All that glitters...

Being the first to wear them in 1972, I was sure that my size 7 Cinderella toes would slip effortlessly into the iridescent soles and we would become “one” again….
I couldn’t resist. There in my daughter’s Christmas pile, was the recycled Nike box, lined with soft white tissue paper……and the shoes. Silver platforms that took me up 18 flights of stairs and back again a dozen times between sets at the David Bowie Concert, shoes that , get this... I wore with painter’s pants, a glittered belt and almost nothing on my chest, to Rosie O’Grady’s for nickel beer night. The shoes I balanced on while dancing on a fluorescent coffee table to Pink Floyd in Christian’s garage apartment.

SLB gave them to Haley for Christmas, continuing the “gift that keeps on giving” tradition. And since Haley’s been borrowing from my closet, my pocket book, my make-up box and dresser drawers for years, I plucked them from her tidy little stack of presents without guilt.

I just HAD to wear them. For old times sake.

Well, after 30 years, two broken toes, and an extra ten pounds, it was a TIGHT SQUEEZE to say the least. If it weren’t for that damn pinky toe, still swollen three months after pirouetting in the living room at 2 A.M., I might have been able to stand it. But then there was the fact that, feet don’t fail me now, these glittered babies have been worn by three generations of Campbell Clan Chics….. Some with size 9 feet, some size 6, some with little cheese curl toes, and some with very BIG big toes, some with high arches, some with flat feet, some with a ballerina’s grace, others without. The platform is now a well worn rocker…. So wobbling down the hall in my cocktail dress, trying to maintain balance, (4 hours BEFORE the party began) I began to feel a little sea sick. They hi-jacked forward if you took off too fast, and sort of sliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiid on the tile if you stopped too suddenly. Maybe if I practiced a bit. “Let me try a shimmy” ….pretty good. Dip …..pretty good. Grind…..pretty good. Twirl ….. “Oh, God, here I go again” , flat on my ya-ya with my silver shoes and puffed up pinky toe pointing towards the ceiling!

I gave up. Raced to Bealls and tossed a pair of beaded oyster slides onto the counter and handed over the card that’s accepted everywhere.

It was the thought that counts.

KEEPER

A heart shaped shell, tumbled in a thousand tides, grainey and wrinkled, tossed at my barefeet...a keeper

An abondoned birdsnest, delicately woven, lined with glad-bag trash and the neighbor's Christmas tree tinsel...a keeper. I pruned the tree and left one branch up and three branches down, a tribute to peace, and a Mother's determination. Even empty nests bring comfort.

Marbles, twirled and swirled, blown glass spun in a circle...pocketed by little boys, rolled on wooden floors....found 23 years later buried in Georgia clay... a sister's keeper.

Silver shoes, 3 inches high, scuffed just at the toe... glitter faded, straps stretched out....toe prints on their soles...Keepers

Pisces man with a wrinkled face, and a wrinkled smile and a Coors light in his hand....reaching over, diving in, embracing his "you still look 21 to me" gorgeous wife collapsing at his side....and saying "WE CAN DO THIS. IT's OK. I LOVE YOU".... Keeper

Christmas card with a Magpie poem ....Keeper

Wedding album, mildewed and tossed, pages eaten by hungary moths and uninvited roaches, chocked full of random papers, the key to your past...A keeper....meant to be lost for 20 years and found on a rainy Friday..to be wrapped up in Christmas paper and bows and passed onto my child with so many questions.....I apologize if i haven't told the stories right...memories are sometimes made-up as you go, but I love you, and unedited, this book, stuffed with the truth is a keeper....

Beer bottle caps. Damp from the chill. Tossed in a painted gourd. Collected year round, from Friday nights out, Sunday night cries....And later touched by the pen or the brush of a Magpie...reincarnated into jewels and sillies and ornaments...tossed amongst loved ones like fairy dust...keepers

Tattoos....You're stuck with them. Love it. Because you damn sure can't leave it. A permanent salute to the moment....keeper.
(And I am at this moment contemplating a yellow butterfly...come Paigey, and Kimbies, and Corinne, Linda, and Judy and Curty and Haley and Noah and Christine and Anna and Amber and Arianna Olivia and Peyton and Alana and Kyle and Stone and Tami and Dad-O and Grand-C and Chancellor and Scott and Annie and Nadine and Stan and JR and Jimmy Mac and Peggie and Badri and Sheila Anne and Tim and Papa and Nicky and Rumors and Joe and RCK and Vicci and Anne and Orhan and San Marino and everyone and everything that makes the butterfly effect so very very yellow...)

Keepers...May the New Year be Blessed with all we cherish....
and all we've yet to discover.................

On Borrowed wings....

On a borrowed computer, on swiped internet...from the porch....
I miss you guys! Miss Vicci, can't wait to see Kim's beautiful smile when she is gifted with your treasures...Anne, I can't begin to tell you....SLB, can't wait to see you, I mean CAN'T WAIT!.....C, Hope you and family have a beautiful Christmas blessed with peace, love you girls!... Orhan...God, i miss your posts....Everybody, wishing you peace, love, and a blessed New Year!


RESOLUTIONS....

I've tried it everyway. New Year's, that is. As a child, we hooped and hollered, twirled Nana's noisemakers in the air! "It's New Years!" Along the way, we started sneaking down to the basement, having James whip us up Suicides....coke and rum and vodke, pepsi and OJ swirled in iced tea glasses....gag me with a spoon! But it left us breathless, and sitting in circles, watching midnight grab the sky, singing...."Sha Na Na Na...Hey...Hey...Hey...Good-bye... holding hands, and sometimes upchucking heads. I ache now. We are not all here now. Those were the New Years we should have hugged each other harder and left the toilets to their own.

And then we were legally "grow-up". And we hung from balconies and french kissed at midnight. It was still good. Even the year Gary Fishowitz overdosed and sentenced himself to a life pacing in an antiseptic aquarium plugged into IVs for eternity. It was still going to be a good year. That was the year Christian came out of the closet, called off his engagement to Juliet, and rocked his parent's world. We applauded him. The year that Kimbies got suspended for smoking in the bathroom and the year that my boyfriend, in a a death defying act, flipped the camaro upside down and I LIVED! It's all good.

And then we were on our own. and dateless, and all piled up in a "too expensive" "too cramped for comfort" apartment and "What the hell?" they were having a Champagne and Caviar Party at the clubhouse...So we tooled our size six fannies over and swallowed fish eggs and pink bubbles and left with the first three cars that fled the scene...

And we married our rides....(Some of us for better, some for worse, and one just for the ride)

Time flies when you're having a really good time, and we must have because it's a blue that I really don't remember....and suddenly....

It's another life and

I'm at the airport and I'm watching as my soldier lumbers down the ramp and it's late, far too late to bring in the New Year, and I'm thrilled...
He's alive and He's home and I'm in loe and jet lag is an urban myth...

We set the clocks back four and a half hours and embrace the New Year just before the sun comes up....on our own make-believe time.

Years pass.
they bring their blessings and their curses.

I've cheered New Years and blessed it out. I've welcomed the New and buried, literally, the old...dug mammoth holes in the flower beds, and put the crap to rest. I've burned it. And run out into the street and tossed it's ugly karma to the sky...ashes floating aimlessly, landing on the curbs. i've kissed the sky and wished on stars...I've given up and gone to bed....

Last year, we started this "Resolution" thing again...The time had come. A million things to resolve to, to amend to, to agree to, to give in to. But we picked only three. kimbies and Butch and I. We must have known then. WE CHOSE PEACE. WE WANTED PEACE. And oh yeah, they would get a dog and I would get a boyfriend, We just sort of threw that in. We just wanted peace.

"Sometimes you get what you want, sometimes if you try, you get what you need" MJ and the Rolling Stones.

So we buried our friends, and Kimbies has cancer, and the first boyfriend in 14 years didn't work out.

On New Years Eve, we have reservations. Resolutions. Dresses. And a limo. Kimbies will be mannequin beautiful in her hippie bandana with her priceless husband at her side. We'll leave little Nay-Nay, the Chihuahua, in her pink tutu at home. We'll cheer. Probably cry. We'll dance. We'll have exactly one too many drinks. We'll hug. We'll all hold hands at some point and maybe fall on our knees on the dirty litle floor and thank God for the noise of rock and roll, and the healing, and the Angels that brought us here. And at midnight, we'll turn and kiss...

I'm so glad even resolutions give us second chances. This one is a keeper.

Peace

I Must be Dreaming....

I woke up swallowing words. Whole words. Big chunks. It made my throat feel raspy, smoke scratched. Like trying to swallow Saltine crackers in the desert.

I blinked. There was no sunshine billowing through the curtains. It was dark. But morning still. I could hear birds. Chirping. Sqwauking actually. The cats were playing round-da-round, flying through the halls chasing the mischevious poltergeists that only come out to play in the last moments of night.

I almost choked. Swallowing whole phrases. Instant replay of every NEVER I ever said.... rushing past me, through me, into me. Eyes wide open now. Night vision working. Everything is the same. The same old comforter piled in a heap at my feet. The wooden floors scratched and carpeted with cat and dog hair dancing just above it's surface. The alarm clock glaring, the time set two hours and twenty minutes into the future. A reminder that I need to wake up confused, because the comfort of actually knowing what time it really is, will lull me back to sleep. I gulp. It's O.K. Everything is the same. I was just dreaming.

But I wasn't. That was hours ago, and there are words stuck in my throat, tatooing the sides, hanging on like tonsilitis..... I can't swallow them yet. Go there.

I said I would never ever again feel this way. Never ever again go this way. Never ever again.

I was wrong. Welcome to my World. It's all good, baby...
I still feel the butterflies....

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….

It's good, It's all good

OK. My hair is falling out. Those spaghetti straight golden tendrils that I used to twirl between my fingers when in thought, that I used to plop up on top of my head, held securely by a pencil, when it was hot. It’s all falling out! Breaking off in obscene places and just leaving my head. “Must be the stress” my girlfriend Sheila said. “It looks like you were ironing it and fell asleep” she added. Thanks, girlfriend! I do not iron my hair and when was the last time I "fell" asleep? I fight it, baby!

I first noticed it in July. Woke up one morning with this tuft of crimped hair just sort of static-like at the back of my crown. Damn! Did someone CUT a chunk of my hair while I was sleeping? And then, uggggh, it kind of spread. Like I was going for the bangs look all the way around my head . Check the chemicals in the pool. I must be baking out here in the lazy round river. No, no, it’s good.

Geez….what’s a girl to do?

In August I noticed that the blow dryer was spitting little electric flames out at my face, burning my earlobes.... and was overcome with relief….. Shhhhhwwwweewwww…. Close one! I’ve been frying it every morning and just didn’t realize it. Pitched the blow dryer and replaced it with a new “better” version….only blows cool air. Heal me, please.

Uh, no. It’s still falling out. Skinny fetched me hot oil treatments, ummm, to no avail. OK, it’s good. It’s sympathy pains. I’m sure that’s it. Our beautiful sib, Kimmilee is going through chemo and losing her hair in chunks. Like every thing else in our lives, we’re just doing it together. It’s good. I can do this. But, somehow, I know….. No…this isn’t it.

I wake up one night tossing and turning and there is Deja, my blue eyed wild child Siamese dancing in my bedhead hair, swatting up a storm! That’s it! She’s been thinning it all along and I’ve slept through it! But, no….I stayed awake for 7 nights in a row, and she never once again, offered to come and pull out my hair in my sleep. I even tried to bribe her.

So now it’s November. I’ve changed shampoos, pillowcases, chlorine, blow-dryers, brushes, and boyfriends.

I woke up this morning and it was fixed.

Must have been the boyfriend thing.

Peace, love, and happy hauntings.....

This is it guys....
another spooky little day!
Enjoy!
I'm pulling the black sheers over the windows, and letting the disco ball do it's blue magic...
tiny little orbs sneaking through the wind blown curtains out into the streets....
dancing like bubbles into the Halloween sky!

I can't talk now, we're dancing in the kitchen...

The first time I heard/saw Lyle Lovett was late at night. I was pacing in the kitchen. The TV (one of the few moments in my life I have actually owned a TV, much less had it turned on) was background noise littering the living room space while I circled from the sink to the phone to the sink to the phone to the sink. Wash a dish. Walk to the phone. Wash a fork. Walk to the phone. Klink! Break a glass. Walk to the phone. God, I wanted to pick up that phone and call him so bad. And it was so late. And what would it accomplish anyway…

The incessant humming of the TV wafted around the corner. A different noise. I stopped. Listened. Smiled. Crept around the corner peeking. Like there was a secret waiting there and I was playing “I spy”. I loved it. The sound. The raspy earthy wailfull voice. The rhythm. It moved me. I crouched on the floor , scrunched close to the tiny TV, and fell in love with the words, the laughter, the morning after voice. Write it down. Write down his name. BUY THIS CD!

I’m a rock and roll girl, and maybe a little soul, a little blues, a little country. But a lotta rock and roll. I love to play my music loud, so that the bass thumps on your heartstrings, the guitars become your heartstrings, the drums…Oh God, I love drums. And then came this Lyle thing. I just wanted to sway. To swoop. To dip.

I bought the CD. And gave it away. I bought another one. And loaned it out. Another one. Played it until the tracks skipped and the scratchy voice was stuck on random words, over and over again. I didn’t buy another.

Years went by. Skinny got married and I danced with an old friend. Until the sun came up. A week later, the Lyle Lovett CD came in the mail. Bootlegged, of course. No Smokey portrait of this strange looking gentleman on the jacket. Just the word “Lyle” scribbled in Sharpie marker across the CD itself. I tossed it in the car and rode to work with The Big Band for a day or too, and then there was Janis, The Rolling Stones, a few rants, and a few love songs, and I sort of forgot.

Until last night.

When I ran barefoot out in the rain to plunder through the glove box, and barefoot back …

To sway. To swoop. To dip.

Love it!

I Drink Beer!

I drink beer.

I started early. I’m not proud of it, but this is the way the story goes. I drink beer. Million used to splurge and buy Heinekens and we would ride around in the green van blasting Deep Purple, drinking imported beers and laughing. We’d tell stories, that got deeper as we plundered further into the six pack, and sometimes….we would stop at ABC, lurking in the parking lot, until he would find another lost soul and bribe them into buying us more…and then we would tell stories that made us cry. Hug each other. Love each other.

And sometimes we would just laugh. And drive further. And maybe faster.

It was dangerous.

I outgrew that driving and drinking stage. (And thankfully lived !)

Now, I just drink beer. Ice cold Michelobs, stacked in the fridge like other people pile cheese and milk and broccoli. I drink beer. I don’t do the drunk girl wobbling aimlessly thing, the drown in my cup of spilt sorrows thing, the I’ll take off my clothes if I’ve had too many thing, the watch me cuss you out thing. I just drink beer.

I love the cold bubbly feel of it. The shape of the bottle. The way it tastes.

Oh God, your Mother’s going to hate me…..

DO NOT HIT SEND!

This is the warning my friend Linda bellows into my ear. My Boss echoes it. Peggy preaches it. Spontaneous words. I am compelled to let them fly. A fleeting thought becomes a giant break-through in spiritual self awareness , and suddenly it all makes sense and I have to share it.... SEND! DONE! SHARED! Of course, the morning after, I might not feel the same....

"Mom! Tell me you DID NOT just break up with him on text message?"
"Ummm. yeah"
"Arrrrrrggggghhhhh. Do you think you're 18 again?"
"Ummmm. yeah.... kinda"

I do that. Dirty little fingers. Draw it . Write it . Type it . And hit send! I've written 3:00 in the morning love letters to strangers (well, almost strangers .... Kimbies surgeon for example) and walked them to the leaning mailbox, placed the flag at high mass, at 3:45 AM. In the morning when I wake up, trudge down the gravel drive way, back up and see the little red flag waving at me, I cringe a little.... "Oh God, I have to take it out...snatch the words from the runway before the postman finds them and sets them free" and then I turn the music up louder and keep backing out. Put it in forward. And drive off. It's a love letter for crying out loud. If he thinks I'm a nut so be it. He saved my sisters life. I can write him love letters if I want.

I've painted billboard revalations..... giant banners of "Do you get my drift yet?" and left them annonymously staked on obvious corners like "We Buy Houses" Signs or " Speeding fines doubled when workers present" signs. (Skinny, I remember the night we hauled off with the Beach Bag sign.... Paul McCartney on the radio... "Baby you amaze me"..... We laughed all the way home, high from the "WE DID IT" "WE GOT THE LAST WORD IN!")

I hit send.

If I have something to say at the moment. And it feels right. I hit the button. I might have better manners, or be more reserved, or more inclined to keep it to myself in the morning, but if it feels right when you think it, share it.

Last night my internet was down.
This morning it was down.

I wanted to hit SEND so bad I couldn't stand it.

For once in my life,
I'm glad I couldn't.

Must be that "Baby, you amaze me" thing.

Happy Birthday Skinny!

Peace, Love and Happy Friday the 13th!

"Triskaidekaphobia is a fear of the number 13. It is usually considered to be a superstition. A specific fear of Friday the 13th is called paraskavedekatriaphobia or friggatriskaidekaphobia."

Kind of makes you miss the drive-ins and B rated horror movies...
Spooky little fun.

We're going dancin' instead.

I went on my first date when I was 13....
Curty boy was born on July 13th...
I weigh exactly 113 pounds...
There are 13 doors in my house...
The first house I owned ALL BY MYSELF was numbered 1330..

So jump back, spooky little day....
We're gonna have a blast!.

I know who you are and saw what you did....

There were five of us. Kids. And a natural order of Age. Me, four years, Kimbies, 4 more years, Curty Boy, 2 years, Skinny 2 more years and then Chanty Boy.

For the most part we were passive, a wandering tribe of gypsy souls. Rarely did we scrap. By our teen years, Kimbies and I were given lots of freedom as long as we toted a little one with us. Thus, Curty, Skinny and Chance were introduced to Rock and Roll, fast cars, and secrets early on.

And that would be how the natural order of things would change.

Skinny, when not digging in the dirt, was the first to bop up with "Take me, Take me", often elbowing her way into the front of the line. Which wasn't really hard to do. Curty was passive and frankly,not really interested in cruising with the big kids on Friday night. Happy to just stay home, perched indian legged in front of the big old console TV, watching reruns. And Chanty, with no words to make his wishes known was often at our "take em or leave em" mercy. While I love Skinny dearly, being the oldest, I often opted to take Chanty. We'd plop him on the center console of Million's van, and venture into the week-end, Deep Purple blasting from the 8-track, windows rattling. See, Chanty, dumplin' of a sweetie, is down syndrome...born with a forever smile and dancing eyes. And in those little eyes you have to read the world, because he doesn't speak The Kings English. His tiny voice box was just born jumbled up and the sounds and noises he makes are endless streams of babbling, sound effects, noise....but never words. He early on, became the keeper of secrets. Never one to tattle tell.

Not the case for Skinny.

Her endless arms and legs piling into the week-end, also meant her wishing well eyes were there. Soaking in every word, every sight, every secret. She would be elbow deep in a bag of Lay's BBQ chips, singing, WATCHING. Gathering. Later, on occassion, trading sssssshhhhhhhssssshhhhhhs for candy bars. A business agreement. A lucrative and viable business agreement. "Don't tell Mom and Dad"

As the years grew and her legs grew, we settled into sisterhood. Trading secrets for secrets. Trading the spoken for the unspoken. Trading the order.

Sometimes now she leads.

And I quietly follow.

Oh.....the secrets Chance could tell.

I'd rather be flying.....

I used to fly. At night. Suspended in fast forward, out of control.

I would lay awake in bed. Praying for peace. For sleep. For respite. And I would fight sleep, the only real get-away. "Keep your eyes open" "Keep singing, humming, thinking, wiggling your toes". And then I would feel it. God, I hated to feel it. The falling. Asleep at your toes. As if a thousand wasps had stung you. It hurt so bad and it crawled. Filthy little winged things chewing up your legs. Numbness. Taking over your body. And when I was totally encased in the vibrating, tingling," oh my God I have to leave this body"feeling, the body would leave me.

And begin to fly.

To bat really.

To zoom over the furniture furiously. Frantically zipping through the house, slapping walls, just skating the ceiling. Searching, searing desparately for a way out. Sometimes I would just fly faster and faster in endless lopsided figure 8's, nearly cracking my head on the fireplace mantle, bouncing vases off the coffee table. And sometimes I would leave. Find an open window. Soar into the night. Free. Fast.

And I would fly so high there would be no oxygen. And my lungs would expand until they felt like a leaded x-ray tank embedded in my chest. When my hair would wire out with energy and be alive, crawling, flapping at the sky. And I would fly over roads, and memories, and yet-to-be's, sometimes diving, nearly crashing onto crowded highways, headlights blinding me.

And then I would come home.
And crawl into my body.
And say a prayer.
"Oh, I'm done. It's over for tonight." "I can rest now".

And the humming would start again...........................................

I haven't flown in years now. I later learned it was a syndrome. Psychotic actually. Symptom of those out of control. Dreams they called them. Those that didn't fly......

I awoke with eyes cutting, eyeballs wide open, but glass, there must be glass in my eyes. I can't read the clock. The open doorframe is casting a shadow. And it's a monster. I sit upright. In my yesterday's clothes, I forget to breathe. The dog is growling. At the shadow. "Oh my God, what if she dies from eating crackers and cheese for two days. I have to look that up on the internet. Is it safe to feed Georgia Triscuts and cheese?" I listen. She's growling. She's living. Deja pounces on my forehead, running circles in the dark. She has no claws, my only one, so I know I am not bleeding. She runs in circles. " I fed them right? The cats. They still had food. " I listen. "Isadora, Tallulah?"

It's so dark. It's three A.M. I wander down the hall. What is Georgia growling at? And I remember. It's the hauntings.
I haven't paid the
phone billl
the car insurance
the second mortgage
the attorney's fees....

I'm being sued. You were perfectly fine. But what would your husband say when he found out the 14 year old station wagon that ran perfectly fine until you got bumped would be totalled and they would only give you 750.00 for your BESSIE? He would say sue her. For your teeth that you never bumped, but should have been crowned 20 years ago if you could afford to go to the dentist. Sue her!

"I've loved you for a million years". The voice. The blue eyes. His. Hers. The funeral. The not funeral. The "I'm trying to tell you something, wake up! and listen to me" messages I KNOW they are sending. "I can't understand you, I can't see you. God, can't you just stand in the drive way smoking cigarettes, sit at the kitchen table and TALK TO ME ANYMORE?"

I bop the coffee cup in the microwave. Hit 2 by instinct.

I'm up for the day.

Peek into our other world

Sometimes I just can't write.
I can't think.

Here's where I go to hide.
www.justgivemepeace.blogspot.com

Empty Nest

I hauled everything out to the curb. Loaded it up in black plastic bags and left it for the garbage man. The beer bottles I found under his bed. The coke can with spent cigarette butts in the closet. The borrowed clothes never returned, I didn’t know who they belonged to…and the styles have changed, anyway. I chucked the weight set into the woods…too heavy for the trash, and I’m too tired to bury them in this cemetery I call a yard.

And then I sat down and cried.


A prom picture, marred by a beer bottle ring , was stuck to the entertainment center you hauled home from the trash. I spent 15 minutes peeling it off the glass shelf, before I pitched the found five -shelf treasure and gently buried the picture in my top dresser drawer. A trophy, your engraved name missing, toppled sideways, stood lonely in the corner of the room. What piece of furniture did you take with you, that left this plastic soldier exposed? I dusted it off, and laid it to rest in the kitchen cabinet. Receipts for things I never knew you owned, were smeared onto the vacant floor. Every now and then, pennies, nickels, quarters…lazily tossed amidst them.

I opened the windows and let the fresh air in. Noticed that even in your going, you were coming, The screen was propped just so. I’ll miss you . Precious child of mine.

Wings
I pray they are mighty

A Sign of the Times

So today, this precious little lady reaches up to my neck and gingerly touches my love beads, cradles them in her hand.
"Oooohhh, they're so pretty, so unusual" she says in her perfectly lipsticked 80 year old voice. " I've never seen a steering wheel charm before".....

Last Call

Sorry guys, I had to go here. I have a stack of LPs , tattered cardboard corners, and covers I used to croon over, in the corner of the living room. A collaged heap of CDs tossed randomly on the floorboard of my car (front seat passenger side). An ever growing, ever reminiscent collection of sound. That I like to play LOUD. And sing to. And yes, dance to…

And sometimes the music is new and noisy and grindy and great, and sometimes, it’s just old school. The stuff that memories are made of. For whatever reason, I started thinking about certain songs and how you can remember the EXACT moment when you heard it….. felt it....banked it forever into your memory.

So here it goes….

Smoke on the Water, Deep Purple…
Million’s van, flying down Drewer Hill, well we were rolling really, but it felt like flying…blue lights dimmed behind us, just watching, And finally, I threw up

Just the two of us
A champagne and caviar party resulting in the first of many endless nights at The Entertainer, (now, a topless go-round) dancing in circles. And then, what the hell, getting married. I have since given up Champagne, and the husband

Aquarius, The Fifth Dimension
Getting kicked out of PCS Christian school. Age: 13 It was on the radio when my Father came to fetch us Filthy little sinners! How dare you have a pool party (on your own time) and invite mixed (boys and girls) company to bathe (swim, play Marco-polo, float, dive) together while listening to Rock and Steal your Soul (The Beatles) music? Ummmmmm…..It was my birthday?

Red Rubber Ball
Christian’s funeral. The procession. The absolutely ridiculous words ringing tin-like out of the radio. And how prophetic they were.

Moon River, Andy Williams
Ohhh, I shouldn’t be sitting right next to my Mom on this couch listening to this in the state I’m in.

Tainted Love…
The Palace. You were there SLB.

The Kiss, Tom Jones and The Art of Noise
Dancing, gliding, dreamily off the deck and into the pool, satin dress parachuting up to the surface…..
Plop, splash, splish, slip, swoosh…..a sea of wedding-goers joining us. Pool party anyone?

The Letter, The Boxtops
Soldiers. My soldier. Yellow envelopes. Homecomings

Pink Cadillac….
Rumors! The Other Side. I still do NOT know how to do the electric slide!

Private Dancer, Tina Turner
Tami on the mike, belting it out at Fitzgerald’s. No Karaoke. Just a mike and her voice filling the room. She‘s 12 years old and we have her at the bar drinking Shirley Temples! Our parental instincts were always ….proper?

Build me up Buttercup
The 6th grade. Ronnie Beasley and a valentine too big to slide under the desk.

Mr. Lonely, Bobby Vinton
Pale blue carpet in a long long living room. Stereo at the far end of the room. Furniture lining the walls leaving the center open for a plushly padded dance floor. Mom and Dad on Friday nights, Martini’s on the coffee table. Kimbies and I, long legs dangling, parked on the couch, watching them dance in rhythm, in sync, in love.

Funeral for a Friend, Elton John
Dancing on the tables. Kim’s living room. Birthdays. Slumber party. (We had to have a slumber party, we couldn’t drive home)

Queen, anything Queen
Our first apartment. “We are the Champions”. Throwing BYOP parties just to stock the bar ...aka... the dishwasher…top rack glasses…bottom rack bottles. Loading the tub with ice and beer. Sleep walking in the window.

Creep, Radio Head
The radio cannot play this loud enough. Reversing all the “I’m a creep’s” to “You’re a creep’s” ….. This would be my all time favorite Rant song. And I’m not even gonna say why.

To be continued….
On another reminiscent night….
And oh yeah, I just did the spell check, and I do make up words!

Sometimes you sing
Sometimes you dance
Sometimes you just go backwards