Tag-along......

There's a first time for everything and since getting bopped on the head with the bike, I've gotten tagged x two, struck by lightening twice, and um, cursed at twice......so I give! Here's my random eight! Clink! To Indigo Blue and Wreckless for dragging this trainwreck into their game! (And mind you guys, the few things you don't already know about me, well, you may wish you still didn't!)

1. I stick my tongue out when I draw. Just a little. Enough to touch my upper lip. And yup, I can do that for hours.

2. In my world, everything is a He or a She. It's just gotta be that way. Or else they won't listen when you talk to them. ..

She things:
The house
The pool
Tallulah the cat, although the Vet swears different.
Some of the spirits that roam my halls.
Lights, lamps, disco balls...they're all shes.

He things:
The car
The hammock
The lawnmower and broken weed-eater (And a drunk I might add!)
Some of the spirits that roam my halls
The dryer and
The plumbing

3. I don't have a girlie-girl voice. It's raspy and throaty and hoarse. Always has been. And damn I love to sing......and whisper. I am a great whisperer.....

4. I took the lightbulbs out of all the chandeliers in my house and put candles in the candlelabras. That's why they're called that, right?

5. I believe that in the end, peace wins. If I didn't believe that, I couldn't believe in anything.

6. I prefer the floor to furniture.

7. I will swim in a green pool. I'm not afraid of amoebas or tadpoles kissing my toes.

8. Sometimes I cuss. And I do it very well....


If you wanna be tagged, just jump on the trainwreck....
peace~love

Upside down and backwards.....

I don't believe in clocks.

I mean I have them, and they work. They tick. But they're all set on different times. The bedroom clock is on Saturday time. One hour and forty minutes faster than the DJ on the radio says it is....That's because, Monday through Friday, I want dozens of opportunities to hit the snooze button and not be interrupted by that bolting, panicked fear, that I actually have overslept. And when I finally roll over, crawl across the sheets, and swat it for the last time, I want enough time left over to drink two cups of coffee, stare out into space, color on the porch if I'm so inclined, and wait until the very, very last moment to get in the shower and fly out the door. On the week-ends I want to wake up to the sun beating through the windows, and at least "think" I slept in.

The kitchen clock is one hour fast. Just because. I don't believe in giving away hours or getting them free. I've never understood daylight savings time, and I sure as hell don't want to give it back. The clock on the microwave is right. He set it that way. I don't cook. So I never look at it. The digital baby in the car has been resetting itself back to midnight since the beach. I get in the car at midnight every morning. It ticks right along throughout the day and then jumps back to midnight every evening. Of course, I'm sure that "means something"......

Anyhow, really short story getting long, I had one of those mornings, when I really didn't care to guess what time it was, and I rolled out of the drive-way at midnight, nonetheless. The traffic was glorious. No bumping and beeping, no arms flailing out of dirty windows. Everyone just meandering down the road, listening to the Rolling Stones concert drifting from my windows.

Of course, I was really, really late for work. And all day I was off. I dropped things and smiled. I caught a mirror once and saw the reflection of Rod Stewart's earlier days in my bangs. I smiled and said "Good afternoon" all morning, and when I finally got it right, the sun was starting to tilt. I forgot to get gas. The car gurgled, but I didn't hear it.... Rolling Stones and all.....

I finally made it home.....
And no-one, not the first patient, not Chey, not the good Doctor himself had said a word to me all day. Not about my scrubs.....

The tags....

Inside out and backwards.....

I should have known better than to play with matches....

We were pretty in polka dots. Kimbies and I. She, tall and Indian dark, French braids cascading down her neck. Me. Toothless. With my dirty-mop colored hair chopped off to match my Barbie doll. Our mama dressed us in identical little dresses so we could swirl and smile and impress the masses… “the company”.

I cringed. My knotty little knees were always dirty and scraped from crawling in spaces and places best meant for cats, my fingernails were frayed and fringed, not from nail biting, but dirt digging. I liked to dig in the dirt. Kimbies just smiled. Like a good child should. I grinned. And showed off that “I yanked it out myself” toothless overbite . There aren’t a lot of pictures to back up this story…….

Our parents partied. They had cook-outs and poker games, they drank cocktails and champagne, they danced in the living room. And they had “company”. People that came to visit in long black cars. People that smelled good. Tanned women with cleavage. Men with cigars.

We were allowed to smile…..

And never, ever interrupt……

The “warming” was on a Saturday. The unveiling of the massive addition to the back of the house….the den with its hand carved bar and baroque antique cash register, the “guest rooms”….

I was getting out of it. Only had to wear the pink velvet empire waisted dress for about 20 minutes. While the “company” arrived. Then I could go…

I flew back to my bedroom, peeled the scratchy thing off my bony body and tried on my Trainer. Mama had brought it home for just this occasion. I adjusted the tiny little triangles. Tugged on it a little. Perfect. The elastic straps flopped from my shoulders. Yup, that’s the way it’s supposed to fit.

I grabbed my plastic Brownie pocket book and put the price tags from my very first Bra in it. Keeper. Pulled the uniform over my head, plopped on the floor in my "Saturday" underwear and yanked on the dirty brown socks and a pair of filthy Ked sneakers. Grabbed the musty ole sleeping bag from the corner of the room, borrowed, not bought for the occasion, and started to lug it all out of the house…..

“Sweetie, could you turn the bacon wraps onto low?” my Mama purred at me, as I passed. ’Course! I plunked the stinky sleeping bag down and reached up and counted the little white push buttons. Hit the one next to the red one. OFF!

“It’s almost time for the camp-out, Mommy” I hollered into the empty part of the house. Voices, laughter, cigar smoke, billowed back at me. But not Mama.

I grinned. Drug the dirty sleeping bag out the kitchen door and kicked it down the drive way. Waiting on my ride. I sat on the concrete, legs unlady-like, and waited. Scribbled elementary graffiti onto the bleached white surface with a stick. Chewed my feather-like fingernails. Every time I heard a car engine, I jumped up. Waited. Plopped back down on the concrete. It was taking FOREVER to go on my very first Brownie camp-out ever!

The cigar smoke was getting thick. It sort of crawled out the kitchen door. It was yucky and black. I got up and trudged up the slope to SLAM the kitchen door.

And then I saw it. Felt it. Heard it. The flames. Orange and alive. Licking the kitchen cabinets. Snapping, crackling, making Jiffy-Pop noises. Painting pretty psychedelic designs on the curtains. And it was hot. Really hot.

I ran fast, without tripping once, to our pretty-in-pink bedroom and bellowed at Kimbies…. "The damn kitchen is on fire!” Her brown eyes, like frozen chocolate donuts, pasted themselves onto mine. Her dark little fingers dropped the perfect Barbie with her hair still in the plastic sleeve into the little pink convertible and…..

We ran.
Fast.

And stared.
At the fire.

And then we tiptoed through the new French doors. Holding hands. Past the bartender. And the lady with the big boobs. Out the back door into the moonlight. Where the “company” was in full swing. We searched the hemlines and toe rings (yup, our Mom had one of those), the wing tips, and sports jackets….the voices in the night air…..for Mom or Dad.

We found him first. Flocked by three handsome “Are you a movie star?” men, engaged in hearty conversation. We tugged on his pant leg. He rubbed my chopped off hair. I did that thing with my legs that I did when I was gonna wet my pants in exactly twenty seconds. They kept blabbering.

Finally…….

With that woo-you voice, he bent down and tenderly took both of our chins into his massive hands and whispered “My dearest, darling daughters, what can I do for you?”

And we yelped and welped and jumped and leaped …..

“THE HOUSE IS ON FIRE!”

Confessions.....

I tell. That’s what I do. Kiss and tell. Sin and tell. Check out of Winn Dixie with an unscanned roll of cinnamon rolls, hike back into the store in the pouring rain, plunk my buck 35 down on the counter, and tell.

“I don’t think I paid for this”…..

I was 12 when we stole my Mother’s little red Ford Fairlane. It had already been stolen once and returned none the worse... so…. we all piled in, sweaty little thighs on naugahyde seats, and grinned. Crank that baby up. She purred. That’s why Mama loved her, she always purred. I grinned, cradled the giant Mr. Peanut shaped gear shift knob in my right hand, used both feet to tap the brakes and accelerator simultaneously (that’s how they did it on the Mod Squad!) and we lurched forward. “Here we go, baby!” We all squealed! And hmphrrrrgggh! She stalled. “Do it again!” Kimbies yelped from the passenger's seat, stretching a long-long 8 year old arm across the vinyl seat and shoving the gear shift further into the PRNDL position. Noise. Smoke. We’re going nowhere.

Kimbies shoved and shifted and I stomped my feet at the same time. We shot out of the “drive -right-through” garage and barely missed Mrs. Napoleon’s greenhouse…. banged a hard turn to the right….furiously cranking the “too hot to touch” maroon steering wheel with virgin fingers….and fish-tailed down the dirty alley! Whoooooshhhh. Yeah, baby! Black clouds! Another hard turn to the right and we’re on pavement, Skinny and Curty bouncing, bobbing, laughing in the back seat….

And then I saw it. The intersection. Traffic.

DAMN!

The guardian angel took over. I don’t remember if she stole the keys or body-slammed the brakes. I really have no idea. I just remember lugging the little ones out of the back seat, laughing, and leaving the little Ford Fairlane at the intersection of Barcelona and Blount Street. We hiked home. Skipping over the sidewalk cracks and eventually, Kimbies and I taking turns toting our grimey, sweaty, octopus armed and legged baby siblings home....

Of course the babysitter reported the car stolen. It wasn’t found until the next day…..still sitting at the stop sign, keys in the ignition. The cops drove it home.

Eventually someone else stole it. Drove it all the way to California and wrecked it. Our Mama mourned. She loved that little red Ford Fairlane and obviously so did a lot of other people… “they were forever stealing it” she used to say……

About five years ago, I popped off with the “Do you want to know a secret, Mom?” story at Christmas time. Everyone scooched in closer…..

And I told.

I saw the disappointment in her eyes. The reflection. She was quiet for a moment and then lifted her beer in holiday cheer and the night went on.

She’s like that.

She would never say out loud that it was o.k. that we stole the car. That we laughed. That we were risky. That she thanked God we survived it. And lived to tell about it.

Really, the only thing that probably disappointed her was that not that many people really wanted her little Red Ford Fairlane….

to be continued.....