark of Uncle Kenny. There are small brass bells, handed out to guests at our wedding to ring us out of the church almost ten years ago. Every single thing we hang on the tree reminds me of someone, someplace, or something. Decorating the tree is an afternoon spent listening to me blather on about the tiny teeth marks on the small radio flyer wagon, origin not completely known.

The tree serves as a growth chart; wee copies of The Night Before Christmas, brass French horns, and felt covered Santas now reach almost to mid tree, with my help only required to fill in the sparsely decorated top. Branches sag prematurely from the weight of three ornaments on one limb, large heavy snowmen are moved to the bottom so as not to topple the entire thing on a quietly sleeping beagle and Mary and Kate delight in covering their beautiful tree with everything they can find, including, this year, randomly strewn feathers from some craft box recovered from underneath a bed. There are no ornaments anywhere the back of the tree, but finding a free spot on the front is impossible.

This year, two days after the decorating was completed, the lights in the middle of the tree went out. Jack bought a super duper light blaster gun at Target. He tried valiantly to resuscitate the weary strand but it was no use, our mid section was in the dark, leaving us with a reverse Oreo looking holiday arbor. It's a beautiful tree, decorated with care by six year old Christmas enthusiasts, covered with ornaments from those who love them.

A Long Wave Goodbye

For the first time in months the big old tray that carries dinner to the front porch sat unused while the girls set the table in the dining room. Mary was sent to the back deck for rosemary, not basil. And dinner was served in a bowl, potato soup, with nary a tomato in sight. It happens just that fast.

My mother, a morose sort who fancies herself a deep and insightful thinker, has always said of September, yuck. It's death to me, or something along those lines, meaning that she can't see the apple forest for the dead trees. She has been known to throw open the back door on Columbus Day, wave her arms wildly, and scream "you are dead to me". Generally the trees ignore her, as do I. September is crisp and clear and full of apples and sweaters and football. And now, for the first time in years, September is back to school.

Not that I was ready, saying goodbye is not one of my strengths, in fact it falls far onto the fault side. The last day of vacation, the last day of Christmas break, the last blueberry, I'm morose in my own way. And as much as it pains me (and it really does, season changes wreak havoc on old creaky joints now) to wave goodbye to the beach, I jump headfirst into school, once I get past the actual march into the building on the first day. To note, I cried like it was kindergarten, and moped around all day waiting for the madness to come home.

The madness came home a little more tame. Mary, previously unable to sit still for more than 3 minutes, sat in the kitchen and read for almost 2 hours. Kate worked diligently on first day home work, writing sentences from words missed on a Day One spelling test. For the first time they are apart, in two different rooms on two different floors, and, while they were not initially thrilled with the idea, absence does seem to make the heart grow fonder. They will find their way, individually now, although they did insist on dressing identically on the first day, so that "they would know we were twins".

Waving goodbye to the lazy ways of summer is hard, those long and order free days with little to do and no time frame to do it in are difficult to resist. But vacations end, structure is good, and apple pie is better. Sweaters, jackets and backpacks are crowding the beach towels in the front closet, new shoes have replaced the sandals, the linen is ready to be packed away. September is not dead to me, it's a new beginning, a chance to shed the old and work on the new, even if it's in different rooms with different teachers. Let the learning begin!

Smelling Boats and Beds

Jack opened the huge box and I stuck my head in for a peek, but rather than see bunk beds I smelled life jackets. Opening this box was like popping open the cargo space on the front of the boat, the one where we kept ropes and anchors, life preservers and assorted, and rarely used, flotation devices. Mine was multi colored where all the others were orange, and mine was worn all the time, my mother being terrified of water. Why she chose to spend every weekend bobbing around on a boat in a state of panic I still do not understand.


The musty boat smell was the same, and it lingers still, days after the new beds have been assembled and occupied by two very happy five year old sleepers. Opening the door to their room is like stepping onto the boat, the big yellow beast that was my summer home for years. The stretch from the dock was always a bit scary, just longer than my five year old legs could reach, but with a quick push from my dad I was on board, racing away to a weekend of wet lake fun.

Why these beds arrived full of musty boat smell is a mystery, but I'm happy they did. I've been away from that lake for a very long time, the old yellow boat sold years ago. Still, the smells take me back there from time to time: breakfast sausage and cinnamon rolls in a tube, circa 1974 Coppertone, Fritos, dead fish, lighter fluid, damp towels and always the cigar. Landmarks along the way let me know we were getting close, the market in Laurie meant we were minutes from the boat. Windy roads that now would leave me reeling were all that stretched between our car and water, the last 10 minutes by far the longest part of the four hour trip.

Buried somewhere in the family photo archives there is a picture of Mimi and me bobbing along in a huge blow up life boat, me in the multi colored life preserver and pink sunglasses and Mimi with a scarf around her head, cateye sunglasses and a cocktail in her hand dangling over the water. We were tied to a dock, I'm certain, serenaded by Johnny Cash, Simon and Garfunkel, and Neil Diamond. The same sounds that woke me every morning, my father singing "I Walk the Line" as he flipped the sausage patties on the tiny stove.

Our nautical years came to a screeching halt when my grandparents decided
they'd rather spend their summer on the golf course and Dad headed for the mountains; my mother was greatly relieved. Years later, after they divorced, my mother put her sailor suit back on when she married my stepfather, a wonderful man who would have been quite happy living full time at the lake. They built a wonderful cottage with a beautiful view and a deck that hung out over the water. The trip was the same, a different turn at the end to arrive just across from where we used to be, and the smell when you opened the door, much like opening the door to Mary and Kate's room, the intoxicating musty reminder of childhood, living now, for a short time, in my children's room.

The Gate

There were two girls on the other side of the gate who appeared to be about my age. We stood and looked at each other for a few minutes, smiling and waving. My grandmother appeared behind me and suggested that I come back inside, it was time for dinner. Not at all hungry, I wanted to go out and play with these girls. She waved them on but I held firm, I wanted to be on the other side. At five my Spanish was limited to hello, thank you, please, and a few food items. I tried them all, certainly saying something as interesting as "me gusta el taco", the girls giggled, and said something back, which, having no idea what they were saying, made me giggle. Soon enough all three of us were laughing; Mimi went to find the cook.

My grandparents left sometime in mid January. Knowing I wouldn't see them for weeks, I spent the night before they left at their house, helping pack and leaving little notes in their luggage, the black and white patterned Samsonite with the bright orange lining. A week earlier my grandfather had brought them down from the attic so that, even though she took the exact same clothes each year, Mimi could start the packing and organizing required for a month away from home.

Three weeks later Dad and I went to the grocery store for milk, eggs, bacon, bread and these truly sweet sticky buns my grandfather liked, stocking the refrigerator for their return. The next morning we were on a plane, to be greeted in sunshine by my grandfather, relaxed and tan, driving the old orange Volkswagen thing that I thought was the most exciting car ever made. Dad took over and drove us home, Bopaw in the front seat smoking a cigarette and filling us in on what had happened in the year that we had been away. Mom and I rode in the back, my hair flying, her screams muffled by the roar of the open air car as it raced along the malecon.

Mona was still alive, and still horribly unpleasant. She patrolled the beautiful jardin, never beyond the fence for fear that she would bite someone. Only Paulino went in, to feed her, and take care of the flowers. The roosters next door had not made it to a stockpot yet and were still the very early morning wake up call for the entire block. Julia was making pork roast tonight, in honor of Dad's arrival, and papas fritas for me. The Testerman's were coming tomorrow for dinner, Mimi was having a party for their Kansas City friends on Saturday.

We bounced along the cobblestones and up the steep hills in town, Mom alternating between screeching in terror and joy as we passed her favorite shops: cute pink sandals outside Letty's competing for attention with a burro who wandered into our path. When we rounded the corner and stopped at the end of the road I could smell the papas fritas; Mimi's face inside the gate settled it, I was home, at least for a short time.

One week to sleep in the mosquito netting, to bury myself in the sand at El Dorado, to drink fresh squeezed orange juice every morning and to beg my Dad to carry me back up the hill after a post dinner trip down to Bing's for pineapple ice cream. One week to spend with the four people I loved the most in the world, in the place I waited all year to be, Mexico.

And then, at the end, as I knew would happen each year, I said goodbye to my parents and got on a plane with my grandparents for the trip home. Mom and Dad just at the start of their Mexican time, a month of friends and parties and sunburns in front of them, while I was headed to snow and school and heartache, leaving my parents never easy, and my leaving was never easy for Dad. Waking the next morning to the sticky rolls we bought just a week earlier made him closer, even though I knew he was very far away.

Julia came to the gate, talked to the girls for a minute and then turned to Mimi and me. In the end she allowed me outside, but only for a few minutes, long enough to take a picture and let me run to the end of the street and back. At five I had not yet learned that I wasn't supposed to be friends with the people who stood on the other side of the gate.

She Had to Gun It

"I had to gun it."

There it was, the phrase that always makes me put down the paper and focus on what she is actually saying.

Every so often my mother chooses to spend our phone conversation time dissecting the very treacherous traffic situation in Johnson County, Kansas. The most dangerous intersection in all the world is just blocks from her suburban home. Cleverly she avoids it, when possible. And she knows, because she spends an inordinate amount of time considering this, that the two intersections on either side of the danger zone are actually more deadly. The first because it is unexpected; everyone is busy preparing for the known entity yet to come, all energies focused on survival. The one immediately following is even more lethal as drivers are busy counting their blessings having just survived statistically the most treacherous stretch of roadway in the entire world. Three in a row, it's a real death trap.

My mother is not 97. Driving is not a skill sacrificed to old age; at 23, when my father risked life and limb, not to mention the safety of every commuter on earth, by teaching her to drive, she was a bad driver. That they stayed married for a full 18 years after that is the true marvel, divorce surely then an unavoidable casualty of the future. In high school she backed over my car, two weeks later I backed over my sister's bike.

Compounding the issue is that my mother feels that the good people of Johnson County have been brought together by danger, their sense of community really revealing itself as they all struggle to stay alive, or that is how she explains the honking that follows her everywhere she goes. Those beeps and blasts are offered in a congratulatory manner, and so she waves wildly from her window to let others know she appreciates their good wishes as she races past. If she could get names and addresses she'd write them thank you notes. Thank God she's too busy concentrating on the task at hand to yell out her gratitude.

"I had to gun it", let this be your warning.

Don't Turn That Dial

Every day at 7:00 A.M. the alarm clock in my mother's bedroom sounds off, a poorly tuned classical radio station blaring away into her morning. She does not get up, she hasn't in at least five years, when she stopped working. My assumption is that she rolls over and pulls a pillow over her head and continues to sleep, for three to four more hours. She has no idea how to reset the alarm. When she finally wanders downstairs she warms up a cup of coffee in the microwave, the one she has had for 10 years, and will not replace, because it has a dial and the button ones are far too confusing. Her toaster requires her only to turn push down on one lever, nothing more, or she would never have toast to accompany that lukewarm coffee. After numerous complaints about my calling, or lack of, I bought her an answering machine, tired of calling and getting no response. It remained in the box, and still is, I am certain, buried somewhere with all the other electronic wonders that have been gifted to her over the years. Several years ago her brother sent her a television set as the one she was watching was purchased by my father before the Watergate hearings began. The large box sat in the front hall for perhaps four years, an obstacle to climb over when coming in or out of her house, until my sister's kind boyfriend set it up, despite her protests. She hates it. Too big, too confusing, and there is a VCR attached, why on earth would she need that?

This terrifies me.

We have a very high tech, button fronted microwave in our kitchen, although I don't use it often. Our toaster is equally advanced and I rarely find myself at odds with the options available. We don't have an answering machine, voice mail, and I am fully capable of calling to retrieve messages, when necessary, although I rarely do. Don't leave a message if you call, I won't get it, drives my husband bonkers. As does my inability to use the remote, or remotes, we have about 17 of them to control one television set. We recently added to our repertoire, new television, new remote. When walking out of the room, I generally reach over and hit the button on the actual television to turn the thing off which horrifies my husband. There are no less than 8 buttons which, when pushed correctly, will accomplish the exact same thing. Rarely do I push them correctly, recently I heard the neighbor's garage door go up, and down, each time I tried to adjust the volume.

A few years ago I inadvertently set my cell phone to Spanish, every single thing that appeared on the screen was in Spanish. I speak a bit here and there but the intricacies of cell phone directions, those need to be in English, they really do. I worked quite a while on that one myself, finally resorting to the husband, the cell phone genius, and even he was not able to right this wrong. Thankfully a kind soul at work, a native Spanish speaker, was able to get me back to English, after only telling about 42 others. And now it would seem that I have hit a button, or clicked a box or done something to send every blog post I write directly to Facebook. Not all together a bad thing but it was my luck that the first such post to hit the Facebook airwaves was about my new found freedom, which means that my high school drama teacher now knows, should he have read on, that I think my thighs need some reshaping, which they do. Given that I have a high school drama teacher one can safely assume that I am generally alright with putting it all out there, but was this really what I wanted to tell all my friends from grade school?

Jack shakes when I hit the computer, never sure just exactly what I might do. When I accidentally signed up for Facebook, following the step by step direction of a friend who sent me the standard "check me out on Facebook" email, I then, unknowingly, sent out an email to my entire address book, including my father's attorney and the priest who married us, asking them to join me on Facebook. It appears that neither took me up on my offer.

My alarm goes off everyday at 5:45, as per my direction. When we reach the end of the school year and find some civility in waking times, I will shut off the alarm. If for some reason I can't figure that out, then at least I will have the good sense to unplug the thing.

They're With Me?

Every so often I am struck with this thought: who entrusted the care and well being of these children to me? Why on earth does anyone think that I am responsible enough to keep them healthy much less see that they are fed properly, have clean clothing (and bodies), make it to the restroom in a timely manner, and don't say things like "eat boogers". How did this happen? It's me who makes them breakfast every morning; why do we think I can do anything more than open a cereal box and pour milk? I existed on microwave popcorn and Minute Rice in college, at what point did I transform into someone who makes scrambled eggs with cottage cheese, blueberries, and wheat toast? How is it that they find clean clothing in their drawer everyday? What elf comes in and neatly stocks their closets? Was it me who put sweaters on them this morning when it was cool outside? I routinely stumble out of this place inappropriately weather dressed.

I spent Memorial Day weekend in Colorado with two of my best friends, celebrating a 40th birthday. The day after the party found us sitting outside eating breakfast on the patio, me furiously scribbling postcards to my children, who I would see later that day. Best Friend One to Best Friend Two "look at this, did you ever think you would see this? who is she?" I KNOW. I'm as shocked as anyone.

I almost always have band-aids in my purse, and wipes, and little international themed girl sticker books. Crayons, I'm usually good for a crayon or two, and lavender scented sanitizer hand wipes, I always have those. There is a small tube of sunblock, even now, and often a box or two of raisins. Seriously? This is my bag?

My dad and I had a similar conversation, long ago. I was leaving his house to drive home to my apartment, soon after I got out of college. I started out of the driveway, stopped, pulled back in and asked "how do you know I can find my way home? How do you not write out directions for me every time I leave here? How do you know I can do this?" And my dad, my amazing dad, laughed, clearly not sure that I could, and said "I just close my eyes and pray. Please call me when you get home".

He must have done something right, the elves have been busy around here. But who is putting all that stuff in my purse?