There’s a Lot of Scary Movies That Start This Way…

Apparently a weekend writing retreat can mess you up, date-wise.

This was to have posted Monday.  /sigh/

Dateline, rural Michigan.

I’ve always wanted to say that. 

I’ve been in the state for a good 24 hours now, and slowly but surely I am getting over the idea that I will disappear, my luggage discovered at a wayside rest, my prescription sunglasses found by the police outside of a gas station.

I feel about the country how many people feel about cities.

The bed and breakfast at which I am staying has loaned me the use of a car, a Land Rover of indeterminate age.

“First of all,” she says, “she stalls sometimes.  Not a full stall, not most of the time anyway.  So don’t freak.  If it floods, it will only be for a little while.”

She takes a sip of her coffee. 

“Right,” she says.  “Directions.  So!  You take a right out of the front entrance.  You go past the old Schmidt place, the big white place that needs a new roof.  Anyway, there’s a gravel road just after the stand of trees – whatever you do, don’t take that road!  Go another click or two, then take a right at the painted rock, drive around the lake, and you’ll come out where the ballroom used to be and voila!  You’ve arrived.”

An internal shudder runs through me.

“I’m leaving for my writer’s workshop,” I post on Facebook.  “I am wearing a pink and brown patterned dress.  If you later see this dress at a garage sale, alert the authorities and whatever you do, DO NOT BUY THE JERKY!”

I’m sure I’ll live. 

Another Lousy Post About Winter

The grayness…

I look around, note the frozen hipsters on the bus (once their skin goes black, there’s nothing to do but mash them up and make bread with them).

I bemoan the cuts on my hands where I’ve carelessly run their dry knuckles against the hard-edged corners of the month of January.

I absentmindedly count the layers of clothing I am wearing (fully 8 pieces more than in, say, August).

And I sigh.

Winter has its boot on the back of my neck. 

I think back, fondly, to summer.  My memories have developed the soft-focus affect of a dream, just moments after waking.  June.  July.  I don’t remember wearing shoes then.  And I recall stepping outside – now get this! – without putting on a hat. 

Who goes outside without wearing a hat?

From the deepest, most humid parts of my brain, the squat bald man in my head slides his pudgy, dimpled hands against each other gleefully.  The smell of smoke accompanies him.

Where did he get those cigarettes?

I close my eyes.  I hate when he smokes in there.

“Why don’t you,” he says, “call in sick a couple days?”  He takes a drag of his Pall Mall, blows the hit toward my left ear.  “We’ll get drunk,” he says, “and rub our dry little hands over our tubby little middles, see what shakes loose.”

As if to illustrate, he runs his hands over his own belly.  His cigarette, badly in need of ashing, dangles from his lips.

I turn away. 

“Come on,” he says.  “We’ll do Stupid Human Tricks.”  He pulls his tee-shirt up – the one that says “I’m Not a Doctor, But I’ll Take a Look” – pats his head with one hand, rubs his gut with the other.

I sigh.

The ash from his cigarette falls, wiping out most of second grade.

I blink slowly.  I didn’t need those memories, anyway.

The squat, bald man in my head takes another pull from his cigarette – “squares”, he calls them – and closes his left eye, peers at me with the right.  “So what’re you going to do about it?”

I sigh again, something I’m thinking of taking up competitively.  “I have a sick day planned for March,” I say.

The squat, bald man in my head spits into my memories of the seventh grade Sadie Hawkins dance.  “You’ve planned,” he says, horrified, “a sick –“

He can’t finish.

“I’m going to make meatballs this weekend,” I offer, feebly.  “That’s kinda fun…”  The word “fun” is barely out of my mouth before it plops, sullenly and without pretense, to the floor.

The squat, bald man in my head can take no more, and from somewhere far to the back, near the id but really not that far from the escalator, I hear a door open.

“OK,” he shouts, “I can’t hang out here listening to this kind of drivel.  If you need me, I’ll be back here, setting fire to stuff.”

And the door slams shut. 

January.

Us Versus Them; or Bus Fight!

Six-thirty-something a.m.  Minneapolis is a cold, dark place, a place where, 150 years or so ago, a band of dour Norwegian bachelor farmers stopped their oxen, looked around, and muttered, “Oh, vell.  Vhy not.”

And lo these many years gone by, we continue, both the Norwegian and your standard Wegian, to look around, shrug, and mutter “Oh, well....”

These are the thoughts I have on this, a Tuesday, the 3^rd of December.

The bus arrives, as the bus is wont to do, and I step, gratefully, into its warm, utilitarian embrace. I wave my bus pass in front of the doohickey until it beeps, then proceed to my favorite seat, the seat I will always take if it is available, the seat up those last two steps at the back of the bus, next to the back door and the dark, domed lens of the video camera.

Rest assured, people, that should anything felonious/interesting happen to me on the bus, it is my fondest wish that it be videotaped.

Seated, I leave the rest of the commute to the bus driver.  O, how I love him/her.  Their chosen occupation leaves me free to file my nails, place random texts to friends I suspect are also up at this hour, stare out the window at other buses…

The light turns red, and we come to a stop as another bus pulls up, also stops.

I find myself staring out the window at the passengers on this other bus.

I turn back to my bus.  We have 20 people, not including the bus driver.

I turn back to their bus.  I count 18 people.

And just like that, I am wondering if we can take them in a fight.  That one guy up front, the one with the cane and the shaky walk, I’m willing to bet he can swing that thing when called upon to do so.  The black pony-tailed Hispanic gals – how much Spanish do I know, anyway?  We’ll have to pantomime the whole “I’ll go high, you go low” bit, but they look sturdy.

I look over at the other bus.  Pffft.  Three of their guys are sleeping, heads against the glass!

I smile, nod to myself as the light turns green.

Yep.  We could totally take that bus in a fight.

The Third Round Involves Answering Using Helium Balloons

I’ve got a great idea for a game show, one I’ve patterned on my life and the lives of the people around me. I’m quite sure that this is, as we say in Minnesota, a “big wiener”, so we should probably hug and say our good-byes now, as I expect I’ll soon be hounded by TV execs and find myself at parties sipping tiny margaritas out of Johnny Depp’s navel...

I'm sorry. Where was I?

Oh, yes. The game show.

You ready? Here it comes.

The show is called “They Never Saw It Coming”. The premise is that of the people in the room, at least one of them is lying to you – can you tell which one? Each segment of the show has a definite, solid clue in it as to what you should do or who you can trust. The whole show lies in observation, with each level or segment taking you to the “center” where you are given a change to win Big Money based on a question that should be answerable from the previous situations/questions.

It starts out easy, of course. All you have to do is observe. Look at that man’s shifty eyes! Why does he seem nervous? And why does that woman laugh at everything you say? You’re not that funny. Check your purse – is your wallet still in it?

So what would be an example of an easy first round?

“Excuse me, ma’am? Do you have fifty cents? My kids are hungry, and I want to take them to McDonald’s.”

Now why is this an easy question?

Because no man should be approaching me to feed his kids, especially at McDonald’s. Offer the man an apple and walk away. Next question.

You’ve received a call from the mechanic working on your car. He needs your credit card as it seems that part of your problem is that you are low on blinker fluid and you’re going to need your head gasket rotated. Oh, and you see that? Under the hood and behind that pulley there? Those reluctors are ready to go out and MAN are they tough to replace. Very sensitive instruments, those.

So what do you do?

If you wish to proceed to the next round, you tell him you’ll be by to pick up your car within the hour. Everyone knows that the problem is with the lug-nut gap. Besides, when's the last time you cleaned your windshield? That's going to affect performance as well.

It’ll take work, of course; but I think I’m on to a winner.

Now who wants to play “They Never Saw It Coming”?

And in the Summer, There are Those Who Forget to Wear Clothes Altogether

The temperature outside is four degrees. 

When one figures in the wind (out of the northwest, freshly chilled and compliments of the Great State of North Dakota), at four degrees, one is assured of wide-eyed consciousness followed by idle, almost dreamy speculation regarding blackened toes, car trunks doubling as meat lockers, and, for some reason, Mexican food.

The good citizens of Minneapolis, snuggled in fluffy layers of serious clothing, close their eyes against the dark winter-y landscape and inwardly thank the heavens for heated buses.

And then he gets on.

We shall think of him as Mr. Foolish Businessman, because that is how he is dressed.  While the North Wind Doth Blow and the snow eddies in gravity-defying rings in doorways, this guy has taken it upon himself to come to the bus stop in a suit and a light overcoat.

No hat.  No boots.  No scarf.  No gloves.

I frown in concentration, an expression I adopt several times a day that wreaks havoc on my desire for a wrinkle-free face.  So much ridiculousness in the world:  Why is that woman feeding a baby French fries?   Why have so many people taken up recreational spitting?  Why do I have an uncle who warns me, several times a  year, that I am to never fall asleep on cold concrete?

These are the things that keep me awake at night.

And now this guy. 

Why are you dressed for weather at least 40 degrees warmer than today’s projected high?

What would happen if we, the weather-respectful of the bus, were to rise up, push you outside for a bit?  How would ya like that, huh?

In my head, where things are warm and, increasingly, bubble-wrapped for my protection, I envision the regulars on the bus rising in mute consensus. 

We walk, slowly, menacingly, to the front.

“You’re not from around these parts, are ya?”

The man looks around in discomfort, looks up at the non-gruntled collection of sun-deprived, over-stuffed commuters before him.  “I – I was born and raised here.”

Disgusted, a puff of air escapes the lips of the 6:36 crowd.  Somewhere in the background, a woman starts to play the harmonica softly.  A coyote howls in the distance.

“Well then you should know that it’s winter here, partner, and we don’t cotton to people who won’t acknowledge the awesome power of Old Man Winter!”

A grumbling chorus of “thazz righ’, dawg”s and “ja, you betcha”s is heard.

“Bus driver!  I hardly think –“

The bus driver’s face makes an appearance in the rearview mirror, then returns to tailing the die-hard Minneapolis biker earnestly navigating a snow rut in the roadway before him.

“Think?  Well that’s just it, isn’t it? You’re not thinkin’, are ya?  Frostbite is within our stiff-fingered grasp and ohhhh noooo, you can’t be bothered to put a hat on, can ya?”

The group chuckles cruelly, moves forward, arms outstretched…

And what happens next becomes the stuff of transit legend.

They speak of it now, in hushed tones, the morning the riders of the 17W rose up and took back the winter.  They found him, Mr. Foolish Businessman, swaddled tightly in scarves, decorated with the mismatched and abandoned mittens sometimes found on the bus.  “Wind chill, that’s what’ll get ya,” he repeats.  “It’s the wind chill that’ll get ya…”

And he never again forgot to wear a hat.

Wherein My Body Has a Firm Word with My Brain

My body has had quite a lot to say recently.

It started talking last Thursday, when I developed the headache that I now carry with me at all times.  Oddly enough, this headache, while making me squint and periodically push my fingers into my eye sockets until  colors explode with black and red abandon, has not put me in a particularly bad mood. 

“I’m the same way,” my sister says.  “Why let pain get in the way of a good time?”

Still, I’ve been subconsciously reaching for my temples for days.

“Kinda expect to find a vise there, don’t you?”  This from my body. 

“Yes,” I admit.  “I reach up, expecting to find a bolt, a set of calipers perhaps.  And yet, I find nothing.  I don’t know what’s going on. ”

“Wait’ll tomorrow,” my body says.  “Hoo, boy.”

“Hoo, boy?”  I frown.  “What does that mean?”

My body shrugs, snaps open a newspaper and pretends to be deep in thought.  “Hmm.  Says here we can expect falling temperatures.”

My brain squeezes itself past the pressure being applied to my eyeballs and barks a mirthless sound approximating a laugh.  “Ha!  You do realize it’s December in Minnesota?  You can repeat the words “falling temperatures” until March.”  The brain, she squints at the body.  “Are you, sir, toying with me?”

And for the first time since puberty, my body sets down its paper and looks my brain square in the face.

“One,” it says, “I need you to drink more water.”

“But I’m not from –“

“For cryin’ eye, Brain, if I hear that tired old line about not being from water-drinking people one more time, I’m going to take you to a strip club.”

“Well I shan’t go,” the brain says.  “It’s exploitation.”

The body shrugs.  “Some of them are nice to look at.”

The brain purses its lips primly.  “Do shut up.”

“And sleep,” the body goes on, “I want more sleep.”

Silence from the brain.  The brain likes to stay up.

“And the neti pot.  You said you’d use it more often.  It’s a very dry time of year, and my nasal passages are aching.”

The brain nods cautiously.  “I found myself cogitating on this just the other day, that the headache may, perchance, be the inadvertent result of self-created dehydration.”

The body snorts in disgust.  “And I’m cogitating,” it says, “of giving you a swirly, you keep that kinda talk up.”

“A swir—“

“I’m gonna stick my head – full of you, brain-face – in the toilet and keep flushing until you shut up.”

The brain blinks slowly, rises, clears its throat.  “Upon further reflec – um, I’m thinking that perhaps you know best in this case, my dear body.  In bed tonight by 9:00, I promise.”

“And water?  You’ll drink more water?”

“I shall make a concerted effort.”

The body heaves a sigh of relief.   “You’re a good brain when you try.”

The Upper Midwest Full Disrobe Champeenship

“Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen, to the 2012 Upper Midwest Full Disrobe Championship.  I’m Greg Dowdy –“

“ – and I’m David Weekly.  Today’s competition promises to be one full of the spirit, the vitality of the people of this frozen land of ours and the dynamic energy with which those same people fight off boredom.”

“And hypothermia, Greg.  Let’s not forget hypothermia.”

“Right you are, David.  Tonight’s match is the result of two hard-fought events, events in which we marveled at the flight pattern of flung slippers, the flailing of pale limbs, the gusto with which the pallid flesh of our contestants has been stripped and slung toward the promise of flannel sheets.”

“Well said, Greg.  I’d like to add that this has all been done while perfectly sober.”

“That’s right, David.  The broadcasting of the drunken version of this event, held every New Year’s Eve right around 2:30 a.m., ensure both late-night fun and an opportunity for gambling.”

“Wonderfully inappropriate for the whole family.”

“It’s all boiled down to this moment, David.  One contest, one chance.  The Upper Midwest Full Disrobe International Guidelines provide s with the rules:  slippers, socks, leggings, flannel pants, underwear, bra, camisole, long-sleeved tee, cardigan.  In other words, all the things your average woman wears on your average night on the couch, mid-winter.  All of these things are to come off as quickly as possible, followed by a dash across the linoleum –“

“ – or tile –”

“ – or tile floor.  In this corner, we’ve got Amy Peterson, originally out of Brownsville, Ohio, mother of two boys.”

“Greg, Amy’s best known for her vocabulary, both presentable and profane, her collection of toe-socks, and having once made oatmeal for an entire week to, and I quote, teach those dang kids a lesson.”

“Right you are, David.  And in the other corner is her opponent, Tammy Schneider.  Tammy comes to us out of a suburb of Minneapolis where she keeps a grip on her sanity through careful adherence to a strict two-drink minimum before supper.  David, this woman was absolutely Zen-like in the utter destruction of her opponent in Round Two.”

“I don’t think you can use the words “Zen-like” and “destruction” in the same sentence, Greg.”

“Yes, I can, David.”

Ding!

“And there’s the bell, Greg!  The slippers have been flung!  Both participants have discarded their slippers at what may be judged as exactly the same time!  I’ve never seen anything like it!”

“David, we’re cheek to cheek, if I may be so bold, going into what we in the business call The Dropping of the Drawers.  Socks, leggings, flannels, undies:  Incredible!”

“And there go the cardigans, long-sleeved tees, camis, and bras!  Up and over the head in moves normally reserved for someone being attacked by a swarm of bees, the intensity of this competition is electric!  And it’s all come down to the bolt to the bed!  The spring – the leap – both bodies are hitting the mattress at the same time!  Ladies and gentlemen, could this be a tie?”

“David, let’s go to the instant replay.”

“Holy Hannah, Greg, do you see that?!”

“A birthmark shaped like India?”

“The fingertips!  Tammy’s nails have broken the mattress plane!”

“And there you have it, America!  Stick a fork in it, we’re done!  Tammy Schneider is the 2012 Upper Midwest Full Disrobe Champion!”

“Stick a fork in it, we’re done??  Greg, you’re an idiot.”

“That I am, David.  That I am.” 

Round Two of the 2012 Upper Midwest Full Disrobe Event, or Goosebumps Are Your Friends, in an Objective Sort of Way

Ding!

“That’s the two-minute bell, and welcome back to the 2012 Upper Midwest Full Disrobe Event. My name is David Weekly –“

“—and I’m Greg Dowdy.  Thanks for joining us.  Next up in the mid-winter bed-time strip-and-leap competition, Lori Schmidtke and Tammy Schneider.”

“Greg, we spoke with the dark horse in this event, Tammy Schneider, in an interview taped earlier today.  Let’s cut to that.”

“I’ve been taking my own clothes off for years, David.  Winning the Upper Midwest Full Disrobe has been a dream of mine since I was a little girl.”

“Tammy, describe for us tonight’s approach.”

“Well, I don’t like to give too much away, but I like to think I have harnessed the spirit of the bathroom tile in my performance.  The key is in the feet:  I let myself become one with the tile.  When we absorb the utter stillness and chill of the porcelain, we free our inner Inuit.  Counter-intuitively, the only proper response to the bitter cold of winter is nakedness.”

“And there you have it: A disturbing interview with a disturbed woman.”

“I hate to break in here, David, but there’s the bell for Round Two, and we’ve got Tammy Schneider and Lori Schmidtke tearing free of their corners.”

“True to the promise of that taped interview, Tammy has seemingly torn her pants, leggings, socks and slippers off in one surprisingly fluid movement.”

“Little gal, ain’t she?”

“That she is, David, that she is.  Meanwhile, it seems Lori is having a bit of trouble with the last leg of her flannels and – is that a pirouette, David?”

“Greg, it’s rare that we see graceful dance moves in this competition –“

“—and we still haven’t, David.  Lori’s losing valuable time and gaining unsightly goosebumps hopping when she should be getting out of those clothes and under those flannel sheets.”

“Greg, the point is moot because Tammy is a full-on tornado.  The cardigan, long-sleeved tee, the camisole and the bra seem to have come off at once, and there she goes, a pale freckled blur!  She's between the sheets and covered to the chin!”

“David, I haven’t seen a leap like that since that National Geographic special.”

“Agreed, Greg.”

“And that’s it for Round Two.  Join us tomorrow when Amy Peterson takes on Tammy Schneider for the 2012 Upper Midwest Full Disrobe Championship.”

“Two rounds for a Championship, Greg?”

“David, there just aren’t that many sober women willing to demonstrate their full-dress-to-between-the-sheets-winter-undressing techniques.”

“No, there aren’t, Greg.  No, there aren’t.”  

Round One of the 2012 Upper Midwest Full Disrobe Event

Ding!

“Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen, to Round One of the 2012 Upper Midwest Full Disrobe Event.  First up:  Amy Peterson and Lisa Peterson, and these two have come out of their respective corner just a’flinging!”

“It’s fascinating, David, but when you watch these gals, you get two specific courses of action here:  Amy’s started on the top, slippers kicked across the room while pulling the cardigan and long-sleeved tee over-head, while Lisa’s managed to pull the waistbands of both her flannels and her underwear to her knees, where she seems to have gotten her thumbs hooked into her leggings and – holy cow, she’s down!  Down goes Lisa!  Down goes Lisa!”

“Now that’s what we call cheeky, Greg!”

“I’ll say!  Poor Lisa is out of the running as she falls face-first over the tangle of her pants, leggings, and slippers.”

“I saw this once in the 2008 event, David.  There’s no recovery from the knee-bruising tumble of that kind of clothing jumble.”

“Right you are, Greg.  Amy has this locked if she can just stay on her feet.  At this point, we’ve got her 75% nekkid.  We’ve got the tops off, she’s unhooking her bra with one hand while pulling off her knickers.  The athleticism of this woman cannot be understated, Greg.  She’s hopping, she’s running, she’s pulling off one legging at a time –”

“—that woman can snap a bra.”

“You’re not just a’whistling, Greg.  One more sock – and there she goes!  Amy Peterson is tearing across the linoleum floor and has flung herself into the open bed!”

“What can be said about such an exposition?  The perspicacity with which this participant plies the very fabric of her vestments is a testament to the poetic movement inherent in the Upper Midwest Disrobe Event.”

“Greg, have you been watching the Cosell tapes again?”

“Howard Cosell:  The man was a master of the spoken word, David.  Never denigrate him in my presence.  Next up:  Round Two.”

“Greg, I’m excited about our Round Two contenders.  Fresh from her fifth year at a two-year college, we have Lori Schmidtke, three-time local champ and favored in this contest.”

“That’s right, David; and we’ve got Tammy Schneider, an unknown out of Minneapolis.”

“Tammy’s a true dark horse in this event, Greg; and I’m excited to see her technique.”

“Right you are, David.  How right you are.  Lori and Tammy have taken their corners, there’s the bell!”

Ding!

The 2012 Upper Midwest Full Disrobe Event

“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the 2012 Upper Midwest Full Disrobe Event.  My name is Greg Dowdy – “

“ -- and I’m David Weekly.  You know, we’ve been watching these players come up through the ranks, from the local tournaments through the mid-regional events to the Cwad County Cwazy Contest, and all I’ve got to say is wow.  Wow.  These people can really take their clothes off.”

“That’s right, David.  And while it’s true we seem to be seeing more elastic than we used to, these games will just show to go ya one thing, and that’s that we upper Midwest people know how to party.”

“That’s right, Greg.  When the ground gets cold and the night gets long, it’s then that we take a look around our walls and start thinkin’, MAN but I gotta do something with my life, this kinda cold is makin’ my knuckles hurt – oh!  And I believe we’ve just gotten the flag from the judges, and, yes, here comes the two-minute bell for the first event.”

“David, first up are Amy Peterson and Lori Peterson, no relation.  We’ve seen these two before but this is the first time we’ll see them compete against each other.  As in all other disrobes, both gals are wearing a full complement of winter clothing:  bra and underwear, of course, plus slippers, socks, leggings, flannel pants, camisole, long-sleeved tee, cardigan, and the optional pillow cushion.”

“That’s right, Greg.  This year’s battle includes the omnipresent pillow.  And what a decision that has been.”

“It was contentious, David, but it was successfully argued by the Ohio team last year that pillows, couch cushions and stuffed animals were, to anyone sitting on a couch for more than 30 minutes, considered clothing.”

“And that little announcement, Greg, has opened the door to this year’s contention by the team from Wisconsin that lap animals be included in that ruling.”

“David, I understand that to mean both your cats and your smaller dogs.”

“That’s right, Gary:  your chihuahuas, your dachshunds, your corgis.”

“Another slippery slope toward Communism, David.”

“And here come the refs, Gary.  This is it, the first bell in the 2012 Upper Midwest Full Disrobe Event.”

Ding!

Let's Not Bicker and Argue Over Who Blistered Whom

Because ongoing information regarding my footwear is intriguing no matter who you are, I am compelled to update you on my new shoes.

The ones that only recently replaced Leftie and Stompie.

Ah. Leftie and Stompie. Now those were good shoes: up-and-coming shoes, forthright shoes, the kind of shoes that would trot you down a city street just as fast as you cared to go. Those shoes not only knew when to keep their mouths shut but had excellent credit scores and a good head for baseball stats.

Those shoes once saved a drowning child.

But the new ones? They’ve been bitterly disappointing.

The Traitors, as I’ve come to think of them, were comfy in the store. Lovely suede loafers. Best of all, they were an incredible 70% off the retail price.

Seventy percent off!

Who amongst us can resist a $14 pair of shoes?

I put them on, trod the carpeted aisles of the DSW. I pretended to run for the bus, held up an arm and yelled “Wait! Wait!” I pretended to sidestep a wad of gum on the street. I went one way, imagined I had forgotten something and quickly went the other way. I did a quick Charleston.

So far, so good.

But really, with shoes? How can you know?

You can’t; and The Traitors revealed themselves to be untrustworthy, blister-causing turncoats on their first wearing.

Oh, sure, they were my friends in the store, weren’t they? “Buy me! I go with everything! I’m 70% off!”

Foolish mortal.

They bit me, those shoes, again and again. Within blocks of my house, I was in trouble. By the time I had reached the bus stop, my heels were in tears. Why had I forsaken them?

The blisters formed. The left one tore open. Unflattering opinions were shouted, blame firmly placed on my skinflint shoulders. My feet declared me to be a menace to working soles everywhere and plans were drawn up by the left one to leave the lower legs and strike out on their own.

And so I’ve done what any normal person would do. I’ve dug Leftie and Stompie out of the garbage can (where they sat, patiently, in the box of the new ones).

They’ve been reinstated.

The Traitors have been contained in their original box and isolated, left to think about what they’ve done.

They’ll be going back to the store from whence they came.

And that brings us up-to-date regarding my footwear. Tune in again tomorrow when I relate a story about a jacket button that needs replacing.

*sigh*

I got a million of ‘em.

But Sometimes There's Just a Loud Roaring in My Ears

A re-worked re-post from this beer-drinking moron. Enjoy!

As one can imagine about someone who writes every day, I like to spend a certain amount of my life with no actual connection to reality.

I find it just works better with my line of thinking.

My favorite fantasies include a mixture of what could conceivably happen with what could never.

In other words, in my head, it is possible for me to rescue Elvis Presley from drowning while waterskiing.

I find that my best daydreaming is done in that nebulous time between awake and asleep.

I love that region, by the way. It’s like a tiny little vacation.

My favorite late-night fantasy, the one I’ve been lulling myself to sleep with lately, involves my having become a highly respected clarinet player, swinging, Benny-Goodman style, with a 40-piece band behind me. Gene Krupa is our steady drummer and a helluva guy if you can keep him off the sauce. Billie Holiday sometimes joins us for a song or two, rising from the table she keeps up front when she knows we’re in town. She plays a hot game of craps and most of the band owes her money.

We play all the hottest spots. Our crowds are hep cats who show up late and host outrageous after-bar parties. My best friends are L’il Jack, Midge, and Paulie, people who wear vintage clothing and pull short, unfiltered cigarettes from mother-of-pearl cases. Paulie and Midge have been together since forever, but Li’l Jack plays the field.

He’s such a hoot.

I am known as a generous soul, and I am forever being approached by people who had been mean to me in high school and now want to apologize.

They are always profuse with their regrets: “Pearl, we had no idea! Please forgive us for not having recognized your coolness sooner!”

If my difficult childhood has taught me anything, it’s how to be humble in the face of their groveling; and I have the bartender send their table a round of drinks, on my tab, just to show them that there are no hard feelings.

This sometimes leads to misunderstandings, though, and my now-fans try to get closer than I am comfortable with. ‘Hey, Pearl, I love your shoes. So where’s the band going after?’

When I have to make it clear to them, no offense intended, that they just don’t fit into the crowd I hang with now, they are always a little saddened. There are the inevitable tears as the truth of my words sink in; and I am forced to reflect, once again, on the responsibility that my genius carries.




As I say, I like to spend a certain amount of time in my head, away from the madding crowds; but it's not all fun and games in there.

Why Dream When I Can Just Make Stuff Up?

I rarely dream.  While others recount their dreams to others – sometimes at an uncomfortable level of detail – tales of flying over cities and making naked speeches before Congress and whatnot, I’ve got nothing to say.

At this point, I’ll leave you alone for a moment so as to let the idea of me, speechless, sink in.

The medical community will tell you that, after having been tested several years ago, I exhibit abnormal brain waves.

Perhaps my “dreamer” is broken.  

My mother, after all, claims to have lost her “skip”.

"I used to skip," she says, frowning adorably, "I remember it distinctly."

So while I absolutely believe my mother when she claims that she could, at one time, skip, it's not that I used to dream and now don't.

I'm not sure I ever have.

Or perhaps I'm just not one for remembering them.

Everyone, I am told, dreams; it’s simply a matter of whether or not we recall them in the morning.  I’m thinking, however, that if I’m not remembering them, what’s to say I had them in the first place?  Huh?  Answer me that one!

So what’s it all about, Alfie? 

Is it because my conscious life is just so darn fulfilling?

It’s true that I have a fabulous view of downtown Minneapolis – if you lean over and  look right there you can see the garbage incinerator for the whole metropolitan area! 

It’s true that I sometimes leave the house without my cell phone because I live my life on the edge.

It’s even true that I can get the cats to cock their heads at me and then dash out of the room as if late for a meeting simply by playing The Clarinet Polka, which, if memory serves, also works for unwanted visitors and old boyfriends.

The power of the upper register compels you…

Anyway, I still have my “skip”, which I suppose is something.

But I can’t help but wonder if I’m missing out by not remembering my dreams. 

Last I Heard, She was in Oconomowoc

For some time now, I’ve been concerned with matters of communication. 

One likes to be prepared.

“The ransom letter, for example,” I say to the imaginary man in my head.  “When forced to write, against my will, to prove that I am well and not being harmed, I will misspell my middle name.”

My imaginary man, a short, sturdy sort, taps his chin, thoughtfully.   “So it will be “Ann”, not “Anne”?”

“Exactly,” I say, pleased. 

“And this is to communicate that, yes, it’s you, and yes, you’re being held against your will?”

“Precisely.”

“But why,” he murmurs, “would you be kidnapped?”

Whereupon I stare at him until he realizes that a.) I am a precious and rare flower, kidnap-worthy and b.) he should buy me a treat.

The problem is that I was not raised to be demonstrative.  My bloodlines are chock full of staunch, hearty folk, people for whom expressions of love include pats on the back and offers of dinner, for whom a state of upset is revealed through vigorous room-rearrangement and floor-mopping.

“How ‘bout this?” I say.  “How ‘bout I will try to communicate where I’m being held through the use of the first letter of each word in a sentence?”

“Hmm,” he says.

“For example, if the sentence “Barry Levinson Ate Indian Nutriment Earnestly” should show up in the letter, you’ll know they’ve hidden me away in Blaine.”

“Interesting,” he says.  “What happens if you’re being detained in Minneapolis?”

I stare at him, blink slowly.  He pulls a Snickers bar from his pocket.

“No one’s going to kidnap you,” he says, dangling the candy from his fingertips.

Mollified, I tear open the wrapper.

“Anyway,” I say.  “That contingency is taken care of, isn’t it?”

What Am I Thinking? Oh, Not Much...

“The walk to the bus may have looked like any other, but Monday was the day that changed everything.”

I’ve been known to narrate my life. Not aloud, of course, because that would be unseemly. No use in frightening my fellow citizens.

I prefer to think that the commentary in my head is more entertaining than what’s going on around me.

I don’t limit my narrations to my life, though.

I’m willing to narrate yours as well.

“Little did she know that the person next to her at the Farmer’s Market, the person inspecting the turnips, then the rutabagas, was her brother Frank, the man who had left for the Navy 15 years ago only to be struck by lightning and left wandering, witless all these years, in his pursuit of the perfect root vegetable.”

My lips don’t move while I do this, so it’s perfectly normal. Or at least it appears perfectly normal.

Now if my lips moved…

I sometimes see people’s lips moving. They’re walking down the street, fully engaged in something or other. Before Bluetooth and teeny-tiny headphones, this was more amusing than it is now. Like the 'rahr, rahr, rahr' of a dog with a mouthful of peanut butter, one could envision any monologue one liked. Now, however, rather than imagining someone reciting the “I’m-leaving-you-you-rat-bastard” speech as they push their grocery cart through the condiment aisle, the odds are actually much better that the real-life conversation they are having on the world’s smallest phone is more along the lines of “How many kinds of mustard do we have?”

Boring!

So I’m going to continue to create little fantasy lives around them, what they’re saying, where they’re going, why they’re meeting.

Oh, if only they knew how happy they make me, these lip-moving people, or how very much I love them.

Nobody Move, Nobody Get Hurt

I don’t think I’ve ever done laundry for fewer than two people before, and I’m confused.

And just a little frightened.

How strange, to do only one’s own laundry.  Six socks, three shirts, a pair of pants and bath towel lie across chairs, dangle from hangers, drying slowly. 

I stare at them, a dare, perhaps.  I imagine the socks lining up in front of me, a can-can of plain white athletic socks, a diversion while the bath towel creep ups from behind, throws itself over my head…  The pants – a shifty pair with a untrustworthy zipper – go through my wallet, laugh maniacally when faced with the lousy $17 it finds; and all of them chuckle madly as they tear down the hall toward the elevator, off to stuff dollar bills in the G-string of an unsuspecting stripper while the socks chant "Put it on!  Put it on!"

Of course, if the dryer were available, they’d all be hidden away, tumbling, heel-over-toe, a mish-mash of freshly cleaned whites.  Washed in a detergent scent once described by a friend as “angel fart”, the condo would smell of ambition, of a triumph of good over sweaty.

But the dryer’s not working, and anyone walking in would think that something untoward has happened with the hamper, that a virulent strain of garment flu has struck, resulting in an explosion of laundered garb, the washing-machine equivalent of a particularly unsettled stomach. 

Man.  I gotta get out more.

Another Round of Gin and Tonics, Please. Put It on The Cat's Tab.

Still sweating, my face radiating the good health of, say, a boiled beet, I open the front door to find Liza waiting.  Seated at the top of the stairs, tail wrapped tightly around her adorably tiny paws, her eyes glint greenly in the sifted light of an open window.

“Look at you,” she says in a tone normally reserved for her observations on no-name seafood and below-the-butt belted trousers.

“What?” I say, irritably. “I’m supposed to look this way. The yoga studio’s a hundred degrees, for cryin’ out loud!”

Liza Bean Bitey (of the Minneapolis Biteys) chortles indulgently. “Tsk, tsk,” she murmurs. “I thought yoga was supposed to be calming.”

“That’s what the drinks are for,” I say, peeling off my clothes. “Let me hit the shower quick.”

Fifteen minutes later, freshly laundered and talcum-ed to a powdered-donut-like degree, we are in the car and heading toward Psycho Suzi’s, just a couple miles down the road.

It is over the first round of gin and tonics that Liza Bean leans in.

“So what would you say if I were to let you in on an excellent investment opportunity?”

My mouth drops open.

The cat smiles. “I’d like to talk to you about the power of positivity.”

I hold my arm up and holler in the direction of a heavily tattooed server. “Check!”

Liza Bean wraps her little black lips around her straw, chuckles good-naturedly. “Sucker,” she smirks.

“Liza Bean, I swear…”

“Oh, come on,” she says. “You didn’t believe that, did you?”

I scowl at her. “You’re giving me wrinkles,” I say.

A striped paw goes up and a server appears immediately. Cats are notoriously good tippers, and this server knows it.

Liza Bean leans back magnanimously, her raised paw drawing small, all-encompassing circles in the air. “I’m thinking tater tots,” she muses. Her eyes meet mine. “What?” she says. “They’re delightfully campy.” She closes the menu, smiles graciously at the server. “And two more drinks, extra limes.” She turns to me. “Pearl?”

“An order of the pickle roll-ups.”

The server is speeding away as Liza Bean lowers her head toward her drink. “Don’t look now,” she says, speaking around the straw in her mouth, “but there’s a woman over there I believe I saw suspended over New York attached to guy wires in last Thanksgiving’s parade.”

I pull my compact out of my purse, use the mirror to look behind me. “She’s about ready for market,” I agree.

Liza Bean snorts. “And there’s a man over there,” she murmurs, her head tilting ever-so-slightly to the right, “with a barcode tattooed on the back of his neck." She laughs, a low purr of a laugh. "Such angst!”

She accepts her second drink with a nod to the server, squeezes one of three limes into it, sips, adds the second and third. “I’m thinking of running up Tattoo Boy's back and perching on his head after my third, perhaps fourth drink. Where do you stand on that?”

I glance casually at the man she’s talking about. He’s enormous. “Hmm. I’ll be standing next to the car,” I tell her, “frantically trying to get the key in the lock.”

Liza Bean’s eyes sparkle like found dimes. “I do so enjoy our outings.”

“Me, too.” We smile at each with the heartfelt sincerity of the slightly inebriated.

I decide the time is right.

“Liza Bean,” I say, casually, “I couldn’t help but take a look into the car this morning and notice that there was a minnow bucket in the back seat.”

Her green eyes meet mine. “A gal likes to snack.”

“That was a big bucket,” I observe. “For such a small cat.”

She nods slightly. “I suppose I may as well tell you now,” she says. There is silence as she finishes off her second drink. The server appears with Liza Bean's – and my – third gin and tonic. A five-dollar bill is produced from between the toes of the cat’s right paw and the server appears to curtsy…

I blink my eyes. Man but these drinks are strong.

I lose patience.

“OK! OK!” I say. “Tell me already!”

The cat smiles. “We had a meeting last night,” she says, squeezing the limes into her drink. “Perhaps you’ve noticed that I’ve had my violin restrung?”

I shake my head. I hadn’t noticed.

The server appears, sets the tater tots down in front of Liza Bean. The cat smiles and with the deft snap of a wrist arranges a napkin in her lap. “Squeak Toy is getting back together.”

I stare straight ahead. Squeak Toy…

“We never did get the security deposit back at our last space, you know…” Liza Bean Bitey (of the Minneapolis Biteys) sips her drink, holds a claw-speared tater tot up in the air before popping it into her mouth. “But I’d say that, older and wiser, we’ve learned our lessons.”

She smiles, holds up her drink. “So what do you say? What will you charge to let us practice in the attic?”

The Cat Wants to Borrow What Now?

The cat lies in the shaded cool of the ferns, her eyes dreamily half-lidded. An hysteria of sparrows, commuting from one yard to the next, pass overhead, just feet from curved-claw death.

Liza Bean Bitey (of the Minneapolis Biteys) yawns elaborately, a show of white teeth and curled, pink tongue.

“Silly birds,” she pronounces.

Liza Bean blinks lazily against the dappled sunshine, a study in nonchalance.

Apropos of nothing and seemingly directed into the air: “Will the car be available this evening?”

I set my book down, stare at her until she meets my eye.

She is smiling. Times are tough, and her habit of returning the car with a full tank of gas does not go unnoticed.

And she has noticed this.

“Why?”

Liza Bean Bitey (of the Minneapolis Biteys) rolls on to her side, stretches luxuriously; and, in what all the world would perceive to be a casual manner, licks the inside elbow of an extended front leg.

“Why,” she repeats, the word rolling around in her mouth. “A child’s question,” she pronounces.

I sigh. “What time do you need it,” I deadpan.

She smiles. “Ten-ish?”

“Ten-ish?” It’s my turn to repeat. “That’s a little late, don’t you think, for a Sunday night?”

Liza Bean first widens – then narrows – her eyes. “Such manners,” she murmurs.

“Fine,” I say, retrieving my book, first-hand narratives from the Great Age of Sailing. “Don’t wake me when you come back.”

She smiles. “Mmm,” she says, in a tone of voice to which I cannot ascribe an emotion.

Liza Bean stands, stretches, sticking one hind leg out stiffly behind her, then the other. “You know,” she says thoughtfully, “it’s been ages since we had a drink together. You busy after work Monday? Outside of yoga?”

I shake my head in the negative. “What do you have in mind?”

“Welllll,” she says, “I’ve not been to Psycho Suzi’s since they moved it to the river. I hear delightful things.” She pauses. “My treat.”

Now it is my turn to widen, then narrow, my eyes.

Liza Bean holds up a paw. “I’ll hear no more about it,” she says with a small, dismissive wave. “After yoga it is.”

Hmm.

If anyone is looking for me later, I’ll be at the bar.

With a cat.

So A Bear Walks Into A Party...

And now, as previously alluded to, the story of Mary and the bear.

“I’m going to have to ask you to leave,” she says.

“Rahr?”

“Sorry,” Mary says. “It’s nothing personal. We just don’t allow bears in the living room.”

And it was true. Mary and Jon don't normally allow bears in the house at all, but over there, hogging the stereo, there was no bout a doubt it, as my father likes to say. That guy was definitely a bear; and frankly, he’d pretty much worn out his welcome.

I mean, a whole hour’s worth of Zeppelin?

MAN. Just what year did this guy go to sleep, anyway?

“ROWR!” shouts the bear. “RRRRar ar arrr rawr.”

“Oh, I hear ya, buddy,” she says, “I fell off a bar stool once and they practically threw me into the parking lot.” She comes as close as she can to putting her arm around him, tries to steer him toward the door. “This is not that, so don’t get the wrong idea. I mean, hell, I don’t care how much you’ve had to drink, either, but you see that guy over there?”

Mary points across the party to Jon, who is busy drawing a diagram of the firing sequence for a 2004 Saturn on an eviscerated paper bag.

“Rahr?” the bear says cautiously.

“Welllll,” she says, bobbing her head and grimacing slightly, “Don’t take this the wrong way, but Jon’s not down with people and animals drinking from the same cup, if ya know what I mean.”

“Rahr rahr-rahr,” the bear points out.

Mary holds up her hands. “The dog’s different,” she says. “T-Bone lives with us.”

“ROWR!”

“I am not!,” she shouts, her Irish up. “I got a wild side just like everyone else! But this is for your own good, buddy! Time to go!”

And with that, she reaches into her jacket, pulls out one of those plastic, bear-shaped honey dispensers.

“ROWR!” The bear rears up on his hind legs, opens his mouth and "ROWR"s loudly. The party stops, momentarily, all faces on the bear.

How was Mary to have known that the bears find those honey containers offensive?

“ROWR! RAAAHR AAR!” The bear heads toward the fridge, no doubt to snag yet another of the pale ales he’s been stealing from me all night.

“Mary?” Jon calls.

She waves him off, irritably. “I got this,” she says. “You just go back to drawing whatever…” she trails off as she heads into the kitchen.

“Br’er Bear, you don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here.” She grabs my pack of cigarettes off the table, lights it and blows the hit toward the bear. They hate that, you know. “You start heading toward the exit or I’ll be forced to put some cigarette-cherry shaped dents in that nice spring-time coat you’re workin’ on.”

The bear looks down at his belly, how fine his new coat is coming in, looks back up. “Rahr rahr-rahr rahr?”

“Sure,” Mary says. She turns to me. “You don’t care, do ya? If he takes one for the road?”

I shake my head wearily and hold out a pack of Camel Lights.

MAN but I hate when bears come to parties.

We'll Move Down South

We get up early, brush our faces and wash our teeth.  We persist in our wearing of pants in public. We cover our mouths when we yawn, we resist the urge to get involved in situations that do not require our input.

And now we’ve come to our reward.  Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the weekend, the dewy, precious days where the air is sweet and our time is our own. 

What shall we do with this time?  Will we sleep in?   Will we in the northern climes bother to repaint our toenails?  Will we ever make that eggplant rollatini we got all excited about a couple weeks ago? 

The answer to these and other questions lie within the mysterious confines of my iPod; for as I continue to insist, my iPod, set on “shuffle” and played during my morning’s commute, foretells the future.

Shhh.  Let’s listen.

Los Angeles by Frank Black

Barracuda by Heart

Howlin’ for You by The Black Keys

Lovesick by Lindstrom & Christabelle

Boots or Hearts by The Tragically Hip

Different When it Comes to You by Bruce Cockburn

Conventional Wisdom by Built to Spill

The weeken's prognosis? Frankly, I just don't know.  At this point, I've got over 50 hours of work in this week.  My imagination is shot, and I need a nap.  If you'd fill in the blanks here, I'd appreciate it. 

And to top it off, the escalators just inside The City Center weren’t running this morning.

I don’t need them, of course, having been walking on my own since the tender age of 11 months, but the sight of the non-escalating escalators gave me pause.

I stop.

Hammer time.

Since childhood, deserted streets have been my friends. Do I see zombies? I do not. I see freedom. This may shock you, but I’ve got a pretty sturdy little imagination on me and it absolutely loves scenarios like this…

I pause to survey the scene.

It is 6:45 a.m. and the end of the world that we've been hearing so much about has finally happened.

I am, of course, on time for work.

I move in my usual direction, like a cow leaving the milk barn and heading to pasture, in search of coffee. Eight years I’ve been doing this. Something’s not right, and it’s not just the non-escalating stairs.

It is then that I realize that there’s no line at the Starbucks.

Dizzy with pleasure, I walk in like I own the joint. “’Mornin’, Joe,” I say to the coffee dispenser. I help myself to a cup, jauntily throwing a quarter in the tip jar. “There ya go,” I mutter. “Although I’m still unclear as to why I tip you...”

Lawlessly, I cram my pockets full of Splenda packets.

I take a seat, prop my feet up on the table in front of me. I am making lazy plans to head out to a Winnebago dealership and drive one south when it occurs to me that the escalator has started up...

I shake my head, the daydream ruined, and my eyes focus on the moving stairs. In reality, I have not gotten my coffee yet. There is a man in a blue workman’s style uniform in front of me.

“Mornin’,” Pete says. You can tell it’s Pete because that’s what his shirt says.

“Got the steps moving again, I see,” I say.

He nods, almost bashfully. I smile at him to show him I mean no harm and proceed toward the Starbucks.

And I feel cheated when I see that there’s a line.