Dead Cool

I don’t know when it happened, but I just discovered my cool is dead.  I mean dead dead. Not mostly dead.  Not just curled up in the fetal position, awaiting cardiopulmonary resuscitation, seeing the light and waiting to come back dead.  I’m talking just sprinkle its ashes over the Ganges like it’s Jerry F*N Garcia.  Jimmy Hoffa, not found, f*g dead.

Several months ago, my sister sent me a text and asked me if I wanted a ticket to Soundgarden—which is equal to asking a junkie if they’d like some pure smack.  You know that song “she’s still stuck in 1985?”  Dude, I’m still stuck in 1994.  The dred locks are gone, and I don’t think I’ve worn a pair of Birkenstocks with wool socks since about 2004, but I can still totally rock a pair of Doc Martens and some killer flannel.

In case you didn’t get it, I’m a 90s chick. For me, Grunge was the best thing to happen to rock and roll since Woodstock or the Dead at the Fillmore. Well, and there was that Floyd thing…ok, maybe not the BEST thing since then, but close.  Really close.

Anyway.  Yes. I am perfectly aware that it was 20 years ago.  My 16-year old daughter reminds me every day.  My 16 year old DAUGHTER is older than I was when I started listening to Grunge, and she is full of eye rolls and “MOM!” sayings, and just down right letting me know that I am the most uncool thing to walk the face of this earth since my own mother thought the band Bread was cool.

The only people that think I’m cool, anymore, are old fat guys in bars impressed I know the Melvins and Mudhoney. So, we play the Pixies and talk about Garage memories and how we’re pretty sure we were at the same concerts.

 But, when Soundgarden’s new album (their first in 15 years) came out, I sat here for hours drinking wine and waiting to click “purchase.”  Back in the day, I would have been standing in line outside the music store, most likely with really bloodshot eyes and a BAD case of cotton mouth.  Now, I was just sitting at the table with a laptop and a glass of wine in a tie dyed shirt lamenting the death of my youth.  And by lamenting, I mean totally oblivious to the fact I’m almost 40 and as uncool as Barry Manilow’s polyester.

This girl LIVED in obscure band t-shirts, and it dawned on me that most of my shirts are now a cotton-poly blend and labeled “wrinkle resistant.”  I wear pearls…and “slacks.”  I own heels.   I go to the school and help with art projects.  I know how to make soufflé.  I care about dust on the ceiling fan. I SERIOUSLY contemplate plants at the nursery that give the best color factor while requiring the least amount of water. I have the BEST fed clematis vine in town.  I quit smoking reefer over 10 years ago.  I go to fucking CHURCH! WTF has happened to me? *big gulp of wine and swallow a sob*

I got a text from my brother a while back that asked me when I went from fighting the establishment, to BEING the establishment—which as close as my bro will ever get to letting me know I’ve done alright for myself.  That happened when I learned it helps to get paid, so your kids have food…as much as it sucks to say you finally CARE about money.

So, I went to Soundgarden with my sister.  I spotted the security guy with his wrist bands and told my sister to hit him up and get us on the floor.  She refused.  Her words:  “I’m not asking him!  He gets asked that every concert from chicks way hotter than us?”  

My respsonse:  “Are you kidding me?  He’s 21…25 tops.  He’s a walking f*G hormone, and you’re cute!  GET US ON THE FLOOR!”

She refused, and he finally came by and asked us if we wanted on the floor.  “You look fun,” he said. 

I smacked her on the back of the head, said “I told you so!” And, he wrapped the bands around our arms, told us we were good to go, and just as I was thinking I still had my mojo, he looked at my 24-year old sister and said, “Have fun with your mom.”

I was shocked.  Being 13 years older than my sister, I should be used to it by now, but I haven’t been accused of being her mother since I was about 16.  I gave him double birds, and a hearty “I loved you at first, but F*K YOU!  I’m her sister. I hope you need rogaine, you mohawk  little shit!”  Then I marched my sister as close to stage as I could get, right behind the biggest blunts outside of a Snoop Dogg show.

For a few hours, I said, “F*K you 40.  F*K you responsibility.”  And I proceeded to have a wake for the death of my cool.

Most days, the greatest comfort for the soul sucking grief I feel about the dead of my cool, is found by reminding myself that at least I don’t drive a minivan…or have a stick figure family.  But really, it’s the minivan.  Somehow, the death of my coolness seems less harsh when I remind myself that not only was my vagina saved the trauma of birthing enough children to actually NEED a minivan, but I’m also spared having to scream at my children “Don’t make me come back there!” because in my VW, they’re always within arm’s reach.

And, despite it all, this old mama still knows how to trip at a concert.  That girl writing for the Denver Post, that I told to jump the rail and run?…”You want  A Hunter S. Thompson version of an article,” I told her.  She missed out.  I give her two years before she has the dreaded minivan.

My cool might be dead, but I helped pave the way for you little ungrateful bastards, and I might be the mom—but you wouldn’t have an ever loving clue how to work the system, without wrinkle-resistant, past-groupie, uncool, MOMs, like me. 

That sign on the door as you walked into SOUNDGARDEN, the one that said “Moshing can result in injuries, please refrain?” , so you did?  Yeah, it was us old fuckers getting hurt that saved your ass.  You can thank me tomorrow for being part of the generation that said Nirvana and PJ and Alice in Chains and Soundgarden were WAY cooler than New Kids or Ace of Base. 

Thank  GAWD us old people with dead  cool, saved the 90s.  

I called Brian.  He was mad.  “You DO realize you’re almost 40 and have kids, right?”

Yep.  Never forgot it.  Responsible enough to know my limit, still push it.  Fuck you almost 40. I own this shit. Take the cool, I got confidence. You took the cool and left me with experience.  Experience enough to know I don’t want a minivan…or cats…or to be today’s definition of “cool.”  I want to remember having a good time.  Laughter.  Spontaneity.  And my daughters to know it’s ok to be free.  Live. Live strong.  Live hard.  Live happy.  Let your hair down, and by God, please, have fun.  Cool dies.  Fun is universal.

Pretty sure, right now,  no matter what, to my kids, my cool has never existed. Which, in cool mom language means, "I can't go wrong." So, here's to one good mother effing good time.  Here's to fun...and my mid-life.

Trying to Find My Rope-A-Dope

Kurt Vonnegut once said, "True terror is waking up one morning to discover that your high school class is running the country."  I had this quote on my fridge for about ten years, because, I'm a Gen-Xer.

 Let's face it, I don't do delayed gratification.  Thanks to Sesame Street, the Electric Company, and Schoolhouse Rock, I'm a visual learner. Lots of us come from "broken" homes. We were labeled materialistic, disengaged, and slackers.  We survived the Cold War, Ronald Reagan, the Challenger Disaster, the AIDS terror, Black Monday, and Chernobyl.  We watched the Berlin Wall come crashing down.  We watched "Red Dawn" then had to cower under our desks on Monday because of the Red Scare.

But really, I think we're the change generation.  We're more accepting of social diversity...races, religions, sexual orientation.  We hold the highest education levels when comparing age groups.  Compared with other generations, we have the highest volunteer rates.  We strive for long-term institutional changes, rather than the revolution our parents' generation tried to achieve. We're labeled the MTV generation that was more interested in philosophizing than settling for a white picket fence, yet study after study shows us as highly family oriented.  We change jobs more than our parents rearranged the furniture.

I look back, and I'm really not that worried about my generation running the country.  In fact, I'm convinced we'd be better, because there is a part of us that has never, and will never, put down our boots and say, "To hell with it.  If you can't beat 'em, join 'em."  We're good movers and shakers; we organize.  We believe in a better world.

I'm not worried about my generation, because, see, back in my day (yeah, I'm old enough I can say that now), you didn't really get to be a slacker and sing "I'm a loser baby," like Beck did, unless you were also successful.  It was only cool to say you never cracked a book if you still got straight-As.  It was only cool to get drunk in a hot tub the night before the state scholastic competition if you could wake up with your head feeling like it was the size of Manhattan (why did you have to say "Manhattan" *gag*) and your mouth tasting like a dumpster smells, have a latte, and still kick some ass.  It was only cool to skip two weeks of Organic Chemistry in college to hang out in your dorm room with a towel under the door listening to Ravi Shankar if you could show up for the test and still blow the curve.  We made nerds cool.

I'm now the mother of a 16-year old.  THIS I find terrifying.  Terror is waking up to Justin Beiber wailing down the hall and coming face to face with his mug every time you are knocking on the door to tell her to turn it down.  I had Pearl Jam, The Lovemongers, and The Screaming Trees for God's sake.  My dad would sit on the stairs outside my bedroom, tell me to turn it up, and ask, over and over "WHO is this again?" 

I'll tell you what terrifying is.  Terrifying is when the smartest kid in class shows up to pick up your daughter for a date, and he doesn't understand WHERE, exactly, a belt goes.  Just in case a young whippersnapper is reading this, it goes ABOVE your ass, not below.

Terrifying is standing in line at Taco Bell at midnight, sober as a judge, and realizing the deepest level of philosophy coming out of the mouths of the stoned younger generation amounts to "OMG!! LIKE, SRZLY?!" and "FOR REALZ!"  WTF ever happened to debating the fascist standardization of the size of the lettuce shavings on my Chalupa?  Does no one pay attention anymore?

And, really, what the hell is up with me having to stand in line at Starbucks for 30 minutes, behind some teeny bopper who has 3,000 contacts in her iPhone, "because it pulled all her facebook contacts" (like SRZLY, I KNOW you don't actually KNOW all those people, I monitor my kid's facebook, twitter, and whatever those 20 other sites are that add 5 hours to my day) and she can't find Brittany in all of them to ask if she wants chocolate sprinkles or rainbow sprinkles on her skinny cocoa?  For the love of all that is sacred and holy, the line is 15 minutes long.  You send 16,000 texts a month.  Type in her ever loving name, or better yet, have that shit figured out before you walk in.  LIFE SKILLS, PEOPLE! We old bastards need our coffee to fight tyranny (AKA our parents who still know EVERYTHING *eye roll*) and still find the energy to deal with the Beibs and that Swift girl that can't get her shit together enough to have a normal break-up. Which reminds me, what the hell happened to that Starbucks mermaid's breasts?  Was there a pink ribbon fund raiser I missed while waiting for Brittany to make up her mind?

In all seriousness, I still feel like a teenager.  I remember it all too well.  I'm known to sing "Teen Angst" by Cracker to my 16-year old when drama unfolds...I need another folk singer like I need a HOLE in my head...and she just looks at me perplexed.  I know she's trying to find herself and what she is and to stand out from the crowd.  Your middle teens to early 20s is all about proving you're different and finding what the world means and your place in it, while having a total and complete existential crisis. I wouldn't relive it if I had a choice, but I get to as a parent.

I'm just trying to find the balance between letting her experiment and knowing when to put my foot down.  I'm trying to walk a tight rope between knowing I've taught her to do right, and finding the faith within myself to know she can do it.  I'm on a unicycle in this Circus of Parenthood juggling when to let her learn lessons on her own and when to step in and protect her.

She's a smart kid. A different kid than I was.  She has different hobbies and likes, and she's outgoing when I was very shy. My only goal, as her mother, is that she is loving, kind, peaceful, and confident. That she finds what and who she loves.  That she learns to weave in and out of the lanes of this rush hour that is life and doesn't take the HOV lane for through traffic.  That she enjoys the journey and finds in her heart what makes this world better for her.

I'm not terrified of her generation.  I'm not terrified of teenagers.  I'm terrified that in all of it, somewhere, I'll fail. Mr. Vonnegut, true terror is realizing you're Muhammad Ali against the ropes, and your rope-a-dope better work. Its a kid that put you there, and you sure as hell better have trained...not you them.

And most of all, they give us hope.  They give us hope that idealization still lives.  They stand in our face and make us have acceptance.  They stand and say, "Embrace change. Accept us...our vision."  We taught them that vision.  We owe them, at the least, a look.

The Haunting

Yesterday was my ex-husband's birthday.  For most people with an ex, it would be a normal day where you got up in the morning and checked the calendar for the kid's activities, took mental note of something that seemed to have happened in a past life, and went about your day.

Most of us ex's would've have bought a small gift for the kids to give, reminded them to call, and probably exchanged kids for the night, if it fell on an off-custody week.  We'd exchange some niceties...ask about the new kids.  How is work?  How is the family? Talk about shitty spring weather; talk about grades, groundings, and stuff that happened during the week.

More than likely, in this past life that once was mine, we'd talk about the latest argument between me and his new wife.  Me always right.  Never once taking into consideration about him being caught in the middle.

I'd probably still have that chip on my shoulder.   That one that always said, "You chose this.  Your actions did this.  You.  You.  You.  You're where the blame lies."  I'd probably still feel the resentment I imposed on myself, but blamed on him.  I'd take it more for granted than I did WAY back then.

Since it was his birthday, I'd feign niceness. Pretend I'd forgotten all the times I was told I'd never be anything without him.  I'd pretend I didn't remember the pancakes and hotdogs and three jobs I worked while attending college, because I promised I'd never give him the satisfaction of thinking he ever helped me do anything while the child support never came or I cuddled a hurt little girl sad her dad didn't show up.  I'd pretend, but I'd hold a smirk on lips that let him know.

And he would know.  He would know because he would fail to look me in the eyes--instead he would stare at the ground and wait for her to get her stuff.  He would make awkward jokes, pretending he didn't know my pain. And, I would make him suffer, again and again.  Over and over.

Because I DID hurt.  When he cheated with my best friend, I hurt in a place I didn't even know I had....despite knowing this thing was over before it started.

I was remarried, but by God Almighty, he'd know the hurt.  I'd remind him...with a look.  I'd hold my head a little higher when he walked in the door.  I'd plan an elaborate vacation--just to say, "Remember how I couldn't do it? Remember?"

I held that grudge and looked forward to the day, THAT look crossed her eyes.  THAT one.  You, know.  Where she looked at him and knew he never showed up when he said he would.  The one where me never saying anything bad in front of her, turned into her discovering on her own.

I never got that day.  I never got that day, and I never got the day me and his new wife were able to speak civilly on the phone.

What I did get is something my daughter never will.  I got an apology.  It was a sunny day in the summer, and I saw the caller ID and almost didn't answer.  I'd let him know the guy I was about to marry wanted to adopt our 4-year old daughter.  No contact for over a year; I didn't need to let him know, but I felt obligated.

I answered because I honestly thought I was going to get my way.  Instead, I heard, "I just want to apologize for everything I've done to you.  I am truly sorry."

I didn't accept that apology, and I didn't apologize for everything I'd done wrong.  And everything I'd done was just as bad as what he'd done. "Paybacks are a bitch," was my motto back then.

I am haunted that I never apologized.  But more haunting, is that my daughter will never get an apology.

My daughter will never get him at her graduation.  He won't be there to drop her off at college.  He can't walk her down the aisle.  She rarely sees his side of the family.

See, he died. He passed away in a car accident when she was nine.  She was supposed to be with him that night, but just like most nights, he had something else to do.  He drank, drove, and died.

I can't even count on both hands anymore the friends I've lost to drunk driving or have been killed by a drunk driver.  And, it all of a sudden slams into you like a car out of control, how much what I've suffered, what I dealt with...how much it doesn't fucking matter.

I was jolted awake at 4:37 in the morning by my husband...I will never forget looking at the clock or the look on his face when he told me what happened.

Despite the hurt we had between us, I was devastated.  I had to tell my daughter when she woke up, after pancakes and after I found the guts, what happened.  Still the worst day of my life.

I'm not supposed to admit it, especially now, that I loved him.  I did.  And, a certain part of me still does.  But, my love has been given to someone else...someone who has always put me and my kid first.  I am not allowed to grieve.

I'm not supposed to remember it was my first love...things I should have worked out after the divorce.  One person  hugged me at that funeral and asked if I was alright.  I wasn't.

Despite my vindictiveness and his absence, we'd become friends again.  We actually were able to come to a mutual understanding about our child...despite my anger.

I still want to be mad.  I want to slap him.  He had a good heart.  He had a problem.  He's missed out on every glorious occasion that wonderful thing we created has done since she was nine.  He missed out on her braces, her graduation from Catholic School, her first formal, her first kiss, her first date.  He'll miss out on so much more, and I want to slap him.  Not for what he did to me, or even as much as I feel it, what he did to her.  He's missing out on things he wanted to be here for.

I want to punch him in the face...not for what he did to me, like in my past life.  But for haunting  the most beautiful thing in the world  with the perpetual what if?  He and I?  We chose our path.  Our daughter didn't.

I look back, now, and know I should've have taken and given an apology.  I know it doesn't mean anything compared to what she has been through.  Its so easy, to be the me generation.

My daughter deserves an apology.  For the time I took from her when I left him.  For the time he took from her when he decided to leave.

My daughter never asked for this.  Part of growing up, part of having kids--means your heart is ripped out and walking around in someone else's body, is realizing your hurts are trivial.

I still have both my parents.  My baby still cries...yesterday and that day in December.  I have no more grudges...except her guardian angel owes her an apology.  The one I got and she didn't.

I know now, how it is to be caught in the middle.  Between someone that has been there for her, and someone that was supposed to be.  I know, now, how little our adult trivialities REALLY matter.

I wish he was here.  Not for me. Not for my grudge or my grief.  I wish I had apologized.  I wish I had forgotten my grudges.  I don't even want to remember or remind him of what we both did wrong.  I just want him here for her...how she remembers.

It haunts me.  My grudge.  My hate.  I'd take it all back to give him to her.  All my tears.  All my heart...all the pain I never got to express that eats at me.  I don't want her to have THAT look I so much looked forward to.  I wish she could have him...here.

And you thought Easter grass was bad

Uranium-235 has a half-life of something like 700 million years. I'm not a nuclear scientist, but I'm pretty sure that by the time this stuff has passed even 4 half-lives, the Easter grass I bought 7 years ago will still be lingering in the jungled-over ruins of my rotted house.  Some future archaeologist will find it and try to piece together what purpose it served in ancient times.

For reals.  I haven't purchased or used Easter grass in 7, yes SEVEN, years, and despite having vacuumed at least twice and having purged the children's bedroom several times during those years, I still find it--in the most random places, like the corner of the bathroom or a heater vent.

The stuff keeps living; well, its that or old Lewie Pasteur giving the smack-down to the theory of spontaneous generation was total bullshit. Either way, Easter grass is a pain-in-the-ass to a level that only parents can fully understand.

I've officially been the barer of fruits of my loin for 16 years last Wednesday.  I cannot emphasize enough how this doesn't make me an expert in the parenting realm.  I am of the humble opinion that it does, however, deserve me an honorary Ph.D. in "Knower of Things That Drive Average Non-Overachieving Parents Insane."  So, in the name of philanthropy aimed at helping the less fortunate overcome Asshole Syndrome, I offer the following dissertation on "Things That Drive Lazy Parents Such As Myself Insane" (Easter grass not included, because you already know my thoughts on that).

Oh, and I should caveat, its mostly me just being an easily irritated bitch, so don't take it personal.

1.  The Coach from The Stand Reliving His Glory Days of High School Sports Parent (or, more commonly I NEVER Played Sports but My Kid is Destined to be the Player I Never Was Parent): This is the guy (or lady) that is stretching and warming up at a little league game for 4-year olds.  This is the parent keeping score when the score board is shut off for a reason.  This is the parent screaming at their kid during a time-out to do something while the coach is trying to tell the kid something--these two things the kid is hearing are usually EXACT opposites.  This is the guy, who at a basketball game for kindergarteners, is showing off his mad dribbling skills (usually off some kids head) and trying to slam dunk in front of the other parents.  You know what parent can get away with that shit and look cool?  Michael F*N Jordan.  The only one.  Ever. 

2.  The Endless Advice Giver:  This is usually the lady who is the room mom, scout mom, religious education volunteer, president of the PTO, school board runner, obsessive pinner, and food storage fanatic (all home-grown, organically, of course, and canned in her own kitchen).  She has a daily photoblog for every.single.day. of her 9 children's lives.  She's usually the one with the disapproving look in the corner when you're five minutes late for story time at the library.  Her kid could read before he walked and was doing differential equations before he weaned, which she credits to a diet completely lacking in sugar and processed food (I mean, really.  Who needs a childhood and social skills?).  She's usually the one you have to work with at the Barnes and Noble book fair, and she orders you to accost people for donations while she holds down a chair and tells you how lucky she is she doesn't have to work and feels so sorry for you, while you secretly plot smacking her in the face with a Women's Studies textbook on 'privilege.'  If all else fails, you can recognize her when she runs in a panic to stop her kid from eating flies out of the window seal.

3. The Clueless, Oblivious, I-Either-Overdosed-On-my-Xanax-or-Have-no-Brain parent: This is the lady you get stuck volunteering with over an activity that makes herding ferile cats look like a cake walk.  She turns in circles searching for a pen for 2 hours and makes you realize those Deadheads have nothing on this bitch.  She forgets what she was talking about mid-sentence of a 10 minute, monotonous story about laundry, and happy hour is still five hours away.  Her children are the ones tearing shit off the walls and screaming like an air raid alarm.  She's usually best friends with the Endless Advice Giver.  There's a middle ground, people.  Find it.

4.  The I-Don't-Really-Give-a-Shit Parent: This is the parent that only shows up because they feel obligated (and, if your kid's school is like ours, they get charged $20 an hour for every hour under the volunteer quota). This parent is thankful that for 8 hours a day, someone else has to deal with this shit. This parent has no clue when anything is due, because the spouse takes care of all that. This parent beats foot to volunteer for the beer and wine stand at the Halloween carnival.  This is the parent of the child constantly saying, "My mom forgot.  I told her to put it on the calendar, but she forgot."  This parent rolls her eyes when you offer advice about sugar, bedtime, spanking, and just advice in general.  You can identify the fruits of this parent's womb by the stream of curse words they use, in context, in front of nuns at Bingo night, when they are three.  This parent is me.

5.  Grandma:  This is the lady formerly referred to as 'Mom', that beat you within an inch of your life for lying.  This is the lady that never let you go to school without a hot breakfast (i.e. freaking pancakes...NO cereal.EVER.), but sees absolutely no problem with feeding your children chocolate cake and ice cream for breakfast.  She's usually accompanied by someone going by the name of Papa.  He's the guy that she always told you for whom you were gonna be sorry when he got home.  She pulled her hair and said things like, 'You're driving me stark RAVING MAD!', but your kid brain thought she said "To start raking mud", and you always pictured her in the borrow pit with a trowel.  This is the lady that begs you to let her have your kids for the weekend, then returns demon spawn that behave as if they were never taught a thing.  EVER.  You'll know this lady when all the things she said would kill you as a child, are the things she enables your child to do.  She's usually the lady in a store somewhere with angelic children worshipping her like a saint.  You'll recognize her by the fact she never tells children 'no.'

Joe

I kind of grew up in a bar.  My grandmother owned it, and we would go with her to the liquor store and to clean and stock the bar in the mornings.  Always at 10:00, after the mail came.  She always gave us money to play the jukebox and we’d get to make our own Shirley Temples with way too much grenadine. We’d play pool, and for a while when we were little, she had Space Invaders on a table machine.

We’d get bored and head outside to roll down the grassy hill next door until we were so dizzy we couldn’t walk.  Then, we’d head across the parking lot to visit Joe.

Joe lived in a tiny one room apartment connected to my grandfather’s office. He always had cookies and comic books for us.  Sometimes we got him out of bed, and if we were lucky, he’d have boxes of CrackerJacks.

Joe and Grandma and Gracie went to lunch every Wednesday…except for poker days.  Then they switched for another day of the week.

Joe was always at Grandma’s on Christmas.  He didn’t work, and Grandma said after he got out of college he applied for one engineering job and didn’t get it and he never tried again.  He was a piano player in bars until he “retired.”  I’m sure he didn’t have a lot of money, but my grandmother had 9 grandchildren and EVERY year, we got a Christmas present from Joe.

Joe had a crazy sense of humor, and he always kind of reminded me of Johnny Carson.  He gave my grandma dirty cards on her birthday that always made her laugh.  

Joe got old and started living in filth.  Grandma had to call his family.  I think they lived somewhere in Oregon, and I remember being shocked that Joe had a family.  I was pregnant with Sheridan at the time, and he called and told me I needed to come get some books.

He was packing, and he was pissed about having to leave.  I remember there was mouse shit on everything, and I said, “But, Joe, you can’t live like this!”  He just kind of slumped.

“Books are on the shelf back there,” He said and pointed to the bedroom.

It’s weird going into someone’s bedroom, and I was a little uncomfortable.  But, I’m a bookworm and I found book Nirvana.  A whole leather bound antique edition of all of Shakespeare’s play and sonnets—each in its own little book.  Steinbeck.  Asimov.

Joe came in and sat on the bed.  “You like Steinbeck?” He asked.

“Yes.  Very much.”  And we had a half-hour long conversation on the tawdry in and outs of “Of Mice and Men” and “The Grapes of Wrath” while I packed a couple of liquor boxes full of books.

When I stood to go, I noticed the wall next to the bedroom door.  It was covered in pictures of us grandkids.  You could tell he started pinning them at the top.  Our baby pictures.  Pictures of Christmas. Honor roll clippings and sports news from The Arco Advertiser.  Sports photos from when we were in high school. It was like an inverse growth chart.  The older we got, the farther down on the wall we were pinned.

It took my breath away.  I guess it was the first time I ever realized how much we all meant to that old man.  We were his grandkids, too.

He saw me looking.  “You can’t have any of those!” he said and laughed.  Then he pointed and said “Remember this?”  and we had a nice walk down memory lane.

Here’s the thing:  Joe was gay.

I only learned this, because he always took my brother and the cousins to town to the movies for birthdays, and once, one of my mother’s aunts had the audacity to tell my mother she shouldn’t let my brother go.  My mom doesn’t get pissed often, unless she feels pretty passionate about something, and she said, “I’d NEVER put my son in a situation where I didn’t think he was safe.  Let me tell you something (and this is how I knew she was pissed, because when she says ‘let me tell you something’, the woman MEANS business)…he’s gay.  He’s NOT a pedophile.” And she loaded us up, and we went home.

I didn’t know what either of those words meant.  I was probably ten at the time.  In the car, I asked her what gay meant, and she told me.  “But, he’s good to you, right?” She asked me.

“Yes.  Always.”  I said.

“That’s all that matters.”

That is all that matters.  

I’m tired of hearing how you can love the sinner and still hate the sin. When did love become a sin?

I’m tired of hearing how gay marriage is a threat to traditional marriage.  REALLY?  How?  Are you scared that by someone else vowing to love someone for better and for worse somehow, in some way, makes your vow any less valid?

I’m tired of hearing “What’s next? Polygamy?”  Who cares?  Seriously.  How would even THAT affect your marriage?  I had Rural Community Economics in college with a guy from Kenya.  We called him Simba, and he was a Ph.D. candidate.  It was a very small class, and I sat next to him one day.  “So, Simba,” I said.  “You have three moms?”

“Yes,” he said in his heavy accent that I liked to hear.

“Do you want three wives?”

He chuckled.  “My father has always told me to only have one wife.”

“Why?” I asked, intrigued.

“Because more than that and they fight too much!” 

Three moms and as far as I can tell, from getting to know him, he seemed liked he had a pretty good grasp on life.  

I take my marriage vow pretty seriously, for the most part.  And, I’ll be the first to admit, I’m kind of inclined to believe that without some kind of divine intervention, we probably wouldn’t be together anymore.  I DO believe my marriage is a sacrament.  But, that is me.  I own that. And, I don’t need anyone else outside of my marriage telling me what my marriage means anymore than they need me telling them God has to be in their's.

This is the United States.  A place where religion has no place in government, and lately, it seems like nothing blurs that line between church and state, quite like marriage.

If government is going to grant certain sectors of society benefits based on marriage, then we have to give those benefits to everyone.  No one should be marginalized, least of all in the name of God.

The logical fallacies of the arguments out there against gay marriage are textbook classics. 

Don’t tell me how much you love gay people when you seem to be perfectly fine denying people like Joe the ability to make end of life decisions for their lifelong partners, or share insurance benefits, or heaven forbid, raise and have loving families.

Bigot: a person who is obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices; especially : one who regards or treats the members of a group (as a racial or ethnic group) with hatred and intolerance. (Merriam-Webster)

I hate to break it to you, but yeah, if you think it’s somehow fine to deny one group of people the rights everyone else gets, based on who they love and because they ‘sin’ differently than you, then yes, you ARE a bigot and don’t be offended when people tell you so.

Same sex attraction has been observed in almost all mammalian species, at a rate of about 10-20% of populations.  Bigotry and intolerance, as far as I can tell, is only observed in one.

I do believe we all have a cross to bear in this life.  And, maybe, just maybe, instead of telling people their cross is not acting on their love for another person, maybe it’s time we realized our own cross might be learning tolerance for people who are different.

Steubenville

When I was in my early 20s and single, I convinced my grandpa to give me the keys to one of his cabins in Island Park.  The Piper and I were going to a pig roast.  This was back in the day when we didn't just go to a party.  We PARTIED. HARD.

We ended up at the old A-Bar. This was back when I drank vodka collins, and as I was showing off my stupid human trick of being able to tie a cherry stem in a knot with my tongue in under 30 seconds, I noticed a girl almost passed out near a pool table.  Two guys were trying to get her up and she was getting pretty combative.  We'd watched her do a few shots, and her girlfriends appeared to be nowhere in sight.

My eyes got big, and I nodded at the Piper in her direction.  The boys had her up and were trying to get her out the door. We both sat our drinks down and followed them out the door without saying a word.  She didn't want to get in the car with them, so I went to the car and asked if we could give her a ride.  For a second, she was a little lucid and grabbed the Piper.

We got told to mind our own business.  One guy was her boyfriend or something like that.  "Then it shouldn't be a big deal if we give her a ride," I said.  "I'd feel a lot better about it.  No one wants the cops showing up with us all drinking and stuff." I said.

He got really pissy, and The Piper chested up.  Somehow, after lots of cussing, we ended up with this girl in the car, unable to tell us where to go, but she handed us a phone and gave us a name.  We met her friend at Pond's and transferred custody.  I never saw her again, but The Piper and I talk about that night a lot.  I'm convinced something bad would've happened to that girl if we hadn't made them let her go with us.

For the life of me, I cannot remember what she was wearing.  Since it was early September in Island Park, I assume she was dressed just like us and every other 20 something in the place.

I bring up this story, because I felt like I needed to talk to Sha about Steubenville. It seems like everyone out there is worried about how to talk to their kids about this.  Unfortunately, the conversations I had to have with my daughter regarding alcohol came at a very young age, and they both involved the death of people very close to both of us.  The third involved DARE, and we've been having them since.

I was very open with my kid during the DARE conversation.  I've done a lot of stupid shit in my life, and I was open about how I felt.  I was as honest as I thought I could be.  I told her point blank, alcohol will make you do stuff you NEVER in your life thought you would do, and sometimes, it makes people not remember a damn thing.

I told her about the girl in Island Park.  I told her about my own stupid stuff (some, not all).  I told her about girls in college who woke up in the morning mortified about what they had done.

I'm as pissed as off as everyone else out there at the newscasts telling us how two star athletes futures were ruined.  I'm as tired as everyone else with hearing how she was drank herself into that situation.

You know what?  As much as I hate to admit it, I found myself puking in the parking lot once while my friend Tom held my hair.  You know what humans do?  They do what he did, and called me a ride and waited with me until The Piper showed up.

THIS, THIS, is why we don't tell girls its what you wore, or what you drank.  I should be able to walk down the street naked as a jaybird, and THAT does not give anyone consent to do anything to my body.

I'm not shocked that Jane Doe was accused of being a slut.  I'm not shocked at the people who said she deserved it.  When I was in Girl Scouts, they taught us to carry our keys spread out between our freaking knuckles "just in case someone tried to grab us in a parking lot."  I've heard all the "don't dress like that" and "don't act like that" that I can stomach. I watched the Jody Foster movie and knew then how screwed up it all was.

What shocked me, and I mean shocked me, was the defense lawyer saying the young woman never said no.  What shocked me was that these young men said they didn't think it was rape.

NO ONE HAS TO SAY NO.   We are all entitled to sovereignty over our bodies and our sexuality.  You aren't invited to the party, stay the fuck out.  Its not that hard to comprehend. 

That young woman is an athlete and honor student, too.  What about her life sentence?  She decided to drink...at a party...with her peers and "friends."

When you tell me and my daughter how to carry our keys, how to aim for pressure points on an attacker, how to be fearful when its dark, you are telling me, and my daughter, that men and boys have no control.  THAT my friends, is just about as sexist as it gets. You are negating the actions of men like my friend Tom, or another friend who walked me home because we were both too drunk to drive, and saw me to the door...the one I tried to kiss who told me I was too inebriated for that.

You are sending a message that men are inherently evil.  Its not true.

I don't have male children.  I do have a father, a brother, nephews, cousins, and lots of male friends.  ALL who are decent human beings.

You know what?  That young woman was as drunk as many of us have found ourselves. The others appear to have had enough capacity to make a few decisions about what they did, and brag about it in front of the whole entire world. They get a minimum of a year in jail, which in my opinion, doesn't mean shit.  Its still all about them.  "My life is over", one sobbed as he fell into his attorneys arms.

You, sir, will not have to live with being called a SLUT for the rest of your life. Your lack of any sense of what you did, beyond taking a picture that was wrong, is insane.

We call India backwards when a young woman dies of gang rape; we condemn acid burnings in Afghanistan.  Yet, we continue to slut shame and victim blame in our own backyard.

That whole debate a few weeks ago about how if every woman carried a gun, rape wouldn't happen...just got shot in the ass.

Like I said, I don't have boys.  But I can guarantee you, if I did, the conversation starts, not with big words like consent, but a tiny, four letter one called love.

It starts with love and it ends with taking care of people.  People you don't know and people you do.  It involves the fact that just because someone else acted irresponsibly, doesn't mean taking a total leave of your senses.  It means respect.  It means having common human decency and not being shocked when you're a pariah because you show a total lack of it.

It means being a friend.

My daughter turns 16 in a week.  Every time I hear about this story, I think of her.  I can lock her in the house, tell her not to do this, not to dress like that.  Not to trust.

I believe in a better world.

All I can do is teach her to be the best human being and trust her to do it.  I'll still teach her to watch out and be aware.  But I will NEVER, EVER let her believe that because what she wore, or what she said, or because she had sex before, or, God forbid, gets blackout drunk, that somehow gives someone license to treat her as something to use.

I won't ever let her think men lack control.  Its time we stopped selling our men and boys short and making excuses for them when a small minority do fall.  Its time we let some boys know women aren't here to please or be used.

If its actually true, that those boys didn't know it was rape, which I'm not sure I believe, it says a lot about society in general, not just one small town with a football fetish.

Why I Hate the Dinner Dilemma

So, I’m totally down with the fact I’m not the June Cleaver or even the Claire Huxtable of motherhood.  In fact, I’ve made it my life goal not to be. And, I’m in a little bit of trouble with The Sha over it.  I don’t care.  I hope she learns something from what I did. 

In the last week, I’ve had people tell me to get over feminism, and one that accused me of hating my people and wanting to change people’s way of life because I had the vagina to point out we need an Equal Rights Amendment because there is much case law over the years pointing to how equal protection under the constitution isn’t the dream some envision.

A LOT of my thinking in this regard has been ingrained in my head since before I can remember.  My great-grandmother was a proud first-wave feminist.  Except even our family, no one used that word.  It was women’s lib.  

Her stories are personal to me.  When she was told she didn’t need the same pay as her male peers at her teaching job, because she had a husband, she fought. Marching herself to the state capitol, and she got what she was after.  

I’m a Title IX baby.  I was always able to play little league, and lived for sports in school.  In fact, sports is one of the reason I’m not straddled with student loan debt. My great-aunt came to all of my games.  She would tell me how much she loved playing basketball, but half-way through high school, they quit letting girls play, because they thought it would make them unable to have babies.

When I was told by a boss his wife never worked when their kids were young, and maybe I should think about that, I quit and found a new job.  Shocked that being the third generation after my great-grandmother’s fight, here I was looking at someone who claimed to be a social progressive questioning my motherhood, because I worked.  

I’ve stood toe-to-toe with my husband, demanding he help clean house without being asked while I worked and finished my degree (thank God I had only had one semester after we got married, or the ship might have sank).  “I do more than most!” he would say.

“Who is ‘Most’?”  I would demand.  “Tell me who?  And he better not have a housewife!”  I would yell while throwing dishes into the sink in a snit because the house was a disaster. I worked hard to be able to contribute to my families economic well-being,  be able to stand on my own feet if I have to, and I’ll be damned if that means I have to do everything around the house, too.

My great-grandfather always told me, “Never let a man tell you what to do,” and when he met B-Rye, he looked me in the eye and said, “You don’t let him boss you around do you?” Brian laughed at the little white-haired, VERY spiritual Mormon man who was 99 at the time. 

We got in the car and he was still laughing.  I said, “I hope you know, he’s dead serious.” 

And, let me tell you how much we’ve fought over him trying to tell me what to do. :-) 

My point being, its been ingrained in my head since before I can remember that women’s equality is serious, important business.  From my own struggles with mommy guilt to wanting to raise my daughters to be strong women, I take sexist shit personally.  If you really want to piss me off, tell me how much it doesn’t matter.

A major debate in feminist circles these days centers around a conflict between second and third wave feminists.  Mothers who don’t think their daughters appreciate the struggle, don’t fight enough, don’t realize the world they live in and take for granted, was shaped and formed by serious battles.   

And, that is how I got in trouble with The Sha on Wednesday.

I came home from work, and was sitting at the table and asked how her day went.  She laughed and told me I would have come unglued in her health class. She knows these things because she thinks I’m on par with some woman who doesn’t shave her armpits and barks at the moon…well, I wouldn’t put it past me.  BUT, she knows this because I HAVE pointed out she could tell the DARE officer to “suck a fatty.  Girls don’t have to wear dresses to be professional, and when he wears one when its ten below, he can dictate you do,” and I did kind of go on a tirade on a test her history teacher sent home for me to fill out—there was a spot to write in your gender, and I wrote “gender is a social construct that needs to be squashed like the patriarchy” and some other things regarding colonialism and hegemony that were probably pretty radical.  He got a kick out of it though, and told me so at P-T conference. 

I get it I’m radical.  There was a time I really thought everybody just knew and accepted this stuff.  That time passed a long time ago.

But, at least I’ve gotten one thing across to Sha—I’m not gonna stand in silence about this stuff.

See, it’s the start of a new trimester and she is telling me about her health class.  The teacher is lecturing on fast food and asks if anyone in class knows why the consumption of fast food and its horrible health effects have become such an epidemic in America.  No one answered, and the teacher apparently said it happened when women started working, so no one is home to make dinner anymore.

My jaw hit the table.  “She said THAT?  IN CLASS!?”  Sha started laughing, a huge belly laugh.  “Did you tell her men are perfectly capable of making fucking dinner?!”  And she laughed harder.

I got up and started pacing the kitchen, determined I wasn’t making dinner just to prove a damn point.  She kept laughing at me, and told me how she loves my reactions. 

I’m pretty much myself around my kids.  I can be professional and lady-like, but if anyone knows how I really am, its my girls.  Mostly, because I want them to know its ok to be loud and have an opinion and take up space.  They deserve that.  They’re entitled to a voice, and I hope they find it.

“Well, did you say anything, Sheridan?!”  I asked.

“No!”  She laughed. “But I knew you would have.”

I guess a little part of me is glad she even noticed the sexism, even if she was too afraid to say anything.  I told her, “You really should point out that stuff.  By not, you’re letting people think its alright to think those things.  You don’t have to call it ‘bullshit’ like I would, you can say it in a nice way.”

She just laughed again as I finally sat back down, and she pushed some papers in front of me.  She explained to me I needed to read the curriculum for this health class, talk it over with her, and sign a paper agreeing she could learn about sex and STDs.  “She going to teach you about birth control?” I asked.

“No. She said that’s too touchy around here.”

“Figures,” I said and left it at that.  I’d been on my soapbox enough.  “I’ll sign them before I go to bed.  I want to look over them a little more.”

So, later, I signed and dated the paper, and left a P.S. at the bottom.  It said “Please don’t blame the fast food epidemic on women.  Blame it on the still unequal division of domestic labor.” And left a nice little smiley face.

Sha’s embarrassed, and told me yesterday “I’ll just have dad sign my papers from now on!”

“Fine.”  I said.  Dad can sign those papers, because we agreed a long time ago to split chores and share parenting. I kept my mouth shut about how that still doesn’t happen at some houses.

This morning, as Brian was getting Schmoo ready for school, like he has every single day since she was two and I quit working from home, while he was warming up her clothes in the dryer like he does every day so they are warm for her, I asked her if I could fix her hair today.

“I want Daddy to do it.” She said.  “He does it better.”

I sipped my coffee, and watched them get ready for the day (picture above).  In the past, the mommy guilt over this has almost killed me.  As I watched, I’m thankful he’s as involved in her life and every aspect of it as he is.  There’s no way in hell I’d have ever thought to warm up her clothes every day.

I’m lucky.  He IS better than most I know.  I work with women who do everything and have to do it.  Some don’t have anyone to help. Some don’t stand up and demand help.

I was outside the building the other day, and a lady said to me, “You’re a good mom.  You do awesome things with your kids, especially with the hours you put in here.”

I was a little embarrassed, but it was probably one of the best compliments anyone could give me.  “Thank you.  I have a great husband,” I said.  “He helps me a lot.”  And, its true.

He shakes his head at me a lot, just like The Sha does.  “Think about where we live.  You think a lot different than most people,” he likes to tell me.

Well, that doesn’t mean it can’t or shouldn’t change.  So, I won’t fight with my daughter over how I think she should handle things or where she should take women in her generation, and I'll do my best not to be an embarassment to her.   

After all, the point behind it all is I just want her to have choices and opportunities in her life and not be limited by something as trivial as being “just a girl.”

I don’t want her to feel guilty for not making dinner by following her dreams. So, every time someone says something to make her think she's "just a girl" or that dinner is her job, I'm going to say something.  For her.