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!”

Dear John....

Once upon a time….

I lived another life. I dressed up and paraded around in pointy toed high heels and wore perfumed matching pantsuits and pretended to be an Administrator. And then I woke up one day, hacking and coughing from the Channel #5, with bunions on my toes, and pulled my T-shirts out of the closet and my love beads out of my bra…and said “This is Me…”

He didn’t fire me.

He cringed a little. Grimaced, maybe. Feigned annoyance in my direction. Held his breath and prayed it would pass.

It didn’t.


Once upon a time…
You lived another life.
That was then and now is now.

Cringe a little. Grimace. Feign a little annoyance in my direction. Hold your breath and pray it will pass.

It won’t.

You’ve danced in the kitchen…..

And then.....there was Disco....

And the silver glittered shoes....

We didn't trade our tattered levi's and Rolling Stones for anything, but we snatched a little "oooooooooooh, ahhhhhhhhhhhhh" "do the bump" and melded it into our week-ends. We added sparkled belts and wore blue mascara. We hit the clubs.

On Friday nights, we'd pile into Million's van and do the drive-in thing, cheap wine or expensive beer on ice....B-rated movies on the screen. We'd wander from car to car, an open air party. Admission: $2.00 a car. In our world we were hippies.

On Saturday night, we'd trade in our flip flops for platforms, and join Christian and his boys at The Palace. In Christian's world, we were movie stars.... The dance floor was an ever changing Twister game, smoke seeping from it's edges. The disco lights flooded our late night faces with pelting prisms. It was a bottle club. Bring your own. Buy the cup, the ice, the mixers. Tip the pretend bartender well......

"Riunite on ice. That's nice" I loved the commercials. The color of the wine. And the sound the ice made clanking in the glass. We tipped the bartender well......

Last night, we danced in the kitchen....

Turned the disco light on....

Traveled.....

We danced through my 8th grade birthday party, an all nighter at Peace Creek.....We swayed through my Senior Prom, and went low for Bob Segar.....held up our lighters and waited for more.....

We swished the Riunite (yep, they still make it!) and prayed we wouldn't have headaches today....

I wore the silver shoes....

Jonah crashed the party. "Guess what I got, Ma?" "A tattoo".......He made fried egg sandwiches and drank beer in the kitchen.....John Travolted across the vinyl floor. We laughed. And he did it again.

We lowered the music and lull-a-byed him to sleep.....

And danced in the kitchen.....

The Kiss...

I’ve been in love only once. A very long time ago. And for a very short time. But it lasted forever.

A romance Untainted by the first four letter word. The first harsh ugly word. The first possessive, jealous, bigoted, arrogant, righteous, selfish word.

We talked. He spoke seven languages, English not his native, and spoke them all well. But it’s what he did with his words that grabbed me with octopus arms and hugged me in tighter.

He wove them. He used them for music, for background effects, for medicinal purposes, for tickling, for thinking out loud. He sent words instead of flowers, and gifted me with stories. It was as if we had known each other a lifetime in no time at all…. And we did, because we shared our lives, our childhood secrets, our silly dreams, our disappointments …. The brown bagged everyday stuff, the chaotic “Isn’t this a crises to anybody, but me?” crap, the “I believe in…….” fairytale endings , the “I’ve never told anybody else this….” secret lives that we tote around in dirty Samsonite luggage….. Afraid to pitch, for fear it will be discovered, weary from hauling it around all these years.

We danced and sang out loud, added words, made-up words, used other world words. When he left for Desert Storm, we mailed words across the ocean , army lugged in duffle bags, wrapped in yellow envelopes. We traded tiny cassette tapes, weeks, sometimes months, in the traveling, just to hear each other’s words….

We listened. To each other. And danced in the kitchen.

I married a man whose vocabulary consisted of one, two, three, and four letter words. Occasionally graced by a few BIG words like… Toyota, Delmonico, and some expletives best left off the list. We talked about who fed the dog last, what the neighbors were up to, and the interest Rates on our credit cards. We danced on occasion. We ate well always. We fought like hell.

I listened last night. I watched the words as they were born. As you struggled to build them into a formula that I could understand, as your body spoke the words before they left your lips. When you finally quit fighting with yourself , the words fell fluid like into our space. Where I could touch them. Sense them. Hear them.

And then we danced in the kitchen….