Sunday, November 20, 2011
Monday, November 14, 2011
Blog #4: Privacy online
Facebook. The demise of us all. Or at least it’s Jennifer O’Brien’s. The first-grade teacher may lose her job, stated an article last week on Reuters.com, after calling her young students “future criminals.”
Could this be called a privacy issue? Why of course it could. First of all, it’s the same old claim, O’Brien voluntarily put her thoughts out there for the world to see, those thoughts are no longer private. Second of all, this issue isn’t so much a privacy one as it is a sensitivity one.
All these Facebook “privacy” issues that are popping up in the news, consist mostly of “inappropriate” statements or pictures. But Facebook is no more than the weak link in the chain of “ignorance is bliss.” If Facebook is guilty of one thing, it’s of making it a whole lot harder to be ignorant.
Privacy is lost on Facebook. All Facebook does is show the real us: What people really think, how people really act, what people really look like when they’re drunk. It’s the evidence. Just because we wouldn’t see it if it wasn’t posted on the Book, doesn’t mean it’s not the truth.
Everyone’s been in this situation. We’ve all had embarrassing pictures posted of us, we’ve all devised status’s that we later regret, some of us have even been caught by authority figures in sticky online-depicted situations.
But this is what I want to know: Who’s the rat? I mean really, I will be the first to say it, half O’Brien’s class is probably going to be future criminals. How did her Facebook post travel from her measly 333 friends to the parents of her students and further still, the principal of the school?
True, perhaps she should have kept her thoughts to herself instead of volunteering them to the online world. True, maybe she should have been more courteous to the little munchkins that she’s entrusted to oversee everyday. But is it also not true that the little brats give her hell seven hours a day, five days a week?
Apparently, O’Brien’s complete status had been updated to, "I'm not a teacher - I'm a warden for future criminals!" She wrote the status after her students allegedly hit her and stole money from her.
Would parents sue if she said the same thing to their faces in a parent-teacher conference? How is it different that the words were stated behind the parents backs rather than to their faces? Where they more dangerous this way? No student was named.
Teachers are people too. They are allowed to express their frustration in their everyday jobs to the online world just like the rest of us do. And parents out there need to toughen up a little. Yes, these are their darling children, their darling children that stole money from their teacher.
We are human beings and we are going to do what we want to do, say what we want to say, and hopefully tiptoe the terrible stuff through the our newsfeeds. This matter all comes down to who is smart enough to not get caught and who is stupid enough to flaunt the evidence that evicts them.
If parents and teachers are going to cause such a hullabaloo and be so damn dramatic about having online profiles (aka Facebook pages), perhaps they should just sign off and leave it to those of us who are little less sensitive. Those of us who use it for fun, not to fish around for the trouble that it stirs up.
Could this be called a privacy issue? Why of course it could. First of all, it’s the same old claim, O’Brien voluntarily put her thoughts out there for the world to see, those thoughts are no longer private. Second of all, this issue isn’t so much a privacy one as it is a sensitivity one.
All these Facebook “privacy” issues that are popping up in the news, consist mostly of “inappropriate” statements or pictures. But Facebook is no more than the weak link in the chain of “ignorance is bliss.” If Facebook is guilty of one thing, it’s of making it a whole lot harder to be ignorant.
Privacy is lost on Facebook. All Facebook does is show the real us: What people really think, how people really act, what people really look like when they’re drunk. It’s the evidence. Just because we wouldn’t see it if it wasn’t posted on the Book, doesn’t mean it’s not the truth.
Everyone’s been in this situation. We’ve all had embarrassing pictures posted of us, we’ve all devised status’s that we later regret, some of us have even been caught by authority figures in sticky online-depicted situations.
But this is what I want to know: Who’s the rat? I mean really, I will be the first to say it, half O’Brien’s class is probably going to be future criminals. How did her Facebook post travel from her measly 333 friends to the parents of her students and further still, the principal of the school?
True, perhaps she should have kept her thoughts to herself instead of volunteering them to the online world. True, maybe she should have been more courteous to the little munchkins that she’s entrusted to oversee everyday. But is it also not true that the little brats give her hell seven hours a day, five days a week?
Apparently, O’Brien’s complete status had been updated to, "I'm not a teacher - I'm a warden for future criminals!" She wrote the status after her students allegedly hit her and stole money from her.
Would parents sue if she said the same thing to their faces in a parent-teacher conference? How is it different that the words were stated behind the parents backs rather than to their faces? Where they more dangerous this way? No student was named.
Teachers are people too. They are allowed to express their frustration in their everyday jobs to the online world just like the rest of us do. And parents out there need to toughen up a little. Yes, these are their darling children, their darling children that stole money from their teacher.
We are human beings and we are going to do what we want to do, say what we want to say, and hopefully tiptoe the terrible stuff through the our newsfeeds. This matter all comes down to who is smart enough to not get caught and who is stupid enough to flaunt the evidence that evicts them.
If parents and teachers are going to cause such a hullabaloo and be so damn dramatic about having online profiles (aka Facebook pages), perhaps they should just sign off and leave it to those of us who are little less sensitive. Those of us who use it for fun, not to fish around for the trouble that it stirs up.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Blog #3: Cybercrime
While doing a little bit of in-depth research about cybercrime, I was interested to find Estonia in the title of so many articles. Estonia is the center of European countries to concentrate on threats and fight cybercrime, but the crime still seems to be flourishing, and the punishments for those caught, increasing.
The most recent article, posted on Wednesday, November 9, 2011, details the arrest of six Estonians and one Russian who have been wreaking havoc on computers since 2007. The individuals could face prison terms anywhere between five to 30 years.
Now, the first thought that passed through my head was how miserable the prison conditions are in that area of Europe. But are their crimes really worth up to 30 years in prison?
Their massive scheme earned them a whopping $14 million and infected an estimated four million computers in over 100 countries, including several NASA computers. But thirty years? That’s a lifetime. How did we let them get away with their massive fraud for more than four years?
If you ask me, they don’t deserve that severe of a punishment as much as we deserved the consequences we suffered for those years they got away with it. If our technological abilities are that much weaker than that of Estonian hackers, then we deserve to be tortured by their computer viruses.
I understand how dangerous the growing problem of cybercrime is. I understand the delicate information that countries store in computers, information that could lead to their demise if snatched by the wrong hands, but countries need to focus on protection plans that prevent attacks rather than hunting criminals from 2007 to 2011 and then attacking the attacker and jailing them for thirty years.
Technology is developing so rapidly and so inexpensively that nearly everyone has a computer and internet. And anyone with the internet at their fingertips can become a hacker. The funny thing is, we hand out technology so readily but so few people really know how to use it or understand the power they are capable of with the machines in their households.
However, although I believe that the key to protection is prevention, and countries are trying to tackle this approach quickly, I also believe that no matter how prepared we become, there will always be hackers that are smarter, faster and more capable than the government. It’s the consequence we suffer from allowing free and ready internet access to the world.
Which is worse, the threat of cybercrime? Or the regulation of internet access? And is it solely the responsibility of the government to create protection for the public? Or can the public do something more to protect themselves than simply purchasing Norton and not emailing their social security number?
Almost two thirds of all adult web users globally have fallen victim to some sort of cybercrime, according to the 2011 Norton Cybercrime Report. But if you ask me, I’d rather deal with that all day, any day, rather than lose my internet privileges. Of course, I’m also not NASA and don’t have highly secretive information to hide…
Sunday, October 23, 2011
Blog #2: Digital Divide
Steve Jobs died at age fifty six. At age twenty two, he had created the fledgling fingers of a technology that would, 34 years later, turn into a technological empire. An article
Jobs was a college dropout. A technology genius. He was, and remains to be, one of few. In fact, many people in today’s society don’t have computers, access to computers or knowledge of how to function computers. There is a distinct line drawn between these people and everyday computer users. There is an even more distinct line drawn between Steve Jobs and these people. Can both interact equally in society?
The Digital Divide. It’s a controversial topic to say the least. Some argue that it doesn’t exist at all. Though delusional, those who think that the digital divide isn’t a problem can be comforted by recent research printed in an article
But the digital divide still exists. And it’s still quite a problem that needs to confronted and diminished.
So, was Jobs aware of what he had created and handed over to society? And did society know what they were readily accepting and taking on into our lifestyles? Jobs gave the public an opportunity to rapidly advance our capabilities by supplying us with advanced, yet simple to use technology software. In turn, society has indeed advanced (very rapidly) and carelessly left behind many to fend for themselves without equal opportunities to use the same technologies and advance themselves.
But to me, the real question goes beyond those effected for the worse by the digital divide, and encompasses both people like Steve Jobs, who crown the top of the technology world, those everyday users with constant access to internet and technologies, and those who have no access to either.
It brings up the question: Are humans evolving too fast? Can we as a whole, as a society, as a species, evolve rapidly enough to keep up with the advancement of technology that we are creating, wallowing in and mass distributing.
Steve Jobs lived only fifty six years. In half of his lifetime, he created a machine that has evolved so quickly, it’s forever transformed our society as we know it. We have already bypassed the point of “can’t live without it.” At what point does our existence turn into one of the creepy sci-fi films where we have lost all control and are consumed by our product? that shows internet use is continually increasing despite race, income and other social distinguishes. So yes, overall, more people are using the internet as time goes on. that highlights Jobs life, brings light to just what he left in the lap of society.
Jobs was a college dropout. A technology genius. He was, and remains to be, one of few. In fact, many people in today’s society don’t have computers, access to computers or knowledge of how to function computers. There is a distinct line drawn between these people and everyday computer users. There is an even more distinct line drawn between Steve Jobs and these people. Can both interact equally in society?
The Digital Divide. It’s a controversial topic to say the least. Some argue that it doesn’t exist at all. Though delusional, those who think that the digital divide isn’t a problem can be comforted by recent research printed in an article
But the digital divide still exists. And it’s still quite a problem that needs to confronted and diminished.
So, was Jobs aware of what he had created and handed over to society? And did society know what they were readily accepting and taking on into our lifestyles? Jobs gave the public an opportunity to rapidly advance our capabilities by supplying us with advanced, yet simple to use technology software. In turn, society has indeed advanced (very rapidly) and carelessly left behind many to fend for themselves without equal opportunities to use the same technologies and advance themselves.
But to me, the real question goes beyond those effected for the worse by the digital divide, and encompasses both people like Steve Jobs, who crown the top of the technology world, those everyday users with constant access to internet and technologies, and those who have no access to either.
It brings up the question: Are humans evolving too fast? Can we as a whole, as a society, as a species, evolve rapidly enough to keep up with the advancement of technology that we are creating, wallowing in and mass distributing.
Steve Jobs lived only fifty six years. In half of his lifetime, he created a machine that has evolved so quickly, it’s forever transformed our society as we know it. We have already bypassed the point of “can’t live without it.” At what point does our existence turn into one of the creepy sci-fi films where we have lost all control and are consumed by our product? that shows internet use is continually increasing despite race, income and other social distinguishes. So yes, overall, more people are using the internet as time goes on. that highlights Jobs life, brings light to just what he left in the lap of society.
Monday, October 17, 2011
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
COM 305 - Blog #1
Coming hand in hand with the technology boom is the modern, highly successful fad of online dating.
Studies show that out of the 54 million single people in the U.S., five million use an online dating service. Dating sites are growing day by day and the entire industry is worth approximately $4 billion worldwide.
For those unfamiliar to the online dating scene, users who join can enter information and post pictures of themselves for other singles to see. After subscribing, they then have the opportunity to scroll through other possible singles in their area, or any area for that matter, view pictures of potential mates, read the information provided about each person and then pick who they think would best suit them in a relationship according to the limited to extensive amount of information they’ve acquired.
Of course there is always the possibility that those who subscribe to dating sites aren’t telling the whole truth in the information and pictures they advertise. For example, a picture posted of a person could very well be a high school shot. If no one can monitor whether your information is accurate, then why not shave a few years off your age? Or shave a few pounds off your weight?
That’s the beautiful thing about online dating, the people you meet only see what you choose to let them see. They only see the person you project to them.
But how is it that 17% of couples who married last year, met on an online dating service? Could online dating be the way to go? Is it healthier and does it guarantee a more stable marriage? And if so, why?
According to a post written by Julie Spira, online strategist, author and relationship expert, eHarmony has launched a new dating site called Jazzed. The site aims not at serious long-term relationships like its parent company eHarmony, but more towards relationships for a younger age group that may not quite guarantee marriage, but instead a fun, entertaining courtship.
EHarmony allegedly launched Jazzed to compete with other social dating sites such as Zoosk and OKCupid.
The real question is, money matters aside, what’s all this hype about dating sites, and how come more and more keep cropping up? Jazzed is aimed at the young age group of eHarmony members, 18-34 years. Since when do 18-year-olds need an online dating service to find dates? Most. kids that age are still in high school.
Yet online dating remains successful and is growing by the day. And why not? Why spend two hours putting on make-up and shaving when you can have a conversation bare-faced in your PJ’s while sitting on your own couch? Why stress about your appearance when online dating offers an outlet?
Instead of appearance first - personality second, online dating allows you to portray your very best aspects only, which may or may not be your looks.
This could explain why the average courtship between online couples is only 18.5 months compared to nearly 42 months for offline couples. Dating sites cut to the chase, they eliminate the nervous face-to-face introduction, the do-they-like-me stage, the months of trial and error, personality discovery. All these features are laid out from the beginning, and users pick only the people they prefer.
Jazzed and other dating sites are specifically aimed at easy, instant, virtual dates. They work with other media outlets to create successful mobile dating, integrating social media options such as Facebook, Twitter and iPhone apps. Their huge success proves just what an impact this media age has on our personal lives.
*All online dating stats from Dating Sites Reviews
Studies show that out of the 54 million single people in the U.S., five million use an online dating service. Dating sites are growing day by day and the entire industry is worth approximately $4 billion worldwide.
For those unfamiliar to the online dating scene, users who join can enter information and post pictures of themselves for other singles to see. After subscribing, they then have the opportunity to scroll through other possible singles in their area, or any area for that matter, view pictures of potential mates, read the information provided about each person and then pick who they think would best suit them in a relationship according to the limited to extensive amount of information they’ve acquired.
Of course there is always the possibility that those who subscribe to dating sites aren’t telling the whole truth in the information and pictures they advertise. For example, a picture posted of a person could very well be a high school shot. If no one can monitor whether your information is accurate, then why not shave a few years off your age? Or shave a few pounds off your weight?
That’s the beautiful thing about online dating, the people you meet only see what you choose to let them see. They only see the person you project to them.
But how is it that 17% of couples who married last year, met on an online dating service? Could online dating be the way to go? Is it healthier and does it guarantee a more stable marriage? And if so, why?
According to a post written by Julie Spira, online strategist, author and relationship expert, eHarmony has launched a new dating site called Jazzed. The site aims not at serious long-term relationships like its parent company eHarmony, but more towards relationships for a younger age group that may not quite guarantee marriage, but instead a fun, entertaining courtship.
EHarmony allegedly launched Jazzed to compete with other social dating sites such as Zoosk and OKCupid.
The real question is, money matters aside, what’s all this hype about dating sites, and how come more and more keep cropping up? Jazzed is aimed at the young age group of eHarmony members, 18-34 years. Since when do 18-year-olds need an online dating service to find dates? Most. kids that age are still in high school.
Yet online dating remains successful and is growing by the day. And why not? Why spend two hours putting on make-up and shaving when you can have a conversation bare-faced in your PJ’s while sitting on your own couch? Why stress about your appearance when online dating offers an outlet?
Instead of appearance first - personality second, online dating allows you to portray your very best aspects only, which may or may not be your looks.
This could explain why the average courtship between online couples is only 18.5 months compared to nearly 42 months for offline couples. Dating sites cut to the chase, they eliminate the nervous face-to-face introduction, the do-they-like-me stage, the months of trial and error, personality discovery. All these features are laid out from the beginning, and users pick only the people they prefer.
Jazzed and other dating sites are specifically aimed at easy, instant, virtual dates. They work with other media outlets to create successful mobile dating, integrating social media options such as Facebook, Twitter and iPhone apps. Their huge success proves just what an impact this media age has on our personal lives.
*All online dating stats from Dating Sites Reviews
Monday, April 18, 2011
John Dufresne
In this blog, I write about people who have changed my life. Experiences I’ve shared with friends and neighbors alike. Sad, funny, touching stories that have shaped me into the person I am now. Out of all the people who have impacted me, both significantly and slightly, one persons words changed my life more than anyone else’s.
I was assigned to read a book by John Dufresne last semester for my short story writing class. “The Lie That Tells A Truth,” is a book about writing technique and how to become a better writer. But more than just that, it’s also largely about John’s life.
Junior year was the hardest scholastic year of my life. The workload was overwhelming from classes alone, and while I wasn’t studying, I was trying to remain un-fired from two separate jobs. I was working more than forty hours per week and had hardly any time to go out and get drunk at night like most college students. Despite my stress about school and work, the end of the year was creeping ever closer, as was the end of my college experience. I was continually and glaringly aware of the “light” at the end of the tunnel. What the HELL was I going to do after I graduated? The thought loomed in the back of my mind all year long, and trust me, it’s still there, although, it isn’t as glaring since I read John’s book.
I flipped through the book casually, hardly paying attention to his words since it was an assigned book. I may not have read the whole thing from cover to cover, but one passage stood out at me. Whether I was paying particular attention that day, or whether his words rang so clear as my eyes passed over them that I automatically focused, I’m not sure. But the passage was burned into my brain and evidently meant so much to me that I later (currently) wrote about it.
You get to revise your life again and again until you’re living the life you set out to live. You get to examine yourself, and if you’re not doing what you want to be doing, you get to start over. You create the world you want to live in, and you go there. No one else gets to write your story. Every day is an opening sentence, a new beginning. Every morning is a new youth, every afternoon an aging, every sleep a little death. And in every sleep, the dreams you have deferred will haunt you.
I read it again and again, over and over. A weight was lifted off my shoulders. Not only did the thought of a JOB after college now sound insignificant, but the passage made me reanalyze my whole life. I, and only I, am in utter control of my own life and what happens to me. I constantly worry about making mistakes and what will happen to me and ultimately ending up unhappy. But after reading John’s passage, I looked at my life in a new light. If ever I’m unhappy, I thought to myself, I’ll just find a way, do something, that will make me happy again. It’s as simple as that.
In the beginning of second semester, John came to campus and spoke in the college auditorium. I went to see his speech and the whole time he was speaking, I stared at him and thought….You are the wisest man I know and you’ll never know how you changed the way I thought about my life.
I was assigned to read a book by John Dufresne last semester for my short story writing class. “The Lie That Tells A Truth,” is a book about writing technique and how to become a better writer. But more than just that, it’s also largely about John’s life.
Junior year was the hardest scholastic year of my life. The workload was overwhelming from classes alone, and while I wasn’t studying, I was trying to remain un-fired from two separate jobs. I was working more than forty hours per week and had hardly any time to go out and get drunk at night like most college students. Despite my stress about school and work, the end of the year was creeping ever closer, as was the end of my college experience. I was continually and glaringly aware of the “light” at the end of the tunnel. What the HELL was I going to do after I graduated? The thought loomed in the back of my mind all year long, and trust me, it’s still there, although, it isn’t as glaring since I read John’s book.
I flipped through the book casually, hardly paying attention to his words since it was an assigned book. I may not have read the whole thing from cover to cover, but one passage stood out at me. Whether I was paying particular attention that day, or whether his words rang so clear as my eyes passed over them that I automatically focused, I’m not sure. But the passage was burned into my brain and evidently meant so much to me that I later (currently) wrote about it.
You get to revise your life again and again until you’re living the life you set out to live. You get to examine yourself, and if you’re not doing what you want to be doing, you get to start over. You create the world you want to live in, and you go there. No one else gets to write your story. Every day is an opening sentence, a new beginning. Every morning is a new youth, every afternoon an aging, every sleep a little death. And in every sleep, the dreams you have deferred will haunt you.
I read it again and again, over and over. A weight was lifted off my shoulders. Not only did the thought of a JOB after college now sound insignificant, but the passage made me reanalyze my whole life. I, and only I, am in utter control of my own life and what happens to me. I constantly worry about making mistakes and what will happen to me and ultimately ending up unhappy. But after reading John’s passage, I looked at my life in a new light. If ever I’m unhappy, I thought to myself, I’ll just find a way, do something, that will make me happy again. It’s as simple as that.
In the beginning of second semester, John came to campus and spoke in the college auditorium. I went to see his speech and the whole time he was speaking, I stared at him and thought….You are the wisest man I know and you’ll never know how you changed the way I thought about my life.
Sunday, April 17, 2011
Heather
I worked at a clothing store for a few months earlier this year. Although I didn’t like the job particularly, I loved the people I worked with. I’ve just finished my junior year at college and had to quit my job to survive exams and final projects during the last months of the semester. Junior year as a whole was insanely difficult. I was dealing with not only an overload of school work and difficult classes, but an unhealthy relationship with a boy in my life. Between the two, it was nice to escape to my job, which was easy and exceptionally boring.
One of my bosses was a 25-year-old named Heather. She seemed to be much older than I was since she was my superior, but in reality, she was only my sisters age. We talked sometimes when we closed together and one day, she shared something very personal with me.
Heather told me that her current boyfriend, who she had been with for two years, was an alcoholic. I wasn’t surprised, and most people at work new that Heather was involved in a bit of a scary relationship, she never tried to disguise it. But the details that Heather began to spill, startled and scared me. Not only was her boyfriend an alcoholic, but he was extremely abusive and from her stories, I began to wonder if he was mentally unstable. She told me that night that she was moving out but she would always be there for him, despite everything. I was shocked and asked her why. She told me that he was her best friend and even if she wasn’t his lover anymore, she would never turn her back on a best friend. I was obviously appalled and couldn’t understand how she could remain devoted to an abusive man. Clearly he wasn’t a best friend if he beat her up. Two weeks later, I learned that she never left him and she was still not only his best friend, but his lover as well.
The other day, I closed with Heather again and she rattled off another list of crazy things that her boyfriend had done. He had no desire to seek help or go to rehab, things were not looking up. She told me she was leaving this time. Actually leaving. I went home that night and searched online for single women around Heathers age, who were looking for roommates. I found one and sent Heather the number immediately. Nothing ever became of the situation and as far as I know, Heather is still with her abusive boyfriend.
After hearing her story, I began to wonder, how such a beautiful young woman, who was my boss and seemingly had her life together, could be stuck in such an awful situation. I knew this situation was familiar to many women all over the world, and the more I thought about it, the more I realized that Heathers situation hit closer to home than I ever imagined.
I was in the middle of a sticky, complicated and nothing even close to healthy relationship of three years. Although the boy I was with had never laid an angry finger upon me, he also didn’t treat me the way, deep down inside, I knew I deserved to be treated. One evening, both of us arrived at his house late at night, we were laughing and joking together, happier than we had been in quite a while. Together we entered his room, and to both of our surprise, there was a girl laying in his bed. I was immediately in tears and calling my friend to pick me up. He grabbed me, chased after me and tried to explain, claiming she was a friend and she was staying at his house because she couldn’t go home. I wanted to believe him more than anything. I wanted to think it was the truth and take him back, even just shrug it off and pretend like I didn’t care. But another part of me, the weaker part, thought about Heather. Am I really like Heather? Or can I be stronger than that? Whether your boyfriend is beating you, lying to you or cheating on you, why do so many women get caught in the crosshairs and sacrifice their happiness and self-respect to stay with men like this?
Heather’s situation, though it may still be going on, helped me to realize just how weak I was. I was really no different than her. I was being disrespected by a boy who wasn’t worth my time or energy, yet I could never leave him. What does it finally take to leave these men behind? Unfortunately for me, it took the misfortune of my boss, to realize just how horribly I was being treated, and how horribly I was treating myself by staying with him.
One of my bosses was a 25-year-old named Heather. She seemed to be much older than I was since she was my superior, but in reality, she was only my sisters age. We talked sometimes when we closed together and one day, she shared something very personal with me.
Heather told me that her current boyfriend, who she had been with for two years, was an alcoholic. I wasn’t surprised, and most people at work new that Heather was involved in a bit of a scary relationship, she never tried to disguise it. But the details that Heather began to spill, startled and scared me. Not only was her boyfriend an alcoholic, but he was extremely abusive and from her stories, I began to wonder if he was mentally unstable. She told me that night that she was moving out but she would always be there for him, despite everything. I was shocked and asked her why. She told me that he was her best friend and even if she wasn’t his lover anymore, she would never turn her back on a best friend. I was obviously appalled and couldn’t understand how she could remain devoted to an abusive man. Clearly he wasn’t a best friend if he beat her up. Two weeks later, I learned that she never left him and she was still not only his best friend, but his lover as well.
The other day, I closed with Heather again and she rattled off another list of crazy things that her boyfriend had done. He had no desire to seek help or go to rehab, things were not looking up. She told me she was leaving this time. Actually leaving. I went home that night and searched online for single women around Heathers age, who were looking for roommates. I found one and sent Heather the number immediately. Nothing ever became of the situation and as far as I know, Heather is still with her abusive boyfriend.
After hearing her story, I began to wonder, how such a beautiful young woman, who was my boss and seemingly had her life together, could be stuck in such an awful situation. I knew this situation was familiar to many women all over the world, and the more I thought about it, the more I realized that Heathers situation hit closer to home than I ever imagined.
I was in the middle of a sticky, complicated and nothing even close to healthy relationship of three years. Although the boy I was with had never laid an angry finger upon me, he also didn’t treat me the way, deep down inside, I knew I deserved to be treated. One evening, both of us arrived at his house late at night, we were laughing and joking together, happier than we had been in quite a while. Together we entered his room, and to both of our surprise, there was a girl laying in his bed. I was immediately in tears and calling my friend to pick me up. He grabbed me, chased after me and tried to explain, claiming she was a friend and she was staying at his house because she couldn’t go home. I wanted to believe him more than anything. I wanted to think it was the truth and take him back, even just shrug it off and pretend like I didn’t care. But another part of me, the weaker part, thought about Heather. Am I really like Heather? Or can I be stronger than that? Whether your boyfriend is beating you, lying to you or cheating on you, why do so many women get caught in the crosshairs and sacrifice their happiness and self-respect to stay with men like this?
Heather’s situation, though it may still be going on, helped me to realize just how weak I was. I was really no different than her. I was being disrespected by a boy who wasn’t worth my time or energy, yet I could never leave him. What does it finally take to leave these men behind? Unfortunately for me, it took the misfortune of my boss, to realize just how horribly I was being treated, and how horribly I was treating myself by staying with him.
Autumn
When I was in high school, I had the best of friends. There was nine of us, Kayla, Kayla, Michaela, Kirstin, Melissa, Sunni, Amy, Casey and Kylynn. Most of us had grown up together, developing our friendships from kindergarten to graduation. We grew up together, survived puberty together, developed our lives together. We were there for each other in moments of change, fear and growth.
After graduation, we all went our separate ways. Sunni and Casey went to the same college and became roommates. Michaela and Kirstin did the same. One of the Kayla’s and Amy went to neighboring schools in the same town and visited each other often. All of them stayed in the Northwest; Washington, Montana and Oregon. After graduation, I boarded a plane and flew to Florida, all alone. I left my best friends on the opposite corner of the country.
My first two years at Flagler College were rocky but exciting, full of surprises, mistakes and realizations. I made friends with the first people I met and clung to them. We became inseparable and had wild adventures in the dorms throughout freshman year. They were good friends, maybe even great ones, but none of them even approached being as close to me as the girls I had left at home.
The following year, my new friends and I found a house and moved in together. Sophomore year was filled with even more mistakes and mishaps. We were growing up and clearly beginning to grow apart. I never bothered to become close with any of them because I still believed I had best friends and didn’t need more, I wouldn’t dare replace the girls I grew up with. At the end of sophomore year I realized that I wasn’t happy living alone in Florida and depending on girls four thousand miles away to be my best friends. I couldn’t call them and tell them about my life when they hadn’t met any of the people I was talking about. I couldn’t give them advice when I wasn’t experiencing their life with them.
Junior year I went out on a limb and moved out of my roommates house. I was back in Montana for the summer and didn’t have anyone to live with in the fall when I returned. Days crawled by and I tried to not stress about how few friends I had and my lack of living situation. Out of the blue, I talked to a friend in Florida one day. He told me that his girlfriend, a girl I knew by acquaintance, was looking for a new roommate too. We began talking and we decided to take the chance and live together. Throughout the summer we talked only about housing, communicating through texting and face book. She found a house for us and I mailed her appropriate amounts of money to cover my share of the expenses. When I returned to Florida, Autumn and I greeted each other awkwardly. We had communicated so much throughout the three months of summer but we never had officially spoken face to face.
Weeks turned into months and before we knew it, the awkwardness had melted away and we did everything together. We partied and drank, watched movies and cried over guys. We cooked dinner together every night and developed a routine. We took care of each others dogs and soon first semester had flown by. Autumn spent Christmas in Mexico and I sat alone on my couch through the holidays, all alone. She brought me back a bottle of Mexican Tequila and we enjoyed it together. Over spring break, she drove me to the airport and picked me up a week later. I jabbered on and on in the car during the ride home. I told her all about my friends from home who I had spent the break with. I began to realize, Autumn had somehow become so much more important to me than my closest friends. They remained my best friends but after three years apart from them, I was losing track, losing interest, growing apart from my childhood friends.
Autumn will graduate in six days. Despite my begging, she applied to multiple jobs and internships in different states. She will leave me in July and I’ll have to move in with someone else, and develop another friendship. I’ll always talk to Autumn, our friendship has become so strong we will surely be lifelong friends. But despite her leaving, and despite our closeness, the way we bonded in just nine short months, she taught me how easy and fun it is to make new friends. She is so very different from my friends at home. She has become my best friend in my adult life. Though I will never leave behind my childhood friends, Autumn has taught me about new levels of friendship and what they entail at an older age, and I’m so very thankful.
After graduation, we all went our separate ways. Sunni and Casey went to the same college and became roommates. Michaela and Kirstin did the same. One of the Kayla’s and Amy went to neighboring schools in the same town and visited each other often. All of them stayed in the Northwest; Washington, Montana and Oregon. After graduation, I boarded a plane and flew to Florida, all alone. I left my best friends on the opposite corner of the country.
My first two years at Flagler College were rocky but exciting, full of surprises, mistakes and realizations. I made friends with the first people I met and clung to them. We became inseparable and had wild adventures in the dorms throughout freshman year. They were good friends, maybe even great ones, but none of them even approached being as close to me as the girls I had left at home.
The following year, my new friends and I found a house and moved in together. Sophomore year was filled with even more mistakes and mishaps. We were growing up and clearly beginning to grow apart. I never bothered to become close with any of them because I still believed I had best friends and didn’t need more, I wouldn’t dare replace the girls I grew up with. At the end of sophomore year I realized that I wasn’t happy living alone in Florida and depending on girls four thousand miles away to be my best friends. I couldn’t call them and tell them about my life when they hadn’t met any of the people I was talking about. I couldn’t give them advice when I wasn’t experiencing their life with them.
Junior year I went out on a limb and moved out of my roommates house. I was back in Montana for the summer and didn’t have anyone to live with in the fall when I returned. Days crawled by and I tried to not stress about how few friends I had and my lack of living situation. Out of the blue, I talked to a friend in Florida one day. He told me that his girlfriend, a girl I knew by acquaintance, was looking for a new roommate too. We began talking and we decided to take the chance and live together. Throughout the summer we talked only about housing, communicating through texting and face book. She found a house for us and I mailed her appropriate amounts of money to cover my share of the expenses. When I returned to Florida, Autumn and I greeted each other awkwardly. We had communicated so much throughout the three months of summer but we never had officially spoken face to face.
Weeks turned into months and before we knew it, the awkwardness had melted away and we did everything together. We partied and drank, watched movies and cried over guys. We cooked dinner together every night and developed a routine. We took care of each others dogs and soon first semester had flown by. Autumn spent Christmas in Mexico and I sat alone on my couch through the holidays, all alone. She brought me back a bottle of Mexican Tequila and we enjoyed it together. Over spring break, she drove me to the airport and picked me up a week later. I jabbered on and on in the car during the ride home. I told her all about my friends from home who I had spent the break with. I began to realize, Autumn had somehow become so much more important to me than my closest friends. They remained my best friends but after three years apart from them, I was losing track, losing interest, growing apart from my childhood friends.
Autumn will graduate in six days. Despite my begging, she applied to multiple jobs and internships in different states. She will leave me in July and I’ll have to move in with someone else, and develop another friendship. I’ll always talk to Autumn, our friendship has become so strong we will surely be lifelong friends. But despite her leaving, and despite our closeness, the way we bonded in just nine short months, she taught me how easy and fun it is to make new friends. She is so very different from my friends at home. She has become my best friend in my adult life. Though I will never leave behind my childhood friends, Autumn has taught me about new levels of friendship and what they entail at an older age, and I’m so very thankful.
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Kevin
When I was little I spent most of my summer days at my friend Emily’s house. My parents were good friends with her parents and we would often barbeque together, celebrate the Fourth of July together and go camping together. My older brother, who is four years older than me, was in the same grade as their son, Kevin. I remember the fun I used to have when I went to their house. We would stay up late watching gory television shows which was a treat for me since my parents didn’t own a TV. Emily and I would play dress-up for hours on end. She had make-up kits and it was at her house that I learned how to apply eye shadow and lipstick. I remember feeling like a grown-up when we would model our clothes for Emily’s family, showing off our costume make-up and flowered hats. Kevin was thirteen at the time. To me, he was like a brother. He was a boy and absolutely had cooties. He would play with us sometimes, he taught us how to play truth or dare and made us tuna sandwiches. But it was also Kevin that took away the innocence of a little girl one summer. She was about my age and I knew her. He forced her out of her childhood and into the adult that we so often dressed up as.
I didn’t understand it at the time but I was old enough to know something was wrong. It started with hushed conversations between my parents behind closed doors. Things were tense in our household. My older brother was pulled aside and spoken to in private by my parents for a long time in their bedroom. He came out looking serious and said nothing when I asked him what was wrong. Kevin, Kevin, Kevin. Then name was dropped a few times but no one would say what he did. Finally, after several days of serious tones, my parents asked me to stay seated at the kitchen table after everyone else was excused. They kept it light, they were sweet. But I could tell from their eyes that a piece of their world had fallen off, they were frantic with worry. “Has Kevin ever touched you?” The question seemed simple enough to me. I repeated over and over the truth, Kevin had never once laid a finger on me or made me feel uncomfortable in any way.
It was years later that my parents finally admitted the truth to me. His trial was still not over and Kevin was being tried as an adult for molestation of a six year old girl. I knew her. She was two grades beneath me. The story was kept quiet in my town. But my parents never really recovered from the severity of what happened. Years later, when I talk to them about it, their shock is still evident. Their best friends, the people who they trusted their children’s lives with, had raised a child that committed unspeakable acts at the age of thirteen. Kevin claimed to have been sexually abused when he was a child as well. I remember that after the storm blew over, I didn’t go over to friends houses for a long, long time. You never really know what happens within families and who you can trust in the wild and wonderful world, and I think my parents learned that lesson better than most.
I didn’t understand it at the time but I was old enough to know something was wrong. It started with hushed conversations between my parents behind closed doors. Things were tense in our household. My older brother was pulled aside and spoken to in private by my parents for a long time in their bedroom. He came out looking serious and said nothing when I asked him what was wrong. Kevin, Kevin, Kevin. Then name was dropped a few times but no one would say what he did. Finally, after several days of serious tones, my parents asked me to stay seated at the kitchen table after everyone else was excused. They kept it light, they were sweet. But I could tell from their eyes that a piece of their world had fallen off, they were frantic with worry. “Has Kevin ever touched you?” The question seemed simple enough to me. I repeated over and over the truth, Kevin had never once laid a finger on me or made me feel uncomfortable in any way.
It was years later that my parents finally admitted the truth to me. His trial was still not over and Kevin was being tried as an adult for molestation of a six year old girl. I knew her. She was two grades beneath me. The story was kept quiet in my town. But my parents never really recovered from the severity of what happened. Years later, when I talk to them about it, their shock is still evident. Their best friends, the people who they trusted their children’s lives with, had raised a child that committed unspeakable acts at the age of thirteen. Kevin claimed to have been sexually abused when he was a child as well. I remember that after the storm blew over, I didn’t go over to friends houses for a long, long time. You never really know what happens within families and who you can trust in the wild and wonderful world, and I think my parents learned that lesson better than most.
Friday, March 11, 2011
The man in the orange shirt
People buzzed past me on either side, speaking in languages that I couldn’t understand or identify. I was in a train station in Denmark. It was a beautiful day, sun cast down and warmed the city. I walked through a park next to the train station, wrote in my journal and ate a granola bar from my diminishing stash. My train was scheduled to depart in an hour and I sat on a bench alone watching the families stroll past me.
While my mind wandered and I suppressed the ever-lurking stress in the back of my mind, I tried to plan where I could sleep for the next few days. I was alone in Europe, with nothing more than a ten pound backpack and a tracking phone with only a few minutes left on it. A man was suddenly sitting next to me on the bench, interrupting my thoughts and peering into my face.
“Hello,” he spoke to me in a thick accent. He had dark skin and dark hair, he looked to be maybe Indian. He wore an orange shirt I remember. I couldn’t identify his accent. Before I knew it, he was talking and talking, his eyes searched the crowd around me. He started asking me questions about our government, about where I was from. He pried and pushed, even yelled with excitement as he spoke about President Bush and his disagreement with our government. I hardly listened to him, I was so distracted by his sudden approach. Paranoia took hold, I remember how people had warned me of getting robbed and how careful I should be traveling alone. My money and passport were secure under my shirt. I pulled my backpack closer, wrapped my legs around it and held the strap with both hands. He spoke on. I wondered if he was distracting me and he had friends that were watching in the crowd and waiting to pounce upon me. Beads of nervous sweat formed on my forehead. Finally, when I began to wonder if he would ever leave me alone, a tall white man sat next to me and opened a newspaper. The man in the orange shirt glanced at him. “Oh is this your father?” he asked. Startled, I realized it was my out. I nodded and scooted a few inches closer to the man holding the newspaper.
After Orange Shirt had left, with a nonchalant wave, I breathed a sigh of relief and realized all my muscles were tense. Had the man been a threat? Was he just genuinely nice? Was my fear an overreaction? It made me wonder. Had society trained us to be wary and afraid of strangers, suspicious of even the honestly nice passerby? I look back and think that my interaction with Orange Shirt could have ended in a much worse manner, I was a hundred and ten pound, eighteen year old girl traveling through Europe alone after all. But it didn’t and I still wonder if he was just being nice to me or if he had ulterior motives.
While my mind wandered and I suppressed the ever-lurking stress in the back of my mind, I tried to plan where I could sleep for the next few days. I was alone in Europe, with nothing more than a ten pound backpack and a tracking phone with only a few minutes left on it. A man was suddenly sitting next to me on the bench, interrupting my thoughts and peering into my face.
“Hello,” he spoke to me in a thick accent. He had dark skin and dark hair, he looked to be maybe Indian. He wore an orange shirt I remember. I couldn’t identify his accent. Before I knew it, he was talking and talking, his eyes searched the crowd around me. He started asking me questions about our government, about where I was from. He pried and pushed, even yelled with excitement as he spoke about President Bush and his disagreement with our government. I hardly listened to him, I was so distracted by his sudden approach. Paranoia took hold, I remember how people had warned me of getting robbed and how careful I should be traveling alone. My money and passport were secure under my shirt. I pulled my backpack closer, wrapped my legs around it and held the strap with both hands. He spoke on. I wondered if he was distracting me and he had friends that were watching in the crowd and waiting to pounce upon me. Beads of nervous sweat formed on my forehead. Finally, when I began to wonder if he would ever leave me alone, a tall white man sat next to me and opened a newspaper. The man in the orange shirt glanced at him. “Oh is this your father?” he asked. Startled, I realized it was my out. I nodded and scooted a few inches closer to the man holding the newspaper.
After Orange Shirt had left, with a nonchalant wave, I breathed a sigh of relief and realized all my muscles were tense. Had the man been a threat? Was he just genuinely nice? Was my fear an overreaction? It made me wonder. Had society trained us to be wary and afraid of strangers, suspicious of even the honestly nice passerby? I look back and think that my interaction with Orange Shirt could have ended in a much worse manner, I was a hundred and ten pound, eighteen year old girl traveling through Europe alone after all. But it didn’t and I still wonder if he was just being nice to me or if he had ulterior motives.
Friday, March 4, 2011
Jaxson
The first time I met Jaxson, he was teetering on his chubby one year old legs atop the back of a leather couch. He was a friendly baby and gave me a grin and a gurgle as he wobbled to and fro on the narrow ledge. My first instinct was to dive for him, scoop him up and set him down on solid ground. But I was only sixteen and didn't know Jaxson, his family, or their routine, and evidently, Jaxson was allowed to climb onto the couch and risk life and limb for the sheer pleasure of it. "Oh he does that all the time." Said his mom Jen, when she noticed my concern. "He hasn't fallen yet so I just let him do it." Well it wasn't until I had been Jaxson's nanny for several months, that he actually took a tumble right off the back of the couch. I was in the kitchen, cleaning his lunch dishes and keeping an eye on him from across the counter. He grinned from ear to ear and wobbled on his fat little legs, it was clearly his favorite place to be. Suddenly, mid-teeter, his right heel slid over the edge and the smile melted from his face. His balance was lost, his expression registered realization and then fear. I knew I wouldn't be able to reach him in time and I froze in my place, breath held, arms extended. With a bump and a shriek, he hit the floor behind the couch. I leaped across the room and within a mere instant had him wrapped in my arms, shushing and kissing and rocking. He seemed to be uninjured, mostly just shocked and afraid, but it took me a whole hour to finally calm down and regulate my racing heart.
He was the love of my life. I dedicated almost every day to him. I would leave school and immediately drive to pick him up from daycare. We would go home and make dinner, play with his toys that recited the alphabet and mimicked animal sounds. I cut his hot dogs into tiny triangles, always petrified he would choke on to big of a bite. Every night I put him to bed and he fell asleep to country music on station 93.1, Kyss FM. I fell asleep shortly after he did, on the large leather couch that he loved to climb on. His mom was a bartender and would come home in the late hours of the night. She would wake me gently and I would tell her about the day that Jaxson and I had shared. I wanted him as my own. He was so sweet and calm. His thin blond hair and blue eyes melted my heart. I was so young but because of Jaxson, I developed cravings to have a child of my own. He and I would lay in a hammock in the front yard and watch the blue of the sky shift beyond the leaves of the trees. In the winter, I would bundle him up in so many layers he was nearly immobile. I loved him so much.
One day, after I had been Jaxson's nanny for a little more than nine months, his mom told me that she and Jaxson were moving to Costa Rica. Apparently, her family owned a vacation home in Costa Rica and she had decided on a whim to move there. I was shocked that she had so suddenly decided to move their lives across the nation, but I was more shocked that I would never see Jaxson again. Two months later, they were gone. I was unbelievably heartbroken, but also, in a way I was liberated. I was free to see my friends more often and didn't have to work every night. But I missed Jaxson terribly. I missed our routine and his laugh. I missed how he made me feel inside. The pain didn't last long. I felt like I'd had a puppy taken away from me. I loved him but I also began to realize, once he was gone, he had been such a burden in my life and had consumed nearly all of my time. I adjusted back to living a normal high school life and began to think about Jaxson less and less. Jaxson’s mom sent me one picture, it was of the two of them in a swimming pool, Jaxson was smiling his big goofy grin. He was tan and splashing. Years have passed, he must be about seven now. That’s crazy for me to think about. I wonder sometimes if he would remember me if I were to ever see him again. I'm glad he was such a large part of my life for a little while. I learned how to love and how to respect children and I learned an appreciation for the freedom I still have without a child of my own.
He was the love of my life. I dedicated almost every day to him. I would leave school and immediately drive to pick him up from daycare. We would go home and make dinner, play with his toys that recited the alphabet and mimicked animal sounds. I cut his hot dogs into tiny triangles, always petrified he would choke on to big of a bite. Every night I put him to bed and he fell asleep to country music on station 93.1, Kyss FM. I fell asleep shortly after he did, on the large leather couch that he loved to climb on. His mom was a bartender and would come home in the late hours of the night. She would wake me gently and I would tell her about the day that Jaxson and I had shared. I wanted him as my own. He was so sweet and calm. His thin blond hair and blue eyes melted my heart. I was so young but because of Jaxson, I developed cravings to have a child of my own. He and I would lay in a hammock in the front yard and watch the blue of the sky shift beyond the leaves of the trees. In the winter, I would bundle him up in so many layers he was nearly immobile. I loved him so much.
One day, after I had been Jaxson's nanny for a little more than nine months, his mom told me that she and Jaxson were moving to Costa Rica. Apparently, her family owned a vacation home in Costa Rica and she had decided on a whim to move there. I was shocked that she had so suddenly decided to move their lives across the nation, but I was more shocked that I would never see Jaxson again. Two months later, they were gone. I was unbelievably heartbroken, but also, in a way I was liberated. I was free to see my friends more often and didn't have to work every night. But I missed Jaxson terribly. I missed our routine and his laugh. I missed how he made me feel inside. The pain didn't last long. I felt like I'd had a puppy taken away from me. I loved him but I also began to realize, once he was gone, he had been such a burden in my life and had consumed nearly all of my time. I adjusted back to living a normal high school life and began to think about Jaxson less and less. Jaxson’s mom sent me one picture, it was of the two of them in a swimming pool, Jaxson was smiling his big goofy grin. He was tan and splashing. Years have passed, he must be about seven now. That’s crazy for me to think about. I wonder sometimes if he would remember me if I were to ever see him again. I'm glad he was such a large part of my life for a little while. I learned how to love and how to respect children and I learned an appreciation for the freedom I still have without a child of my own.
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Megan and Michael
There were two people I met during my high school career that changed my life significantly more than anyone else. They weren’t the boys I dated or the best friends that I made. They weren’t even the teachers I had or adult figures I looked up to. No, Megan and Michael were just six and nine when I spent the summer before my junior year with them and they were the two most inspirational people I grew to know in my four years of high school.
“You need to be prepared when you see her,” my mom said to me. “She looks shocking.” I shrugged it off, I imagined it couldn’t be worse than anything I’d seen on TV. My mom’s best friend, Vicky, was taking care of a woman dying from liver cancer. She was in denial, somehow she hadn’t accepted her fast approaching death despite the tumor that had swelled her failing liver to thirteen times it’s normal size. When I finally did meet her, I realized that my mom was right. I had to consciously control my facial expression when I saw her stomach. Her liver was filling it and it hung down over her thighs. But besides her bloated middle, the poor woman’s body was emaciated. She wouldn’t live much longer.
Megan and Michael seemed strangely detached from their mothers deteriorating condition. She was a single mom and was still living at home with both of them. Vicky was going in and out daily, helping take care of her, as was my mom and other friends and volunteers. However, I began to get the feeling that Megan and Michael contributed most of the care.
I was sixteen and jumped at the chance to help two kids whose mother was dying. “Just hang out with them,” Vicky told me. “Give them a chance to be kids.” While their mom went to chemo, we went hiking. I packed lunches, salami sandwiches and animal crackers. While their mom slipped away day by day, we went to the lake and floated down the river on inner-tubes. I took them to the counselor once a week, each time they would come out with grins on their faces. They always said how much they loved their psychiatrist.
One morning Megan found her mom unconscious on the floor of the bathroom. We went out for ice-cream that day and Megan and Michael were nothing but smiles. I began to realize that these two kids were the strongest people I had ever met. They had become accustomed to the painful appearance of their own mom. There was a little furrow that had appeared across Megan’s forehead, a wrinkle most likely caused by stress. She was only six and she had developed a stress line on her face, but I never once saw her cry. They experience was undoubtedly hard on both children, impossibly hard, but they bounced. They appeared happy when we were together, they laughed and played just like kids. Maybe they compartmentalized, maybe they suppressed their fears and tears. But I believe that they found the ability to truly feel happy while their mother died in front of their eyes. And to me, it was inspiration in a time of grief.
A few weeks later, their mother passed away. I didn’t see them after that, they moved away with family, to a new school and a new life. All alone without their mother. It’s been five years now and I know that two of the strongest kids have grown into two caring, happy and brave teenagers. I still think about them, and I still wonder how I would hold up if I had to go through what they did.
“You need to be prepared when you see her,” my mom said to me. “She looks shocking.” I shrugged it off, I imagined it couldn’t be worse than anything I’d seen on TV. My mom’s best friend, Vicky, was taking care of a woman dying from liver cancer. She was in denial, somehow she hadn’t accepted her fast approaching death despite the tumor that had swelled her failing liver to thirteen times it’s normal size. When I finally did meet her, I realized that my mom was right. I had to consciously control my facial expression when I saw her stomach. Her liver was filling it and it hung down over her thighs. But besides her bloated middle, the poor woman’s body was emaciated. She wouldn’t live much longer.
Megan and Michael seemed strangely detached from their mothers deteriorating condition. She was a single mom and was still living at home with both of them. Vicky was going in and out daily, helping take care of her, as was my mom and other friends and volunteers. However, I began to get the feeling that Megan and Michael contributed most of the care.
I was sixteen and jumped at the chance to help two kids whose mother was dying. “Just hang out with them,” Vicky told me. “Give them a chance to be kids.” While their mom went to chemo, we went hiking. I packed lunches, salami sandwiches and animal crackers. While their mom slipped away day by day, we went to the lake and floated down the river on inner-tubes. I took them to the counselor once a week, each time they would come out with grins on their faces. They always said how much they loved their psychiatrist.
One morning Megan found her mom unconscious on the floor of the bathroom. We went out for ice-cream that day and Megan and Michael were nothing but smiles. I began to realize that these two kids were the strongest people I had ever met. They had become accustomed to the painful appearance of their own mom. There was a little furrow that had appeared across Megan’s forehead, a wrinkle most likely caused by stress. She was only six and she had developed a stress line on her face, but I never once saw her cry. They experience was undoubtedly hard on both children, impossibly hard, but they bounced. They appeared happy when we were together, they laughed and played just like kids. Maybe they compartmentalized, maybe they suppressed their fears and tears. But I believe that they found the ability to truly feel happy while their mother died in front of their eyes. And to me, it was inspiration in a time of grief.
A few weeks later, their mother passed away. I didn’t see them after that, they moved away with family, to a new school and a new life. All alone without their mother. It’s been five years now and I know that two of the strongest kids have grown into two caring, happy and brave teenagers. I still think about them, and I still wonder how I would hold up if I had to go through what they did.
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Rodney
On a Saturday night a creature crept amongst the ripe tomatoes, speckled bananas and waxy jalapeños in a basket on our kitchen counter. It was dark and chilly in our house when I muted Law and Order and padded silently into the kitchen with bare feet to scrounge hopelessly for a snack of sorts. Little did I know but the creature was there. In our kitchen. Tail hanging over the edge of the fruit basket, about to be caught red-handed stealing mouthfuls of hot pepper. Light cast down upon the creature as I carelessly flipped the switch, my pupils dilated then focused. The little bastard stared me straight in the eye, sniffed twice (rather haughtily) and then made his break for the back of the stove. Well of course I screamed. I’m rather ashamed to admit that I also leapt upon a chair in fright and was looking about frantically when my roommate dashed to my rescue. Following my sputtered explanation, quite the ruckus ensued in our house, this was a big deal to say the least. We were experiencing our very first mouse in our very first house.
“You know . . . Mice don’t have bladders,” my sister would later tell me over the phone. “They track footprints of urine everywhere they go.” So there we stood, in our urine covered kitchen, a broom clutched threateningly in my hand and the dust pan (to sweep the carcass into after I bashed it?) raised protectively in my roommate, Autumn’s hand. Where was the little intruder? Our ears strained to hear minute mouse movements. Where had he been? Had we been eating food tracked with tiny footprints of mouse urine? Amid our crisis we decided there was but one thing to do. I picked up my phone and I speed-dialed Rodney.
Now Rodney is an interesting character to say the least. We were first introduced to him in September when we moved into the house we are currently renting. I remember him knocking on the door one afternoon. It was a little jingle he tapped with his knuckles and I found it odd as I opened the door and took in the sight of him. He wore an old and faded Hawaiian shirt with the sleeves cutoff. His bright green running shorts blew gently in the wind and flaunted more than a bit of tanned thigh. He was old. A Vietnam vet I would come to learn. His hair was white and always combed down with water when he came to visit us. His nose was very large and lumpy looking. He held his hand out to me, stuck it in through the edge of the door and announced, “Hi, I’m Rodney. I live upstairs, I’m your neighbor.” It was the beginning of a short but lovely friendship between Rodney, Autumn and I.
Rodney had been a big help to us in the first few months that we lived in the house below his apartment. We would see him wander by our windows in the late afternoon, picking up pieces of trash from our front yard and he would always hoot out a hello and raise his old hand high for a little wave. He once asked me to help him become acquainted with his new cell phone. “I hate these damn things,” Rodney said. “I ain’t never had one but you know, I guess it’s time I get one.” After that, I frequently saw him wandering outside the house in the late evenings in his green shorts, yackin’ on his phone to someone or another. He would see me and give me a wave and a hoot, I think he came to appreciate his new phone.
It was late in the evening when I called him on his phone to come downstairs fast and help us with our mouse. He didn’t answer and I listened to his voicemail that I had helped him program as I clutched the broom in apprehension. We were still standing in the kitchen when he called me back. I answered breathlessly.
“Hello?” I said.
“What!” he barked menacingly.
“Rodney! I just saw a mouse! We have a mouse in our house!”
“What?! I can’t hear ya!”
Rodney was drunk.
“Rodney, there is a mouse in our house. We don’t know what to do.”
“You got a mouse?”
“Yes Rodney.”
“Well I got a gun.”
“No Rodney, no gun. I don’t think that’s the answer for just a little mouse.”
“I’m comin’ down!”
Much to our relief Rodney came down twenty-five minutes later holding a flashlight instead of a gun. He reeked of booze but his hair had been wetted and combed down carefully. Rodney spent a five minutes poking around in our cupboards. No mouse. Autumn and I stood by tensely, she with the dust pan clutched to her chest, me with the broom handle clutched to mine.
“Well girls, I just don’t see nothing’,” Rodney said. “It’s just a little mouse, it won’t do you no harm.”
The three of us sat down in the living room and Rodney began to explain to us that the solution to removing the mouse was to get a cat. We patiently explained back that we couldn’t adopt a cat due to allergies and perhaps a nice mouse trap would suffice? “No mousetraps!” He bellowed. “No, no mousetraps! You get yourselves a cat you hear? Don’t go using no mousetraps.”
Eventually we ushered him out of our house and sent him back upstairs to bed. Soon after we leapt into our Autumns car and drove to Wal-mart to buy a four-pack of mousetraps. The following day, Rodney came meandering past our window, shaded his eyes with his hand to see inside and gave us a little wave. We met him at the door and welcomed him in, explained that there had been no sign of the mouse since last night. Meanwhile, little did he know but there was two mousetraps set and waiting in a dark corner of our cupboard, one with peanut butter and one with feta (incase it had a more refined palate). “Man, I tell you what, if only I was younger when I met you two girls,” Rodney said. “I tell you what, you two girls are something else. Real nice girls.” We loved Rodney. Suddenly, I sat up abruptly. Fully alert. Had she heard it? She had, Autumn was staring back at me with wide eyes. The sound of the mousetrap snapping was unmistakable. Rodney rambled on about his old Vietnam days while we stared at each other and exchanged silent communication. Could we tell him what had just happened? No, we couldn’t tell him, he had been so adamant about not buying mousetraps.
“You have to go Rodney,” I said. He looked slightly bewildered as we rushed him out of our house.
Peeking into the cupboard, there he was. The little mouse who had eaten our jalapeños. It was almost sad, seeing his crippled little body. After all, he had been our mouse, almost a guest in our home. These thoughts were still lingering in our minds when we walked back to the living room and were just sitting down when a second mousetrap snapped. Could we possibly have more than one mouse?
This story goes on to encompass many, many more mice, a full on infestation you could say. Our cupboard became a battle zone, mouse droppings, bits of fur, it was a regular bloodbath. We caught mouse after mouse, set trap after trap. One horrific night a mouse scampered across my roommates body in bed. We became professionals at bating and killing the rodents that mysteriously intruded our home. Rodney never found out about our slaying technique but he did occasionally call me late at night, offering to role me a blunt to “help me relax and not worry about that darn mouse.” One day, when the mice stopped coming, Rodney no longer lived upstairs. He had left. Just like that. It was awhile before we noticed that we hadn’t seen him chatting away on his cell phone, or giving us a wave through the front window. We learned that Rodney had cancer. When it was discovered, Rodney’s brother bought him a condo and without a word, Rodney moved away. The mice don’t come around anymore, not after we snuffed out their little souls in our kitchen cabinet. We had gotten used to checking and setting the traps morning and night, the mice had become part of our daily routine, as had Rodney. He made us feel at home living in the new house, checked up on us, visited and laughed with us in his Hawaiin cutoff. When he was gone new people moved in to replace him. We don’t know who they are, we have never talked to them. Someone told us they were dealing drugs from the upstairs apartment. As for Autumn and I, well sometimes we just wish the mice would come back. And Rodney too.
“You know . . . Mice don’t have bladders,” my sister would later tell me over the phone. “They track footprints of urine everywhere they go.” So there we stood, in our urine covered kitchen, a broom clutched threateningly in my hand and the dust pan (to sweep the carcass into after I bashed it?) raised protectively in my roommate, Autumn’s hand. Where was the little intruder? Our ears strained to hear minute mouse movements. Where had he been? Had we been eating food tracked with tiny footprints of mouse urine? Amid our crisis we decided there was but one thing to do. I picked up my phone and I speed-dialed Rodney.
Now Rodney is an interesting character to say the least. We were first introduced to him in September when we moved into the house we are currently renting. I remember him knocking on the door one afternoon. It was a little jingle he tapped with his knuckles and I found it odd as I opened the door and took in the sight of him. He wore an old and faded Hawaiian shirt with the sleeves cutoff. His bright green running shorts blew gently in the wind and flaunted more than a bit of tanned thigh. He was old. A Vietnam vet I would come to learn. His hair was white and always combed down with water when he came to visit us. His nose was very large and lumpy looking. He held his hand out to me, stuck it in through the edge of the door and announced, “Hi, I’m Rodney. I live upstairs, I’m your neighbor.” It was the beginning of a short but lovely friendship between Rodney, Autumn and I.
Rodney had been a big help to us in the first few months that we lived in the house below his apartment. We would see him wander by our windows in the late afternoon, picking up pieces of trash from our front yard and he would always hoot out a hello and raise his old hand high for a little wave. He once asked me to help him become acquainted with his new cell phone. “I hate these damn things,” Rodney said. “I ain’t never had one but you know, I guess it’s time I get one.” After that, I frequently saw him wandering outside the house in the late evenings in his green shorts, yackin’ on his phone to someone or another. He would see me and give me a wave and a hoot, I think he came to appreciate his new phone.
It was late in the evening when I called him on his phone to come downstairs fast and help us with our mouse. He didn’t answer and I listened to his voicemail that I had helped him program as I clutched the broom in apprehension. We were still standing in the kitchen when he called me back. I answered breathlessly.
“Hello?” I said.
“What!” he barked menacingly.
“Rodney! I just saw a mouse! We have a mouse in our house!”
“What?! I can’t hear ya!”
Rodney was drunk.
“Rodney, there is a mouse in our house. We don’t know what to do.”
“You got a mouse?”
“Yes Rodney.”
“Well I got a gun.”
“No Rodney, no gun. I don’t think that’s the answer for just a little mouse.”
“I’m comin’ down!”
Much to our relief Rodney came down twenty-five minutes later holding a flashlight instead of a gun. He reeked of booze but his hair had been wetted and combed down carefully. Rodney spent a five minutes poking around in our cupboards. No mouse. Autumn and I stood by tensely, she with the dust pan clutched to her chest, me with the broom handle clutched to mine.
“Well girls, I just don’t see nothing’,” Rodney said. “It’s just a little mouse, it won’t do you no harm.”
The three of us sat down in the living room and Rodney began to explain to us that the solution to removing the mouse was to get a cat. We patiently explained back that we couldn’t adopt a cat due to allergies and perhaps a nice mouse trap would suffice? “No mousetraps!” He bellowed. “No, no mousetraps! You get yourselves a cat you hear? Don’t go using no mousetraps.”
Eventually we ushered him out of our house and sent him back upstairs to bed. Soon after we leapt into our Autumns car and drove to Wal-mart to buy a four-pack of mousetraps. The following day, Rodney came meandering past our window, shaded his eyes with his hand to see inside and gave us a little wave. We met him at the door and welcomed him in, explained that there had been no sign of the mouse since last night. Meanwhile, little did he know but there was two mousetraps set and waiting in a dark corner of our cupboard, one with peanut butter and one with feta (incase it had a more refined palate). “Man, I tell you what, if only I was younger when I met you two girls,” Rodney said. “I tell you what, you two girls are something else. Real nice girls.” We loved Rodney. Suddenly, I sat up abruptly. Fully alert. Had she heard it? She had, Autumn was staring back at me with wide eyes. The sound of the mousetrap snapping was unmistakable. Rodney rambled on about his old Vietnam days while we stared at each other and exchanged silent communication. Could we tell him what had just happened? No, we couldn’t tell him, he had been so adamant about not buying mousetraps.
“You have to go Rodney,” I said. He looked slightly bewildered as we rushed him out of our house.
Peeking into the cupboard, there he was. The little mouse who had eaten our jalapeños. It was almost sad, seeing his crippled little body. After all, he had been our mouse, almost a guest in our home. These thoughts were still lingering in our minds when we walked back to the living room and were just sitting down when a second mousetrap snapped. Could we possibly have more than one mouse?
This story goes on to encompass many, many more mice, a full on infestation you could say. Our cupboard became a battle zone, mouse droppings, bits of fur, it was a regular bloodbath. We caught mouse after mouse, set trap after trap. One horrific night a mouse scampered across my roommates body in bed. We became professionals at bating and killing the rodents that mysteriously intruded our home. Rodney never found out about our slaying technique but he did occasionally call me late at night, offering to role me a blunt to “help me relax and not worry about that darn mouse.” One day, when the mice stopped coming, Rodney no longer lived upstairs. He had left. Just like that. It was awhile before we noticed that we hadn’t seen him chatting away on his cell phone, or giving us a wave through the front window. We learned that Rodney had cancer. When it was discovered, Rodney’s brother bought him a condo and without a word, Rodney moved away. The mice don’t come around anymore, not after we snuffed out their little souls in our kitchen cabinet. We had gotten used to checking and setting the traps morning and night, the mice had become part of our daily routine, as had Rodney. He made us feel at home living in the new house, checked up on us, visited and laughed with us in his Hawaiin cutoff. When he was gone new people moved in to replace him. We don’t know who they are, we have never talked to them. Someone told us they were dealing drugs from the upstairs apartment. As for Autumn and I, well sometimes we just wish the mice would come back. And Rodney too.
Friday, February 11, 2011
The Old Man
Victor Montana’s population was 854 ten years ago. It’s 856 today because Darcy LeRaye had herself some twins a few years back. Darcy is a single mother and waitresses at a little café called The Brand and it’s a place that I know good and well. Well I guess it’s a place I knew good and well because ever since I lit outta Victor I never thought twice about The Brand or anything else that made me into who I am today. It’s like I stopped growin’ up that day and became grown up as soon as my tires aimed south and spit dust. But it’s funny how you can make a plan and it all goes wrong and you can dream something and the world just wags it’s finger in your face. I ended up back in Victor because I reckon I got myself lost and confused and didn’t I have enough confidence to walk both my feet forward. I didn’t want to end up back at home and I didn’t want to end up eating at The Brand again but that’s what happened to me.
It’s the only place in Victor besides the grocery where you can get food on a Sunday and my friends were lugging me along to grab some grub after a late Saturday night. They thought it was cute how we sat at the same table that we used to all those years ago. It’s got a picture on the wall next to the table of a little boy riding high up on a horse, his little legs stickin’ out perpendicular over the horses back because they’re to short and the horse is to wide. I get real sentimental about stuff like that, stuff like reminiscing and déjà vu. I didn’t feel much of anything as I sat there, a little perhaps, like I wished deep down that I was still a kid and I hadn’t gotten as old as I was.
It was ‘99 and we rolled up to The Brand on a rusted green riding lawn mower. We must have put one thousand miles or more and that old rattle trap by the end of the summer. That mower coulda taken us to the moon and back if we’d known the way. Before that summer we always rode our bikes everywhere we went, but the summer of ‘99 is when we really started riding in style. It was about a mile and a half into “town,” consisting of a grocery, a hardware store, a casino, a dentist/doctors office, a hair salon, and The Brand. Every Sunday morning the three of us, Sunni, Amy and I had a tradition. We would wake up early, fire up the mower, and head on into town to eat early bird breakfast at The Brand. We headed a cloud of dust the size of Mt. St. Helens, scaring every cow in the fields we passed with Sunni and I perched up on the back and Amy going strong at the wheel. Roaring at a steady seven miles an hour , it took us a solid twenty fifteen minutes to get to The Brand. We’d park our mower in the same slot every week, next to rusty bailing trucks with panting cattle dogs in the back.
I remember the last Sunday we ate at The Brand because it’s pretty near the most crazy thing that ever did happen to me. It happened halfway through our Buckaroo Burritos. Contentedly absorbed in stuffing our faces, we didn’t notice a plastic packet of grape jelly come sailing over the high-backed booth until it landed in Amy’s eggs and splattered Tabasco sauce onto her shirt. Forks poised halfway to our mouths, we froze and starred at the object as if it were a bomb. At a loss of what to do, Amy suspiciously removed the packet of jelly from her plate and we resumed eating. Well it wasn’t five minutes later that a second grape jelly flew gracefully over the booth and landed squarely in Sunni’s glass of milk. Three baffled faces crowded around the rim of the glass and pondered the object bobbing gently within it. Since I am the shortest and the youngest out of the three of us, I was nominated to find the answer as to what was sending jellies over the booth at us. After a few minutes of argument, I heaved a sigh, shimmied over to Amy’s side of the table, and standing on the seat, I peeked over the edge of the booth. Facing me was a young couple and a baby in a highchair, across from them with their back to our booth was an elderly couple, most likely the parents of one of the younger persons. The young couple and the elderly woman chatted pleasantly and crooned at the baby as it waved a spoon in the air. None of them seemed to notice the old man, however, who was hunched over and concentrating on the utensils in front of him. As I watched, straining to see over his bony shoulder, he placed an object on the curved part of his fork, hit the opposite end with his fist and sent a jelly nearly ricocheting off of my forehead. I gave a little scream and hustled back down to the table to report back to Amy and Sunni’s anxious faces. Never one to miss out on an adventurous opportunity, we promptly agreed to launch defensive fire. Sunni licked her spoon clean, grabbed a jelly, and placing it in the hollow of the spoon pounded the opposite end with her fist. The spoon flipped wildly through the air and bounced off the wall, while the jelly shot upward, hit the ceiling and came crashing back down onto our table. A dry reedy laugh cackled from the opposing booth and the same dry voice announced “you have to use a fork!” This declaration was followed with a bombardment of three more jellies, a packet of half-and-half, and more reedy laughter. Engrossed now, we grabbed up forks and started shooting jellies in every direction. The harder we tried, the more disastrous our attempts became. Meanwhile, the young couple and the old woman carried on in casual conversation as if nothing were happening. Fifteen minutes later, our waitress marched over to our table and informed us that we needed to excuse ourselves from the restaurant. In one last attempt Amy placed a jelly on the end of her fork. As if in slow motion the jelly sailed neatly over the back of our booth and landed with a satisfying smack on the opposite side. Immediately afterward, the wails of a baby erupted, the waitress spun to face us, and the dry reedy voice announced, “Ya hit tha baybay!” We made our break to the lawnmower and sped back to the farm as fast as we could go, given the nature of our transportation.
After that we were to scared to go to The Brand anymore, we had never been thrown out of anyplace before. Gradually our parking spot was filled and a while later, we forgot all about the café where our names were carved on the corner booth.
Looking back it’s hard to imagine I couldn’t care about a place like that. It meant so much back then. I’ll bet it meant more to me then, than anything that makes me feel today. I only wish I coulda held on, grabbed that place and wrapped myself up in it till nothing could hurt me and the world could only see that wars should be fought with jelly. Maybe it hasn’t been long enough, maybe one day I’ll go back to The Brand and those greasy Buckaroo Burritos will taste as good as they did during the summer of ‘99.
It’s the only place in Victor besides the grocery where you can get food on a Sunday and my friends were lugging me along to grab some grub after a late Saturday night. They thought it was cute how we sat at the same table that we used to all those years ago. It’s got a picture on the wall next to the table of a little boy riding high up on a horse, his little legs stickin’ out perpendicular over the horses back because they’re to short and the horse is to wide. I get real sentimental about stuff like that, stuff like reminiscing and déjà vu. I didn’t feel much of anything as I sat there, a little perhaps, like I wished deep down that I was still a kid and I hadn’t gotten as old as I was.
It was ‘99 and we rolled up to The Brand on a rusted green riding lawn mower. We must have put one thousand miles or more and that old rattle trap by the end of the summer. That mower coulda taken us to the moon and back if we’d known the way. Before that summer we always rode our bikes everywhere we went, but the summer of ‘99 is when we really started riding in style. It was about a mile and a half into “town,” consisting of a grocery, a hardware store, a casino, a dentist/doctors office, a hair salon, and The Brand. Every Sunday morning the three of us, Sunni, Amy and I had a tradition. We would wake up early, fire up the mower, and head on into town to eat early bird breakfast at The Brand. We headed a cloud of dust the size of Mt. St. Helens, scaring every cow in the fields we passed with Sunni and I perched up on the back and Amy going strong at the wheel. Roaring at a steady seven miles an hour , it took us a solid twenty fifteen minutes to get to The Brand. We’d park our mower in the same slot every week, next to rusty bailing trucks with panting cattle dogs in the back.
I remember the last Sunday we ate at The Brand because it’s pretty near the most crazy thing that ever did happen to me. It happened halfway through our Buckaroo Burritos. Contentedly absorbed in stuffing our faces, we didn’t notice a plastic packet of grape jelly come sailing over the high-backed booth until it landed in Amy’s eggs and splattered Tabasco sauce onto her shirt. Forks poised halfway to our mouths, we froze and starred at the object as if it were a bomb. At a loss of what to do, Amy suspiciously removed the packet of jelly from her plate and we resumed eating. Well it wasn’t five minutes later that a second grape jelly flew gracefully over the booth and landed squarely in Sunni’s glass of milk. Three baffled faces crowded around the rim of the glass and pondered the object bobbing gently within it. Since I am the shortest and the youngest out of the three of us, I was nominated to find the answer as to what was sending jellies over the booth at us. After a few minutes of argument, I heaved a sigh, shimmied over to Amy’s side of the table, and standing on the seat, I peeked over the edge of the booth. Facing me was a young couple and a baby in a highchair, across from them with their back to our booth was an elderly couple, most likely the parents of one of the younger persons. The young couple and the elderly woman chatted pleasantly and crooned at the baby as it waved a spoon in the air. None of them seemed to notice the old man, however, who was hunched over and concentrating on the utensils in front of him. As I watched, straining to see over his bony shoulder, he placed an object on the curved part of his fork, hit the opposite end with his fist and sent a jelly nearly ricocheting off of my forehead. I gave a little scream and hustled back down to the table to report back to Amy and Sunni’s anxious faces. Never one to miss out on an adventurous opportunity, we promptly agreed to launch defensive fire. Sunni licked her spoon clean, grabbed a jelly, and placing it in the hollow of the spoon pounded the opposite end with her fist. The spoon flipped wildly through the air and bounced off the wall, while the jelly shot upward, hit the ceiling and came crashing back down onto our table. A dry reedy laugh cackled from the opposing booth and the same dry voice announced “you have to use a fork!” This declaration was followed with a bombardment of three more jellies, a packet of half-and-half, and more reedy laughter. Engrossed now, we grabbed up forks and started shooting jellies in every direction. The harder we tried, the more disastrous our attempts became. Meanwhile, the young couple and the old woman carried on in casual conversation as if nothing were happening. Fifteen minutes later, our waitress marched over to our table and informed us that we needed to excuse ourselves from the restaurant. In one last attempt Amy placed a jelly on the end of her fork. As if in slow motion the jelly sailed neatly over the back of our booth and landed with a satisfying smack on the opposite side. Immediately afterward, the wails of a baby erupted, the waitress spun to face us, and the dry reedy voice announced, “Ya hit tha baybay!” We made our break to the lawnmower and sped back to the farm as fast as we could go, given the nature of our transportation.
After that we were to scared to go to The Brand anymore, we had never been thrown out of anyplace before. Gradually our parking spot was filled and a while later, we forgot all about the café where our names were carved on the corner booth.
Looking back it’s hard to imagine I couldn’t care about a place like that. It meant so much back then. I’ll bet it meant more to me then, than anything that makes me feel today. I only wish I coulda held on, grabbed that place and wrapped myself up in it till nothing could hurt me and the world could only see that wars should be fought with jelly. Maybe it hasn’t been long enough, maybe one day I’ll go back to The Brand and those greasy Buckaroo Burritos will taste as good as they did during the summer of ‘99.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Finnish Women
I’ve been traveling for eighteen hours when I meet a girl with a classic Nordic appearance who is beautiful without makeup or accessory. The Finnish are beautiful people. Their country is thickly forested with numerous large lakes and a lively population of healthy mosquitoes. Second to Japanese, the Finnish language consists of the highest percentage of vowel use. She tells me this in mild conversation and I listen to a continual flow of melodious vowels and gentle undertones broken by guttural ka’s.
It is a tiny wooden house on the lake’s edge that she takes me to. She gives me a robe and I don’t know where it came from and I don’t care. I shadow her motions as we step inside. My senses are heightened as I follow her lead and I am acutely conscious of the outcome of my unfolding actions. I have become aware that I will be in fact, truly bathing with this girl and am relieved that I do not feel nervous and was never one of reserve. She begins to take off her clothes shamelessly, I hang back, trying to stay one step behind her. She takes off her shirt, so do I, ties her hair up, so do I. Preoccupied with averting my eyes from her body, I am unaware of my own nakedness. The Finnish do not understand modesty. Embarrassment is embarrassing. In her accent and rolling syllables she asks “Why are people shy?” It’s meant as a statement and she touches the side of my waist, “You have a beautiful body. We all have the same. We all are the same no?” We turn to the heavy wooden door, I push, am supposed to pull. The wood under my hand is warm and the air behind it is as thick and moist as Asian rain. A variety of bodies and a wave of wet heat hover before me and without hesitation I step into the enveloping warmth of foreign tradition. Women’s voices filter through a haze of sodden air and dissolve into the wooden walls. Everything is wood. The sauna is similar to a small log cabin, thick pine logs stacked on top of each other into a low ceiling. If I was taller I would have to bow my head like some of the other women. Women of various ages, all who are beautiful in a state of conventional ambiance, all who are naked except one girl who is wearing a bikini. She is so clearly American and stands out like red in a room. They are embarrassed for her and avert their eyes as if she were the one who was naked and everyone else clothed, but no one says anything. They are polite as is the way with so many foreign cultures. “It is better than American spa yes? The air is so fresh” the Nordic girl says in my ear, beckoning with her hands, combing them through the syrupy air, speaking close to me as if the density of the billowing steam reverberates sound.
Light strains through a single window and rivulets of condensation allow me to glimpse the lake outside. There are many summer houses dotting the shore of this lake and the many other lakes in Finland. Saunas are everywhere, in almost every household, and usually within a few feet of the lakes edge. Steps lead directly from the door of the sauna into the water. There are more steps to, which I will climb to the second level inside the sauna. Near the door, they are wet, the wood slimy underfoot, but the air is a bit lighter here and women sit thigh to thigh facing each other on parallel benches. The intimacy of bathing together is apparent through the manner of conversation held on these benches. They discuss things that make them feel; events that occurred in their day, their children, places they go, places they want to go. Men. I listen to them laugh, my hair hanging in wet strips around my face. I am the only person in the sauna with dark hair and this is the only factor that reminds me that I haven’t grown up in this culture, that this is something I have never done before. Sweat is seeping out of me now, running down my back, creasing through my eyelids, dripping off my nose, tracing down my shoulder. More hands throw water onto the stove and it screams off the hot metal, exploding into the stifling air. The heat is to intense for me now and I stand up from the benches where the women will remain to discuss delicate food.
Soon chunks of soap appear and when they do the air is sweetened. A homemade bar is pressed to my hand, it smells like flowers and lathers like whipped cream. Thick pale suds glide to the boards underfoot and elderly women hold the elbows of the more stable as to not slip on the wet rock, but I do. I slide and my hands grasp the wet bodies of strangers, with sweat in my eyes I cannot see them but I hear their kind laughter and it makes me forget that I have dark hair. I pick up a bristled brush from a bench and scrub the soap into circles on my skin. A woman touches my shoulder and offers to wash my back, I guess that she is about the age of my mother and I hand her the brush gratefully, hold my hair and shake my head when she asks if she rubs to hard. With her fingertips on my bare skin, I share a moment with this stranger, more intimate than any I’d ever shared with the very woman who gave birth to me. I fail to comprehend the gravity of the realization I’ve just made for I am drunk on the air, my inhalation and sight obstructed. I can feel the molecules of heavy air come in, my lungs hang with its weight and finally reject its moisture reluctantly through the back of my teeth.
We are going to rinse now, metal pans pass from hand to hand, some with hot water, some with cold that I can’t understand the origin of. I almost find myself surprised that this step is necessary, as if I expect to become cleaner and cleaner, building upon the process of bathing with these people, not conclude it, rinse it away, dry it off. Some have massaged the soaps lather into their hair and have to hang their heads upside down to rinse it free. I feel as though the very inside of my mouth is sweating and swallow with my lips together.
The atmosphere within the thick air is forgiving of not only appearance but of thoughts, manners, and mind-set. Everyone is welcome and included, absorbed into the Fin’s unguarded traditions. Strangers wash the backs of one another, and I think that maybe it’s the result of nudity that compassion circulates from one to the next. Passing by way of women, who don’t know me, women I don’t know, will never know, yet who share with me, an unrepeatable experience . When in sauna, one temporarily surrenders all concerns, these women gather to bathe, relax and rejuvenate. The lack of privacy within the walls of the tiny log cabin defends us, soap and sweat unite us, binding us together, a family of females. Simultaneously, in a wet mass, we struggle ourselves out, into the clear twilight, slipping in one another’s puddles and footprints, some diving head first, others stepping gingerly into the lake, into water so cold breath seizes inside me. And it is this moment, the revolution of bitter water consuming my body, striking the clarity of my conscience, that I realize I have just experienced for the first and hopefully last time in my life, a moment of absolute equivalence, felt thoroughly absent of all identity in a circumstance lacking even the slightest of criticisms. I have lived in a moment of entirety, I’ve experienced Finnish perfection, täydellisyys.
It is a tiny wooden house on the lake’s edge that she takes me to. She gives me a robe and I don’t know where it came from and I don’t care. I shadow her motions as we step inside. My senses are heightened as I follow her lead and I am acutely conscious of the outcome of my unfolding actions. I have become aware that I will be in fact, truly bathing with this girl and am relieved that I do not feel nervous and was never one of reserve. She begins to take off her clothes shamelessly, I hang back, trying to stay one step behind her. She takes off her shirt, so do I, ties her hair up, so do I. Preoccupied with averting my eyes from her body, I am unaware of my own nakedness. The Finnish do not understand modesty. Embarrassment is embarrassing. In her accent and rolling syllables she asks “Why are people shy?” It’s meant as a statement and she touches the side of my waist, “You have a beautiful body. We all have the same. We all are the same no?” We turn to the heavy wooden door, I push, am supposed to pull. The wood under my hand is warm and the air behind it is as thick and moist as Asian rain. A variety of bodies and a wave of wet heat hover before me and without hesitation I step into the enveloping warmth of foreign tradition. Women’s voices filter through a haze of sodden air and dissolve into the wooden walls. Everything is wood. The sauna is similar to a small log cabin, thick pine logs stacked on top of each other into a low ceiling. If I was taller I would have to bow my head like some of the other women. Women of various ages, all who are beautiful in a state of conventional ambiance, all who are naked except one girl who is wearing a bikini. She is so clearly American and stands out like red in a room. They are embarrassed for her and avert their eyes as if she were the one who was naked and everyone else clothed, but no one says anything. They are polite as is the way with so many foreign cultures. “It is better than American spa yes? The air is so fresh” the Nordic girl says in my ear, beckoning with her hands, combing them through the syrupy air, speaking close to me as if the density of the billowing steam reverberates sound.
Light strains through a single window and rivulets of condensation allow me to glimpse the lake outside. There are many summer houses dotting the shore of this lake and the many other lakes in Finland. Saunas are everywhere, in almost every household, and usually within a few feet of the lakes edge. Steps lead directly from the door of the sauna into the water. There are more steps to, which I will climb to the second level inside the sauna. Near the door, they are wet, the wood slimy underfoot, but the air is a bit lighter here and women sit thigh to thigh facing each other on parallel benches. The intimacy of bathing together is apparent through the manner of conversation held on these benches. They discuss things that make them feel; events that occurred in their day, their children, places they go, places they want to go. Men. I listen to them laugh, my hair hanging in wet strips around my face. I am the only person in the sauna with dark hair and this is the only factor that reminds me that I haven’t grown up in this culture, that this is something I have never done before. Sweat is seeping out of me now, running down my back, creasing through my eyelids, dripping off my nose, tracing down my shoulder. More hands throw water onto the stove and it screams off the hot metal, exploding into the stifling air. The heat is to intense for me now and I stand up from the benches where the women will remain to discuss delicate food.
Soon chunks of soap appear and when they do the air is sweetened. A homemade bar is pressed to my hand, it smells like flowers and lathers like whipped cream. Thick pale suds glide to the boards underfoot and elderly women hold the elbows of the more stable as to not slip on the wet rock, but I do. I slide and my hands grasp the wet bodies of strangers, with sweat in my eyes I cannot see them but I hear their kind laughter and it makes me forget that I have dark hair. I pick up a bristled brush from a bench and scrub the soap into circles on my skin. A woman touches my shoulder and offers to wash my back, I guess that she is about the age of my mother and I hand her the brush gratefully, hold my hair and shake my head when she asks if she rubs to hard. With her fingertips on my bare skin, I share a moment with this stranger, more intimate than any I’d ever shared with the very woman who gave birth to me. I fail to comprehend the gravity of the realization I’ve just made for I am drunk on the air, my inhalation and sight obstructed. I can feel the molecules of heavy air come in, my lungs hang with its weight and finally reject its moisture reluctantly through the back of my teeth.
We are going to rinse now, metal pans pass from hand to hand, some with hot water, some with cold that I can’t understand the origin of. I almost find myself surprised that this step is necessary, as if I expect to become cleaner and cleaner, building upon the process of bathing with these people, not conclude it, rinse it away, dry it off. Some have massaged the soaps lather into their hair and have to hang their heads upside down to rinse it free. I feel as though the very inside of my mouth is sweating and swallow with my lips together.
The atmosphere within the thick air is forgiving of not only appearance but of thoughts, manners, and mind-set. Everyone is welcome and included, absorbed into the Fin’s unguarded traditions. Strangers wash the backs of one another, and I think that maybe it’s the result of nudity that compassion circulates from one to the next. Passing by way of women, who don’t know me, women I don’t know, will never know, yet who share with me, an unrepeatable experience . When in sauna, one temporarily surrenders all concerns, these women gather to bathe, relax and rejuvenate. The lack of privacy within the walls of the tiny log cabin defends us, soap and sweat unite us, binding us together, a family of females. Simultaneously, in a wet mass, we struggle ourselves out, into the clear twilight, slipping in one another’s puddles and footprints, some diving head first, others stepping gingerly into the lake, into water so cold breath seizes inside me. And it is this moment, the revolution of bitter water consuming my body, striking the clarity of my conscience, that I realize I have just experienced for the first and hopefully last time in my life, a moment of absolute equivalence, felt thoroughly absent of all identity in a circumstance lacking even the slightest of criticisms. I have lived in a moment of entirety, I’ve experienced Finnish perfection, täydellisyys.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
President Clinton
It was summer of ‘98, years ago, hot as blue blazes and dry too. Dry enough to burn and it did. President Clinton had his ass in a sling from fooling around on his wife and lying about it or something. Lenny Kravitz released chart topper, American Woman, and it seemed kinda ironic, topping all the charts like it did. It was a real big deal but I didn’t give two beans about the whole thing. America was up in arms about this being their president and all but I had two best friends, a bike and ninety-four summer afternoons of freedom to fill with mischief. Clintons affair didn’t effect me none.
I pretty much lived at Amy’s house that summer. She was the tallest of our threesome and blonde. Her parents owned an organic dairy farm and they were about the best parents any kid could ask for. I wanted them as my parents that’s for sure because they never cared what we did. Me and Sunni, we were there all the time, all day, every night, and Amy’s parents never cared none. The only time we ever really saw her parents, either of them, was late at night when we would creep into the TV room where they watched SNL poke fun at the Clinton Lewinsky affair. That humor was way far over our heads and we never got what was so darn funny but we would lean against each other on the old futon, laugh when they laughed and fall asleep with bowls of popcorn spilling across our laps.
Those were about as close to the “good ole days” as I can remember back and boy did I ever have some fun. We were a few scrawny little girls, but healthy for sure from all that sunshine baking us brown as mud and all that exercise climbing trees and playing hide and seek in the hay bails. We had some record big bruises and slivers all up in our callus peeling hands. Our hair was always ratty, snatched back into ponytails. We had homemade popsicle juice dried to our cheeks and we never wore no shoes, not one day that whole blistering summer.
We’d gone and did some of the craziest stuff, life threatening stuff and we thought we were really living. I remember climbing out Amy’s bedroom window just for the fun of it and sitting on the roof watching the sky go by. We would chase and tease the bull, Shorty, till he was blowing steam and spitting fire and so mad he would have killed us for sure if we weren’t so fast and dodging. It was our job everyday to round in the cows for milking and we would grab some long sticks and a few dogs and Amy would yell “Round ‘em up Champie!” And I would laugh but I would yell it too, “Round ’em up Champie.”
We would grab right onto electric fences just because we dared each other to. Some days we would go out into the field where the lonely tractor butchered up the season crop and ground the soil until it smelled so rich and the alfalfa would be growing so high it was way over our heads and we would get lost and turned around to high heaven with only our voices to find one another. And some days we would just lay up on that roof and talk and talk and watch thin wisp clouds pass by the sun. We were wild as wolves back then, roaming all over every acre of the farm. We were fearless back then, really living back then.
I’d guess that was the funnest of all the fun I’ve ever had and it was also the end of the fun but I didn’t know it at the time. Or maybe I did know in the way that kids pick up on that kind of stuff. I’d never known any city life, didn’t know any gang, never heard a gunshot. My bare foot soles never ran across nothing but squishy manure and bouncy grass. I was still naïve to the wild world of skyscrapers and rush hour, I guess the world that President Clinton was off living in. But that wild world was creepin up on us because Amy’s parents, while never caring about what we did, were having a full blown affair in their marriage just like mister Clinton. I remember when Amy’s mom had to finally tell her about it and me and Sunni were there through it all, sitting right there on the staircase and watching through the railing Shoulder to shoulder, thigh to thigh, bony scraped knees touching, we heard Amy’s mom say that they were going away. And after that, after we sat on the roof for the last time and patted Amy while she cried, there was a divorce and so many more tears and just like that our fun was over. Amy moved away with her mom, off to a place where she had to wear shoes because there was more concrete than grass growing.
That’s when I finally knew why people were so up in arms about the Clinton scandal. It had meant something to me after all. It’d gone and snuck up on us and boy that kind of thing can really go and ruin something good. The backs of our minds picked up on it. We really didn’t want to know, we didn’t want it to happen, just wanted to keep having fun like we were meant to. But it happened the way it happened and sometimes when I think back to those times when we were wild and free and so young I miss it like the way I think homesickness would feel.
I pretty much lived at Amy’s house that summer. She was the tallest of our threesome and blonde. Her parents owned an organic dairy farm and they were about the best parents any kid could ask for. I wanted them as my parents that’s for sure because they never cared what we did. Me and Sunni, we were there all the time, all day, every night, and Amy’s parents never cared none. The only time we ever really saw her parents, either of them, was late at night when we would creep into the TV room where they watched SNL poke fun at the Clinton Lewinsky affair. That humor was way far over our heads and we never got what was so darn funny but we would lean against each other on the old futon, laugh when they laughed and fall asleep with bowls of popcorn spilling across our laps.
Those were about as close to the “good ole days” as I can remember back and boy did I ever have some fun. We were a few scrawny little girls, but healthy for sure from all that sunshine baking us brown as mud and all that exercise climbing trees and playing hide and seek in the hay bails. We had some record big bruises and slivers all up in our callus peeling hands. Our hair was always ratty, snatched back into ponytails. We had homemade popsicle juice dried to our cheeks and we never wore no shoes, not one day that whole blistering summer.
We’d gone and did some of the craziest stuff, life threatening stuff and we thought we were really living. I remember climbing out Amy’s bedroom window just for the fun of it and sitting on the roof watching the sky go by. We would chase and tease the bull, Shorty, till he was blowing steam and spitting fire and so mad he would have killed us for sure if we weren’t so fast and dodging. It was our job everyday to round in the cows for milking and we would grab some long sticks and a few dogs and Amy would yell “Round ‘em up Champie!” And I would laugh but I would yell it too, “Round ’em up Champie.”
We would grab right onto electric fences just because we dared each other to. Some days we would go out into the field where the lonely tractor butchered up the season crop and ground the soil until it smelled so rich and the alfalfa would be growing so high it was way over our heads and we would get lost and turned around to high heaven with only our voices to find one another. And some days we would just lay up on that roof and talk and talk and watch thin wisp clouds pass by the sun. We were wild as wolves back then, roaming all over every acre of the farm. We were fearless back then, really living back then.
I’d guess that was the funnest of all the fun I’ve ever had and it was also the end of the fun but I didn’t know it at the time. Or maybe I did know in the way that kids pick up on that kind of stuff. I’d never known any city life, didn’t know any gang, never heard a gunshot. My bare foot soles never ran across nothing but squishy manure and bouncy grass. I was still naïve to the wild world of skyscrapers and rush hour, I guess the world that President Clinton was off living in. But that wild world was creepin up on us because Amy’s parents, while never caring about what we did, were having a full blown affair in their marriage just like mister Clinton. I remember when Amy’s mom had to finally tell her about it and me and Sunni were there through it all, sitting right there on the staircase and watching through the railing Shoulder to shoulder, thigh to thigh, bony scraped knees touching, we heard Amy’s mom say that they were going away. And after that, after we sat on the roof for the last time and patted Amy while she cried, there was a divorce and so many more tears and just like that our fun was over. Amy moved away with her mom, off to a place where she had to wear shoes because there was more concrete than grass growing.
That’s when I finally knew why people were so up in arms about the Clinton scandal. It had meant something to me after all. It’d gone and snuck up on us and boy that kind of thing can really go and ruin something good. The backs of our minds picked up on it. We really didn’t want to know, we didn’t want it to happen, just wanted to keep having fun like we were meant to. But it happened the way it happened and sometimes when I think back to those times when we were wild and free and so young I miss it like the way I think homesickness would feel.
Monday, January 24, 2011
The Beginning
If I was to stand on my head
and tell you a story
from beginning to end
about my life, all my merit
the words they'd reach you
twisted and jilted, all but upside down
and you'll listen, you'll laugh
even shake your head but take the queue
for it's a tale of naked
genius
coincidence
crockery and coy
it's a tangled tangled tale that's touched you too
it's a finale and a parade
Santa Claus is real
wink at me blink at me
shake your head hard
but I'll change your life, over and again
like the tales I'm about to tell
within the yarns I'll unravel
moments of misery, mystery, chance to fate
it's tireless truth
forget me not, forever
I'll have my cake and eat it too
give thanks to the people
with more than I
who I write about, appreciate
admire and despise
and the moments
for me they've favored
I write about I'll write about
I'll draw the curtain
It's opinion, more than mostly truth
personal
these people I write about
the ones who changed my life
its naked genius
lightly in my direction
toward my ear
I'm upside down my lips talk toward your ankles
when life blinks
winks
welcome aboard
and tell you a story
from beginning to end
about my life, all my merit
the words they'd reach you
twisted and jilted, all but upside down
and you'll listen, you'll laugh
even shake your head but take the queue
for it's a tale of naked
genius
coincidence
crockery and coy
it's a tangled tangled tale that's touched you too
it's a finale and a parade
Santa Claus is real
wink at me blink at me
shake your head hard
but I'll change your life, over and again
like the tales I'm about to tell
within the yarns I'll unravel
moments of misery, mystery, chance to fate
it's tireless truth
forget me not, forever
I'll have my cake and eat it too
give thanks to the people
with more than I
who I write about, appreciate
admire and despise
and the moments
for me they've favored
I write about I'll write about
I'll draw the curtain
It's opinion, more than mostly truth
personal
these people I write about
the ones who changed my life
its naked genius
lightly in my direction
toward my ear
I'm upside down my lips talk toward your ankles
when life blinks
winks
welcome aboard
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