Write Procrastinator gave me this.
It's the last one I do...
Ten Years Ago:
I was struggling to raise my children on my own. I attended law courses on state grants to write my own briefs because I couldn't afford an attorney, I was depressed, and I burned furniture in the winter. Good times.
Five Things on Today's To-Do List:
1. Watch "La Vie en Rose"
2. Write something....oh, does this count?
3. Laundry
4. C & R day!
5. Pretend I'm productive
If I Were A Billionaire:
You mean when I'm a Billionaire (and now I have that stupid "If I Were a Rich Man" tune in my head)
Three Bad Habits:
1. I squeeze toothpaste from the middle of the tube.
2. I talk in films, doing the six degrees of separation thing and complaining about continuity.
3. I will not eat in front of people I don't know.
Five Places I've Lived:
1. Colorado
2. Mississippi
3. Arizona
4. Louisiana
5. New York
Five Jobs I've Had:
1. Demonstrating how to play a dulcimer at a shop in Grand Lake, Colorado.
2. Cooking lunch for a bank's employees
3. Production Stage Manager
4. Travel Agency Manager
5. Bingo Goddess
I'm NOT tagging.
Monday, May 12, 2008
Saturday, May 10, 2008
The Boy
There has been a hole in my life, during my time away.
The boys were here in New York, and I was miles and miles away from them... wondering how they were. I had the occasional thought, "Do they think of me, too?" After all, I am not family, I am not long in their lives... we spend a few hours together and then, I'm off to my little flat downstairs.
Today, I had a chance to see them for the first time since I returned home... I knocked, and my questions were answered. C called out, "Miss Quin! Dad! She's home, she's home!" and a small bundle of jeans and tshirt and deep, dark, red hair crawled up my legs, pulling himself into my arms, wrapping his own around my shoulders as he buried his face in my neck, saying my name over and over. He took my face in his hands, actually looking me in the eye, a difficult thing for him to do....."Oh, never leave me again, never, never, never!"
I rocked him, both of us in our different versions of separation from life, him with his touches of autism, me with my Asperger's, both of us afraid in so many ways of touch and fear of affection and not knowing how to interact and the ineptness that can overwhelm us.... we rocked there, as he wrapped himself around me much like the moonflower vines I love wrap around a post, and we crooned to each other. He whispered in my ear all the things he'd done while I was gone, along with the nocturnal habits of the aardvark, and how he'd seen one at the zoo--did I know they would pee to mark their territory?
We walked outside to look at how his new plastic alligator I brought him fit into the sandbox. R came home, sunny and open and gave hugs and thanks for his gift, dashing back inside to do what he does so well... be sunny and open and joyful.
C and I stayed outside a bit longer, discussing the lilac bushes and bumblebees vs wasps, why the flowers he had picked died, how he needed to put them in water...I told him where I had been... I told him I'd seen armadillos, and he asked if they were dead. "Yes, they were." He thought about that, and asked if the cars on the road had killed them. "Yes, they are too slow, C... it's a shame."
The subject was done then, asked and answered and done.... it was time for him to go spend the night with his aunt. I had to promise I'd be here when he returns tomorrow.
This makes things harder.... I'm told he had bad days in school when I was gone. He cried one night. I find in him the same connection on certain levels I have with The Investment, an instinctive understanding that is between us, based on our quirks. The idea of leaving him saddens me.
Who else will save their lost tooth in a ziplock bag for a week before putting it under their pillow, just so I can see it? Who will curl up with me, looking for films on youtube of dinosaurs and lions and will insist we watch the attack of the Indian Rhino 47 times a day? Who will dance with me when we watch "Move It" from Madagascar, and not think I dance funny? R sits and laughs at us, before he, too, joins in.
I speak softly around him. He finds ease around me.
We fit.
The boys were here in New York, and I was miles and miles away from them... wondering how they were. I had the occasional thought, "Do they think of me, too?" After all, I am not family, I am not long in their lives... we spend a few hours together and then, I'm off to my little flat downstairs.
Today, I had a chance to see them for the first time since I returned home... I knocked, and my questions were answered. C called out, "Miss Quin! Dad! She's home, she's home!" and a small bundle of jeans and tshirt and deep, dark, red hair crawled up my legs, pulling himself into my arms, wrapping his own around my shoulders as he buried his face in my neck, saying my name over and over. He took my face in his hands, actually looking me in the eye, a difficult thing for him to do....."Oh, never leave me again, never, never, never!"
I rocked him, both of us in our different versions of separation from life, him with his touches of autism, me with my Asperger's, both of us afraid in so many ways of touch and fear of affection and not knowing how to interact and the ineptness that can overwhelm us.... we rocked there, as he wrapped himself around me much like the moonflower vines I love wrap around a post, and we crooned to each other. He whispered in my ear all the things he'd done while I was gone, along with the nocturnal habits of the aardvark, and how he'd seen one at the zoo--did I know they would pee to mark their territory?
We walked outside to look at how his new plastic alligator I brought him fit into the sandbox. R came home, sunny and open and gave hugs and thanks for his gift, dashing back inside to do what he does so well... be sunny and open and joyful.
C and I stayed outside a bit longer, discussing the lilac bushes and bumblebees vs wasps, why the flowers he had picked died, how he needed to put them in water...I told him where I had been... I told him I'd seen armadillos, and he asked if they were dead. "Yes, they were." He thought about that, and asked if the cars on the road had killed them. "Yes, they are too slow, C... it's a shame."
The subject was done then, asked and answered and done.... it was time for him to go spend the night with his aunt. I had to promise I'd be here when he returns tomorrow.
This makes things harder.... I'm told he had bad days in school when I was gone. He cried one night. I find in him the same connection on certain levels I have with The Investment, an instinctive understanding that is between us, based on our quirks. The idea of leaving him saddens me.
Who else will save their lost tooth in a ziplock bag for a week before putting it under their pillow, just so I can see it? Who will curl up with me, looking for films on youtube of dinosaurs and lions and will insist we watch the attack of the Indian Rhino 47 times a day? Who will dance with me when we watch "Move It" from Madagascar, and not think I dance funny? R sits and laughs at us, before he, too, joins in.
I speak softly around him. He finds ease around me.
We fit.
Friday, May 9, 2008
Another Day, Another Flight
Car to plane to plane to bus to train to ferry to home.
An interesting week, indeed. It started with mother deciding I should drive from New Orleans to her home in Mississippi... me, the person who hasn't driven in almost a year, save the three block attempt in the fall, when a number of New York drivers told me I was #1 in their book of driving. Back when I stalled out the manual transmission I was driving, because I've not driven a manual transmission in donkey's years... and what does she drive?
A manual transmission VW. No, not a chicken killing machine, it's upgraded, but, it's got a clutch and you move the stick thing in the middle of the bump thing between the seats when the engine sounds as if it is going to come through the firewall.
My mother is a backseat driver. I was going too fast, too slow, I didn't check my mirrors enough, I was not paying attention to the magnolias in bloom,
the trucks that had tires bigger than we were nor her perfectly good family gossip that I've listened to so often, I know when she's going to take a breath.
She also is horrible about giving directions...
"Momma, there are three exits coming up...which one do I take?"
"Oh, any of them...no, wait, take the next one."
"This one coming up?"
"No, the next one after that! This is this one, that is the next one."
I drive past only to hear, "Oh, well, why didn't you turn there, it's a short cut."
And I know this, how?
I never did figure out the town of no theaters or WiFi.... there is no rhyme nor reason to the way the streets are laid out... the upside is, there is a WalMart, and the vet backed me up in telling mother to stop feeding the terrier table food. In a matter of days, she stopped scratching. The terrier, not mother. I think it was the fried sweet potato sticks that put me over the edge...seeing my once snappy New York Westie eating fried potato sticks was a bit much.
Mother is upset over the food restrictions...and I'm pretty sure she'll still sneak in a bowl of coffee to the dog every morning when they sit outside and watch the birds in the birdbath.
I wasn't there 24 hours, when I felt ill... this was before the dog eating the sweet potato sticks, and not due to my consuming my weight in boiled crawfish and loving my coffee and chicory.
I've had a fairly serious headache for a few weeks and put it off to allergies... long to short, I ended up in the hospital, with high blood pressure. Yet another pill to take, all of it traced to my missing thyroid. Crap food... I had to be tested one morning (they'd seen a shadow on my CAT, so, an MRI was done to make sure I didn't have a brain tumour). The kind nurses left my breakfast, so, I came back to cold toast and cold grits.
Did you know cold grits solidify to a form somewhat like a brick? You can actually pick up the entire mass from the bowl and eat it as if it were a sandwich.
I declined, and opted for the yummy cold coffee. Twenty four hours there, and they released me... with, yes, more pills.
I never made it into the city proper once we drove back to Louisiana... we did see a plethora of dead armadillos, the lovebugs were in season, and a great number of them died on our car with smiles on their faces (for those who don't know, lovebugs link together as they mate, then fly around, smashing themselves on cars and trucks across the south), the magnolias were blooming, and that massive dense forest that makes up Mississippi, with the thick underbrush crept up against the highway.
You always feel it moves silently in the night, waiting for an unsuspecting car to pull over...and vanish.
Kudzu abounds, of course, consuming everything in it's path. Bless the government for bringing that into our area!
Mother remains in ICU, more because she hates sharing a room than anything else. My trip to the airport included a stop for a (bad) softshelled crab po-boy,...sadly full of grit, a pint of frozen gumbo and a (great) shrimp po-boy that I packed in my case along side the pounds of CDM coffee and chicory. These seafood sandwiches topped off my already consumed over the time there- fried oyster po-boys, at least two dozen raw on the shell oysters (no, the stories aren't true), a good two pounds of shrimp, fried shrimp, boiled shrimp, coconut shrimp, stuffed oysters (along with the raw ones) and catfish. And butterbeans and blackeyed peas and fried chicken and tomato and cucumber salad and fried green tomatoes. And gallons of coffee. And a praline or two.
Yum.
Driving over the Lake, you could see the dirty water of the Mississippi dumping in from the opened spillways.... it's carried down mud, trees and even a cow or two from upriver. The levees were threatening to break again, so, the Corps of Engineers have opened up the spillway, and dumped the excess into the Lake. It's amazing how you can see the difference between the waters, and where it enters, it's choppy and rough. The building goes on for I-10, to re-build what Katrina ripped apart.
My Aunt A and I drove and talked and laughed as we always do... without her and my cousin, Ann, I would be lost with this situation with mother. I know she is being watched over and someone is there to check on her daily. I could fly back here, and rest easy, remotely monitoring the situation. Home health care will step in once she is back at Aunt A's... after that, well, we'll see how it goes.
Once I arrived here from the Ferry, I was tired...it had been a long trek home, and I treated myself to something from the Ferry... a gypsy cab ride! I knew it would be a memorable one when I closed the door, gave the address and he said, "How do we get there?" I loves me my gypsy cabs.
Plus, I knew my aunt would be worried otherwise..."Boo, take a cab!" she'd said to me.
I am lucky with my maternal relatives... I come from a line of women who are giving and loving and never hold over my head the odd quirks I have had all my life. They laugh with me, not at me... and love me for who I am. My cousin, MV, saved my life in the thyroid thing... pushing, giving info, always there to tell me to believe it would get better, what questions to ask. Her sister gets along with mother, something I'm not able to do for long periods of time. And their mother?
She's the one I called Aunt Lolo... who calls me Boo, yells at me, says the terrier is a white roach, has housed the parish priest since Katrina, would give you the shirt off her back, has this yard
full of gnomes and statues and a huge bower of honeysuckle and who loved her husband the way we all want to be loved by our spouse. The way he loved her until the day he died.
They keep me going back to New Orleans. That family of mine, who act as if I've never been gone, that all speak at full volume, the ones you know are there. Ann's husband, who never fails to ask how my fat ass is doing, in his heavy accent, yet, will drive all over to find me an oyster po-boy the night I flew in.
Thank you, Lolo and Ann...all of you. For everything you did when I was there, more importantly, when I'm not there. I want to be Lolo when I grow up.
She's there making a little something to eat, reminding you to take your meds, to go to bed, to say your prayers... her only failure was not making me spray on the Off... I now have 4762 mosquito bites, all swollen, all being scratched in shifts.
Including the one on the sole of my left foot that is driving me mad.
An interesting week, indeed. It started with mother deciding I should drive from New Orleans to her home in Mississippi... me, the person who hasn't driven in almost a year, save the three block attempt in the fall, when a number of New York drivers told me I was #1 in their book of driving. Back when I stalled out the manual transmission I was driving, because I've not driven a manual transmission in donkey's years... and what does she drive?
A manual transmission VW. No, not a chicken killing machine, it's upgraded, but, it's got a clutch and you move the stick thing in the middle of the bump thing between the seats when the engine sounds as if it is going to come through the firewall.
My mother is a backseat driver. I was going too fast, too slow, I didn't check my mirrors enough, I was not paying attention to the magnolias in bloom,
the trucks that had tires bigger than we were nor her perfectly good family gossip that I've listened to so often, I know when she's going to take a breath.She also is horrible about giving directions...
"Momma, there are three exits coming up...which one do I take?"
"Oh, any of them...no, wait, take the next one."
"This one coming up?"
"No, the next one after that! This is this one, that is the next one."
I drive past only to hear, "Oh, well, why didn't you turn there, it's a short cut."
And I know this, how?
I never did figure out the town of no theaters or WiFi.... there is no rhyme nor reason to the way the streets are laid out... the upside is, there is a WalMart, and the vet backed me up in telling mother to stop feeding the terrier table food. In a matter of days, she stopped scratching. The terrier, not mother. I think it was the fried sweet potato sticks that put me over the edge...seeing my once snappy New York Westie eating fried potato sticks was a bit much.
Mother is upset over the food restrictions...and I'm pretty sure she'll still sneak in a bowl of coffee to the dog every morning when they sit outside and watch the birds in the birdbath.
I wasn't there 24 hours, when I felt ill... this was before the dog eating the sweet potato sticks, and not due to my consuming my weight in boiled crawfish and loving my coffee and chicory.
I've had a fairly serious headache for a few weeks and put it off to allergies... long to short, I ended up in the hospital, with high blood pressure. Yet another pill to take, all of it traced to my missing thyroid. Crap food... I had to be tested one morning (they'd seen a shadow on my CAT, so, an MRI was done to make sure I didn't have a brain tumour). The kind nurses left my breakfast, so, I came back to cold toast and cold grits.
Did you know cold grits solidify to a form somewhat like a brick? You can actually pick up the entire mass from the bowl and eat it as if it were a sandwich.
I declined, and opted for the yummy cold coffee. Twenty four hours there, and they released me... with, yes, more pills.
I never made it into the city proper once we drove back to Louisiana... we did see a plethora of dead armadillos, the lovebugs were in season, and a great number of them died on our car with smiles on their faces (for those who don't know, lovebugs link together as they mate, then fly around, smashing themselves on cars and trucks across the south), the magnolias were blooming, and that massive dense forest that makes up Mississippi, with the thick underbrush crept up against the highway.
You always feel it moves silently in the night, waiting for an unsuspecting car to pull over...and vanish.
Kudzu abounds, of course, consuming everything in it's path. Bless the government for bringing that into our area!
Mother remains in ICU, more because she hates sharing a room than anything else. My trip to the airport included a stop for a (bad) softshelled crab po-boy,...sadly full of grit, a pint of frozen gumbo and a (great) shrimp po-boy that I packed in my case along side the pounds of CDM coffee and chicory. These seafood sandwiches topped off my already consumed over the time there- fried oyster po-boys, at least two dozen raw on the shell oysters (no, the stories aren't true), a good two pounds of shrimp, fried shrimp, boiled shrimp, coconut shrimp, stuffed oysters (along with the raw ones) and catfish. And butterbeans and blackeyed peas and fried chicken and tomato and cucumber salad and fried green tomatoes. And gallons of coffee. And a praline or two.
Yum.
Driving over the Lake, you could see the dirty water of the Mississippi dumping in from the opened spillways.... it's carried down mud, trees and even a cow or two from upriver. The levees were threatening to break again, so, the Corps of Engineers have opened up the spillway, and dumped the excess into the Lake. It's amazing how you can see the difference between the waters, and where it enters, it's choppy and rough. The building goes on for I-10, to re-build what Katrina ripped apart.
My Aunt A and I drove and talked and laughed as we always do... without her and my cousin, Ann, I would be lost with this situation with mother. I know she is being watched over and someone is there to check on her daily. I could fly back here, and rest easy, remotely monitoring the situation. Home health care will step in once she is back at Aunt A's... after that, well, we'll see how it goes.
Once I arrived here from the Ferry, I was tired...it had been a long trek home, and I treated myself to something from the Ferry... a gypsy cab ride! I knew it would be a memorable one when I closed the door, gave the address and he said, "How do we get there?" I loves me my gypsy cabs.
Plus, I knew my aunt would be worried otherwise..."Boo, take a cab!" she'd said to me.
I am lucky with my maternal relatives... I come from a line of women who are giving and loving and never hold over my head the odd quirks I have had all my life. They laugh with me, not at me... and love me for who I am. My cousin, MV, saved my life in the thyroid thing... pushing, giving info, always there to tell me to believe it would get better, what questions to ask. Her sister gets along with mother, something I'm not able to do for long periods of time. And their mother?
She's the one I called Aunt Lolo... who calls me Boo, yells at me, says the terrier is a white roach, has housed the parish priest since Katrina, would give you the shirt off her back, has this yard
full of gnomes and statues and a huge bower of honeysuckle and who loved her husband the way we all want to be loved by our spouse. The way he loved her until the day he died.They keep me going back to New Orleans. That family of mine, who act as if I've never been gone, that all speak at full volume, the ones you know are there. Ann's husband, who never fails to ask how my fat ass is doing, in his heavy accent, yet, will drive all over to find me an oyster po-boy the night I flew in.
Thank you, Lolo and Ann...all of you. For everything you did when I was there, more importantly, when I'm not there. I want to be Lolo when I grow up.
She's there making a little something to eat, reminding you to take your meds, to go to bed, to say your prayers... her only failure was not making me spray on the Off... I now have 4762 mosquito bites, all swollen, all being scratched in shifts.
Including the one on the sole of my left foot that is driving me mad.
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
About ME
Yes, it's about ME!
1. Grateful Guy had a contest in April, and I won!!!
My wonderful list of prizes include:
He has a great journal, not only for the possiblity of winning a contest, but, because he makes you remember the little things in life can make you happy.
2. Along with my LTGP, Peter, and our third partner, the every fab GolfWidow, I was awarded a prize at the Blog Prom held by Sunshine last week. You can see my groovy Prom Crown on the side of my journal. Let it be known that Peter won for tearing up the floor with his dance moves, and GW for her hip attire, among other things... she won THREE awards... rock on, my friend, rock on! I won for being most likely to be smoking something slightly illegal in the parking lot.
As if.
I want to thank both Sunshine and Grateful Guy for my wonderful things... they are treasured.
Now, to other things...
The person who commented on my last entry...
Thank you for reminding me that not everyone is nice who posts here... it makes me appreciate those who do offer their words of decency, humour, kindness... the things that make me think or give me a reason to possibly alter my view on an issue rise in stature.
You remain a wankstain.
I have been at a hospital from around 6.20AM until 6.15PM this evening, in a sitting room, waiting to hear about my mom. I still haven't seen her. She's okay, but, no rooms are available to place her, so, they kept her in recovery. I slept sitting up in a chair and drank hospital coffee. All of that was better than reading your blargh.
I've given you too much of my time already.
I have to go back once again to the ICU, come home and try and re-arrange a flight to New York, and change the sheets because the terrier had a temper tantrum.
With all of that, my life is still so much brighter than yours.
Word.
1. Grateful Guy had a contest in April, and I won!!!
My wonderful list of prizes include:
- A bamboo flannel. Totally unused, though it has been laundered ready for use, according to the manufacturers instructions.
- A copy of Life Wealth 101. 2nd hand, though a good readable copy.
- Coffee. You all know how much I love my mug of hot coffee, so I’m giving away a 100g bag of vanilla flavoured coffee beans.
- A decorative “cake soap” bar. I’ll try to get some pictures of this up soon. It’s a bar of soap, in the shape of a slice of cake. There’s a layer of what appear to be oats on the bottom, then the rest of the “cake”, with a layer of “cream” on top. All made out of soap.
- A Green & Black’s cereal bar.
He has a great journal, not only for the possiblity of winning a contest, but, because he makes you remember the little things in life can make you happy.
2. Along with my LTGP, Peter, and our third partner, the every fab GolfWidow, I was awarded a prize at the Blog Prom held by Sunshine last week. You can see my groovy Prom Crown on the side of my journal. Let it be known that Peter won for tearing up the floor with his dance moves, and GW for her hip attire, among other things... she won THREE awards... rock on, my friend, rock on! I won for being most likely to be smoking something slightly illegal in the parking lot.
As if.
I want to thank both Sunshine and Grateful Guy for my wonderful things... they are treasured.
Now, to other things...
The person who commented on my last entry...
Thank you for reminding me that not everyone is nice who posts here... it makes me appreciate those who do offer their words of decency, humour, kindness... the things that make me think or give me a reason to possibly alter my view on an issue rise in stature.
You remain a wankstain.
I have been at a hospital from around 6.20AM until 6.15PM this evening, in a sitting room, waiting to hear about my mom. I still haven't seen her. She's okay, but, no rooms are available to place her, so, they kept her in recovery. I slept sitting up in a chair and drank hospital coffee. All of that was better than reading your blargh.
I've given you too much of my time already.
I have to go back once again to the ICU, come home and try and re-arrange a flight to New York, and change the sheets because the terrier had a temper tantrum.
With all of that, my life is still so much brighter than yours.
Word.
Monday, May 5, 2008
Catching Up
Amazing what has happened in a week.
The flight down was long, as flights tend to be when you are in a hurry to arrive somewhere. A long, long journey from my flat to LaGuardia... I left the house at 4.30AM and arrived at the airport at 6.30AM, via two buses and a train. The public transportation system of New York is arduous but, it does deliver.
The day I chose to fly was the day the FAA tightened up it's two carry on's mean two carry on's... so, my purse now counted... turned back by TSA, I checked my small carry on, and then actually had two carry on's instead of two carry on's and a purse.
Curse them!
I had an easy time on the flight, if you remove the fact I sat in the first row behind first class... the class that receives food... something American doesn't serve to we peons. The smell of cooked breakfast wafted back to my seat, causing me to drool a bit onto my useless laptop... useless because although I loaded my i-Word, I neglected to bring my serial number... I have with me a pretty paperweight here in the wilds of Mississippi. No WiFi, no way to do any writing... currently I am using an ancient eMachine and dial up.
I digress.
The flight to New Orleans from Miami started with passengers pointing at me as I boarded....and laughing.
They were all wearing shorts and flip flops.... I still had on my sweater and jeans from New York. I had the great good luck to sit in front of the loudest man I've ever heard. He was drunk before we left... his girlfriend kept shushing him.. as if that helped.
Mid-way to New Orleans... it happened.... three rows ahead.... a man became ill and an announcement was made, "If there is a doctor is on board, please make your way to row 15".
Whoa! Drama!
Two men moved to the row... one from 1st class, one from coach. If I had been the ill person, I'd have waved off Mr. Coach. If you are a doctor and can't afford 1st class, don't come near me!
We all peered over the seat backs (with the exception of Big Mouth who shouted "IS HE DEAD??") to see what was on... the ill party had a bit of a convulsion, it seems.... had a shot from his bag, and all was well.
Ho hum.
The rest of the flight was foodless and dull. Upon landing, while we stood and waited for the crowd to surge forward, Big Mouth was talking to his companion who had given up on keeping his voice down.
"I can't wait for JazzFest. I'm going to have a great time... right baby??" He grabbed her ass.
I turned and asked, "What day are you flying back?"
"Tuesday!"
"Whew. I was worried... I'm leaving Thursday... and I was concerned I'd have to change my flight."
I don't think he found that as amusing as the people around us.
Oh, and they lost his luggage. heh.
Tons more fun.... planted what seems to be a zillion plants in the rich soil of my mother's yard, her little cottage is just that... sweet and a cottage and very dear.
The town has no theater, no place to buy coffee, nothing. She wants me to move here. Granted, Craftsman style homes abound, the air is full of flower scents, green is everywhere, people wave and stop and ask how you are. She is having an operation on Tuesday to have a kidney removed... when she returns in a month, there will be casseroles and ladies to drop by and clean the house... they have purple hair and fluttery hands. Say a little prayer, to whomever, if you would, please.
Me? I've fallen into the way of life already. How do I know?
Weather Guy was in New York for the weekend, and called... "I can't adjust to your voice, with that accent."
My, oh, my....
The flight down was long, as flights tend to be when you are in a hurry to arrive somewhere. A long, long journey from my flat to LaGuardia... I left the house at 4.30AM and arrived at the airport at 6.30AM, via two buses and a train. The public transportation system of New York is arduous but, it does deliver.
The day I chose to fly was the day the FAA tightened up it's two carry on's mean two carry on's... so, my purse now counted... turned back by TSA, I checked my small carry on, and then actually had two carry on's instead of two carry on's and a purse.
Curse them!
I had an easy time on the flight, if you remove the fact I sat in the first row behind first class... the class that receives food... something American doesn't serve to we peons. The smell of cooked breakfast wafted back to my seat, causing me to drool a bit onto my useless laptop... useless because although I loaded my i-Word, I neglected to bring my serial number... I have with me a pretty paperweight here in the wilds of Mississippi. No WiFi, no way to do any writing... currently I am using an ancient eMachine and dial up.
I digress.
The flight to New Orleans from Miami started with passengers pointing at me as I boarded....and laughing.
They were all wearing shorts and flip flops.... I still had on my sweater and jeans from New York. I had the great good luck to sit in front of the loudest man I've ever heard. He was drunk before we left... his girlfriend kept shushing him.. as if that helped.
Mid-way to New Orleans... it happened.... three rows ahead.... a man became ill and an announcement was made, "If there is a doctor is on board, please make your way to row 15".
Whoa! Drama!
Two men moved to the row... one from 1st class, one from coach. If I had been the ill person, I'd have waved off Mr. Coach. If you are a doctor and can't afford 1st class, don't come near me!
We all peered over the seat backs (with the exception of Big Mouth who shouted "IS HE DEAD??") to see what was on... the ill party had a bit of a convulsion, it seems.... had a shot from his bag, and all was well.
Ho hum.
The rest of the flight was foodless and dull. Upon landing, while we stood and waited for the crowd to surge forward, Big Mouth was talking to his companion who had given up on keeping his voice down.
"I can't wait for JazzFest. I'm going to have a great time... right baby??" He grabbed her ass.
I turned and asked, "What day are you flying back?"
"Tuesday!"
"Whew. I was worried... I'm leaving Thursday... and I was concerned I'd have to change my flight."
I don't think he found that as amusing as the people around us.
Oh, and they lost his luggage. heh.
Tons more fun.... planted what seems to be a zillion plants in the rich soil of my mother's yard, her little cottage is just that... sweet and a cottage and very dear.
The town has no theater, no place to buy coffee, nothing. She wants me to move here. Granted, Craftsman style homes abound, the air is full of flower scents, green is everywhere, people wave and stop and ask how you are. She is having an operation on Tuesday to have a kidney removed... when she returns in a month, there will be casseroles and ladies to drop by and clean the house... they have purple hair and fluttery hands. Say a little prayer, to whomever, if you would, please.
Me? I've fallen into the way of life already. How do I know?
Weather Guy was in New York for the weekend, and called... "I can't adjust to your voice, with that accent."
My, oh, my....
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Guest of Guest of a Guest
I was a guest of honour.
Me! GuestofaGuest asked me to be a Guest of GuestofaGuest (say that a few times..) and write a blog entry...
I was floored, to be honest.. I mean, they are on the pulse of what is what in New York, and I'm slogging down in the tunnels and on the decks of the Ferry and avoiding crazy people. However, I took up their offer, and had a great time giving my version of life in New York.
I'd be honoured if you'd read it... I'm off to early bed, so I can early rise, and head off to my Mama's.
Y'all take care now, heah?
Me! GuestofaGuest asked me to be a Guest of GuestofaGuest (say that a few times..) and write a blog entry...
I was floored, to be honest.. I mean, they are on the pulse of what is what in New York, and I'm slogging down in the tunnels and on the decks of the Ferry and avoiding crazy people. However, I took up their offer, and had a great time giving my version of life in New York.
I'd be honoured if you'd read it... I'm off to early bed, so I can early rise, and head off to my Mama's.
Y'all take care now, heah?
Sunday, April 27, 2008
The Drift of Time
There are places you remember.
Wednesday, I head back to one of those places.... a place of heavy air, sweet tea, front porches, people who say, "Why, look! It's QuinAnne!"...who have known me since before I was born--who know my Mama, my Mawma, my Pawpa, his Daddy, his Daddy's Daddy, and so on back generations. They know the family secrets (why we never plowed in that back corner in great Grandpa's land), who married who and why... they talk about how both of Duck's boys were "he-shes, don't you know...and moved to live in the Quarter, leaving Alice in that big ol' house with her Momma"... it's the interwoven fabric of time and family, as tight as the moonflower and honeysuckle vines that cover the sides of houses.
I'm going back to asphalt roads, red clay, huge oak and pecan trees....to heavy meals, long Sunday afternoons, slow strolls in the ease of the dusk when it's cool enough to move, green grass, flowers tumbling, train whistles in the far distance...where sugar coats everything from the crust of a cobbler made with freshly picked blackberries to the words that take their time leaving the speakers mouth.
Back country Mississippi.
There is something to be said for that part of my world... I remember weekends spent there, chickens slaughtered by Aunt Id and my grandmother and the Volkswagon, drinking Coke out of bottles with a hole punched in the cap by the ice pick, waiting for the train to swoop through and throw out the bag of mail--the wind of it's passing swallowing up our screams of delight as we waited for it to race on, allowing my brothers and I to not only look for that thin mail bag holding the goods of the mysterious Uncle Sam, but, to see if our pennies had stayed on the track... gone from good currency to flattened bits of copper....always, always, as the train moved over the spot where the pennies were... we grabbed each other, our stomaches dropping in fear, our screams rising to a fevered pitch... would our three bits of metal really throw all of those boxcars off the track, causing chaos and destruction? The combination of fear and hope churned in our souls, devil fighting good until the train passed... relief fighting disappointment as the caboose passed, the waves that came our way met with a fair-weather wave from us as we climbed down to seek our goods.
Just once, just one time.... we sorta kinda wished maybe perhaps a few cars could slide off the tracks, please?
I hold whispers of memory... my tiny grandfather, white hair, large cigars, thick glasses...hearing aid turned up to catch my voice. Holding my hand, walking down to the Post Office--pointing out trees and bushes and flowers--" That's an azalea.. and that's a beech. Over there, it's a magnolia, baby. Look! Quick...see the hummingbirds??" I always wanted to hold one of those...and he'd say they were just too quick for that to happen. I wore railroad overalls, because he worked for the railroad, and thus, I wanted to look like I worked on a railroad. When we walked, he'd wear crisp grey pants with a white shirt my grandmother had washed and line dried and ironed. My hand fit into his as we walked along, unlike my other grandfather, who was large....I could only grasp his fingers when we walked. We were a pair-- his white, white hair smoothed over from a side part, my brown hair brushed into curls, he'd curve down, speaking to me. Those are my memories of him... those walks. I carried that to my own children; I do it now with C... "See? Those are tulips. Over there is a rosebush. That is an apple tree, see the flowers? They will become apples!" Bonding time, teaching time. A way of showing love. For me, the smell of cigar smoke brings me back to those long walks with a man who reduced his quick pace to my slow one, and would bend over to my size to discuss whatever it was I wanted to discuss, pointing out things with that hand holding the cigar, his soft drawl holding me tight, he listened to me, as if whatever my four year old voice said held the weight of great importance. Patience and love were his gifts to me.
His wedding ring fits my pinky... he was a big man in every way but his size.
I'm going back to help my Mom for a bit.... a week of slow times, family, the terrier will be there. Mother and I will share a bed, a small house, she'll get on my nerves, I'll baby her, she'll fuss, but, she'll love every minute of the time.
We'll drive out to the old home, which is owned by others now...go over and look where Aunt Id's house used to be, until it finally collapsed under the weight of it's memories and termite damage. I'll put flowers on my Papaw's grave. My Mawma isn't buried there, even though her name is on the headstone. She said she had her time in Mississippi... she didn't want to lie for eternity with that "....damn red mud in her face."
I'll drink sweet tea, smell the roses in mother's garden, the mint and the herbs, and half listen while she gossips about people she knows and I have no interest in... fall into that half somnolent state you live in when you are there.
Think about what I've got to do, know I should be doing it, and then... well, I'll have some more sweet tea.
Some places, you simply don't move very fast....unless you are a hummingbird. Even then, you can come to rest, if you choose.
Wednesday, I head back to one of those places.... a place of heavy air, sweet tea, front porches, people who say, "Why, look! It's QuinAnne!"...who have known me since before I was born--who know my Mama, my Mawma, my Pawpa, his Daddy, his Daddy's Daddy, and so on back generations. They know the family secrets (why we never plowed in that back corner in great Grandpa's land), who married who and why... they talk about how both of Duck's boys were "he-shes, don't you know...and moved to live in the Quarter, leaving Alice in that big ol' house with her Momma"... it's the interwoven fabric of time and family, as tight as the moonflower and honeysuckle vines that cover the sides of houses.
I'm going back to asphalt roads, red clay, huge oak and pecan trees....to heavy meals, long Sunday afternoons, slow strolls in the ease of the dusk when it's cool enough to move, green grass, flowers tumbling, train whistles in the far distance...where sugar coats everything from the crust of a cobbler made with freshly picked blackberries to the words that take their time leaving the speakers mouth.
Back country Mississippi.
There is something to be said for that part of my world... I remember weekends spent there, chickens slaughtered by Aunt Id and my grandmother and the Volkswagon, drinking Coke out of bottles with a hole punched in the cap by the ice pick, waiting for the train to swoop through and throw out the bag of mail--the wind of it's passing swallowing up our screams of delight as we waited for it to race on, allowing my brothers and I to not only look for that thin mail bag holding the goods of the mysterious Uncle Sam, but, to see if our pennies had stayed on the track... gone from good currency to flattened bits of copper....always, always, as the train moved over the spot where the pennies were... we grabbed each other, our stomaches dropping in fear, our screams rising to a fevered pitch... would our three bits of metal really throw all of those boxcars off the track, causing chaos and destruction? The combination of fear and hope churned in our souls, devil fighting good until the train passed... relief fighting disappointment as the caboose passed, the waves that came our way met with a fair-weather wave from us as we climbed down to seek our goods.
Just once, just one time.... we sorta kinda wished maybe perhaps a few cars could slide off the tracks, please?
I hold whispers of memory... my tiny grandfather, white hair, large cigars, thick glasses...hearing aid turned up to catch my voice. Holding my hand, walking down to the Post Office--pointing out trees and bushes and flowers--" That's an azalea.. and that's a beech. Over there, it's a magnolia, baby. Look! Quick...see the hummingbirds??" I always wanted to hold one of those...and he'd say they were just too quick for that to happen. I wore railroad overalls, because he worked for the railroad, and thus, I wanted to look like I worked on a railroad. When we walked, he'd wear crisp grey pants with a white shirt my grandmother had washed and line dried and ironed. My hand fit into his as we walked along, unlike my other grandfather, who was large....I could only grasp his fingers when we walked. We were a pair-- his white, white hair smoothed over from a side part, my brown hair brushed into curls, he'd curve down, speaking to me. Those are my memories of him... those walks. I carried that to my own children; I do it now with C... "See? Those are tulips. Over there is a rosebush. That is an apple tree, see the flowers? They will become apples!" Bonding time, teaching time. A way of showing love. For me, the smell of cigar smoke brings me back to those long walks with a man who reduced his quick pace to my slow one, and would bend over to my size to discuss whatever it was I wanted to discuss, pointing out things with that hand holding the cigar, his soft drawl holding me tight, he listened to me, as if whatever my four year old voice said held the weight of great importance. Patience and love were his gifts to me.
His wedding ring fits my pinky... he was a big man in every way but his size.
I'm going back to help my Mom for a bit.... a week of slow times, family, the terrier will be there. Mother and I will share a bed, a small house, she'll get on my nerves, I'll baby her, she'll fuss, but, she'll love every minute of the time.
We'll drive out to the old home, which is owned by others now...go over and look where Aunt Id's house used to be, until it finally collapsed under the weight of it's memories and termite damage. I'll put flowers on my Papaw's grave. My Mawma isn't buried there, even though her name is on the headstone. She said she had her time in Mississippi... she didn't want to lie for eternity with that "....damn red mud in her face."
I'll drink sweet tea, smell the roses in mother's garden, the mint and the herbs, and half listen while she gossips about people she knows and I have no interest in... fall into that half somnolent state you live in when you are there.
Think about what I've got to do, know I should be doing it, and then... well, I'll have some more sweet tea.
Some places, you simply don't move very fast....unless you are a hummingbird. Even then, you can come to rest, if you choose.
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