It happened in a psychiatrist’s office.
“Can I ask you a question?” she asked. “Why are you even at _____?” and she named the place where I work.
I should stop here to add that I don’t know this woman, and have never been in her office. You see, I’m a fat guy; A fat guy who’s currently in the process of getting approval for bariatric surgery and one of those steps is to meet with a psychiatrist. I didn’t know anything about this woman other than what I've learned from sitting in her office:
• The waiting room had an unused feel to it. The shelves were dusted, and the magazines arranged neatly, but you got the impression the room was rarely used. Maybe it was the way the children’s toys in the corner were put away a little too nicely. Plus, it hadn’t been vacuumed recently, further adding to the forgotten vibe of the room.
• She had been a panelist on the Oprah Winfrey Show back in the mid-nineties. There was an autographed 8X10 glossy framed beside a signed form letter from Oprah thanking her for being part of the show.
• She was a force of nature. As I was sitting in the room, first filling out the initial paperwork and then beginning on the first of my three assigned personality tests, she came in through the door. Her voice was a cannon that blasted the stuffy air out of the room and hid the thin simper of her assistant’s soft rock radio. Wiping at her nose with a wad of tissues, she called me “Steve” and welcomed me to her office. “Come on back, come on back! You’ll finish those up after we talk.” Then to her assistant: “Sonya, he’ll finish up after, OK?” as if she hadn’t heard the booming instructions when they were shot at me.
We went back into one of the offices where between sniffles she explained that she didn’t see many patients these days and mostly worked with litigators serving as an expert witness. “I do maybe one or two of these bariatric cases per month lately” she explained. “I like to do them, of course. I’m just really busy.”
The conversation was fast and easy. I had never been to a psychiatrist before, but went into it with the thought that I would be completely open and as forthcoming as possible. We chatted about general addiction, my past, my daughter, and the back and forth came naturally. I felt like we were both enjoying the discussion. She was quick-witted and personable, sharing antidotes from her own past here and there when appropriate.
Interruped briefly for a nose blowing break, talk turned to work. She knows some people who have worked at the company I work, so was familiar somewhat with the environment. I explained that while not passionate about the work I do, I enjoy doing a good job and see myself as a constant that people can depend on. I could tell she didn’t like the answer.
“Look, it’s really none of my business. I don’t even know you and I’m not your therapist. Still though…Can I ask you a question? Why are you even at _____?”
She knew the answer before I did, but she waited for me to say it.
“Because I don’t know what I really want.”
We chatted some more about going back to school or changing careers before the rest of the answer came to me: “I think there’s something missing in me. There are people that I know who are creative and successful, not necessarily money-wise, but successful with what they do. They all seem to have this drive inside that pushes them to do what they love. I don’t seem to have that.”
This wasn’t groundbreaking. It was no epiphany. It was something I had considered previously before pushing the thought away. This was the first time I had really said it aloud though. It all boiled down to “I don’t know what to do” or, worse: “I don’t want to do anything”.
My newfound one-time-only therapist didn’t settle down on that topic though, and so we touched on childhood and moving around and she drew parallels between my father and I which while maybe not flattering, were again not groundbreaking material. It was a really great conversation. At the end of the day, there are only a few people who don’t enjoy talking about themselves to someone who declares it all fascinating material.
We stood, shook hands, and as we stepped back out into the waiting area where I would have to finish my personality tests, she declared me a delight to her assistant who said “Oh, that’s wonderful!” before discussing the rest of her schedule. I sat back down in the chair I had left 55 minutes before, and started on my tests with something bothering me just slightly about the experience. It wasn’t until I was walking to the car that I realized what it was.
It’s a cliché now, a man sitting in a chair at a gentleman’s club getting a lap dance on a Tuesday afternoon, thinking that the girl rubbing against him has really come to like him over time. In the face of all that skin, it’s easy for some to forget that she’s working and that when you ask for one more dance she’s thinking how she’s one step closer to paying rent on time. I knew guys like this, especially in high school. They’d come back from the clubs they’d managed to get in with Polaroids of them paired with Destiny or Chablis, smiles wide on their faces. They’d talk about how she even stuck around for a few minutes after the dance was over and really seemed interested when they described the car they were going to buy next month. (“She told me to go back and I can give her a ride in it!”)
I realized, putting my key into my compact car (so normal it’s nearly invisible), that in my way, I was very similar to these guys. Here I was enjoying a talk with a bright woman who was being paid (well, I might add) to be interested. Whether or not she was actually pretending wasn’t the point. She was good enough at her job that I forgot she was making rent money while I was busy being engaging.
Don’t misread me; I’m not so cynical that I’m directly comparing the two professions. I’m just saying that when money is exchanged, intentions are clouded. Just because she gets you hard doesn’t mean she’s in love, and just because she helps you find insight doesn’t mean she finds you interesting. It’s a job.
Driving home, I decided it didn’t matter. I wasn’t less engaging if she made $250 out of the deal. I’m a charming motherfucker.
I also decided on that drive that I would write about my time with my single-use therapist who had her fifteen minutes of fame with Oprah.
See? I do want to do something.
Showing posts with label memories...in the corner of mind. Show all posts
Showing posts with label memories...in the corner of mind. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Friday, October 29, 2010
You Know, The Shriners?
I don't remember how I found the place initially, but I'm guessing it was because of the banner that read "JOBS JOBS JOBS" hanging out front. People in town didn't know the actual name of the business, but if you told them you worked at "JOBS JOBS JOBS" they would smile in recognition.
It was a series of folding tables - sturdy metal frames with particle board tops laminated in fake wood grain. Stained by years of coffee slopped from Styrofoam cups, they stank like the ashtrays sitting at each telephone. The phones themselves as stripped down and basic as the rest of the room, were black with gray buttons, their cords tangled on the floor.
The sales goal for the night was written on the bottom right hand corner of a small dry erase white board with each of our names listed above. We would fight over whose name was written in what order even though it held no bearing. Everything was a competition, and nothing was given up lightly.. A notch was made by each name as sales were made. $32 sale was one notch, $64 was two and so forth.
On the phones, my first name was always Frank. The last name would vary.
"Hello, Mr. Washington? My name is Frank Stevens and I'm calling with the ______ _____ Shrine Temple Number 53, you know - The Shriners? How are you this evening? Great! The reason for my call is you were kind enough to help us send 6 underprivileged children to our annual variety show last year and we were hoping we could count on your support again this year..."
We always said "you know - The Shriners?" because we wanted the person at the other end of the line thinking of the guys in funny hats and the little cars at parades. We were told this was preferable to the fact that our contracted client was actually an African American community organization.
I was consistent with my numbers, but I never got the really big sales. I think there was one time where I sold a $128 package, but for the most part they kept the big ticket leads for _______. He would hunch sullenly over his phone, mumbling into the receiver so quietly you rarely heard him until the receiver would go back into the cradle and he’d exclaim “YEAH FUCKERS!” ruining two other potential deals in the process. He would jump up, his chair tottering on the two back legs until they finally settled down on all four, and run to the board to mark himself four slashes for the sale.
We were children, and we acted like it.
I was too young to drive when I first started working there. Some of the other guys drove cars or lived close enough to walk, but I had to be dropped off and picked up each night. My mom would complain that I smelled like smoke, and I would patiently explain how everyone there but me was a smoker, scared she would catch a whiff of Marlboro under the four pieces of Big Red I would be chomping on.
Occasionally a few girls from our school would get hired on, but the constant smoking or our childish leering meant they'd rarely stick around long enough to see two paychecks. We were a core group of four or five teenage boys, with a rotating cast of characters who never really made the cut.
We'd work from 5:30 to 9:00 each night, and a few hours Saturday morning, running through the sales script for whatever organization had hired us out for their event. It was always for the kids though. Economically disadvantaged, disabled, disenfranchised, whatever.
"Hi, may I speak with Mr. Donaldson? Hi, this is Frank Griffin calling for Special Heart for Special Children. How are you tonight?..."
We would walk to the grocery store that anchored the strip mall for snacks during breaks. We'd stop at the drug store for drinks and cigarettes. We'd spend our paycheck at the sports card store, and fight over who got the better rookie cards. We'd brag about the girls we'd been with (or lie about the girls we'd been with, at least in my case), and talk about the beer we were going to drink that weekend until one of the owners would come out of the office in the back and yell at us to get back on the phones.
I don't remember the exact process of how it all came to an end. One day we had a meeting where the tearful woman who ran the shop explained check kiting to us, a term I had never heard before. She explained that we would have visits from the FBI and that they were there to just review her books and that we as the sales group had done nothing wrong. We continued to make our calls, but the two agents in the back office dampened the mood.
No one had been getting rich off the backs of underprivileged kids, she had just been trying to pay bills and cover payroll. Shockingly, the half a dozen teenage boys they had on the roster hadn't been enough to generate a living for all those involved. Instead of seeing it as a lost cause, she scrambled to keep things afloat.
The parent company that she worked for said they were going to work with her and she would be able to avoid jail time if she cooperated fully with the FBI and their internal investigation. She complied on all fronts, and they promptly took her to court. I had left the job by the time she was sentenced but I'd heard that she'd pulled some sort of weekend only jail time for awhile.
A few years later, I was working the counter at a gas station in Utica, Ohio when a lady came in and asked for a pack of Salem 100's. I looked up to see it was her. We chatted for a minute in the awkward way people do when they would really be anywhere else instead of rehashing the past. I asked about her family, and she asked about mine. She started to leave, then stopped and said:
"I'm sorry. I always felt like I let you down. You're just a really good person...a good guy, and I kind of fucked things up for everyone."
I felt this overwhelming desire to tell her I wasn't great at all. I wanted to tell her of all the shitty things I had done just that week alone. I wanted to make up even worse stuff just so she wouldn't feel so bad. I didn't know where this accountability to me had come from, but I was uncomfortable with the label - unhappy to be seen as a person good enough to warrant this kind of naked apology.. I opened my mouth to say some of this, but she smiled and stepped out...the bell above the door cutting off my words.
It was a series of folding tables - sturdy metal frames with particle board tops laminated in fake wood grain. Stained by years of coffee slopped from Styrofoam cups, they stank like the ashtrays sitting at each telephone. The phones themselves as stripped down and basic as the rest of the room, were black with gray buttons, their cords tangled on the floor.
The sales goal for the night was written on the bottom right hand corner of a small dry erase white board with each of our names listed above. We would fight over whose name was written in what order even though it held no bearing. Everything was a competition, and nothing was given up lightly.. A notch was made by each name as sales were made. $32 sale was one notch, $64 was two and so forth.
On the phones, my first name was always Frank. The last name would vary.
"Hello, Mr. Washington? My name is Frank Stevens and I'm calling with the ______ _____ Shrine Temple Number 53, you know - The Shriners? How are you this evening? Great! The reason for my call is you were kind enough to help us send 6 underprivileged children to our annual variety show last year and we were hoping we could count on your support again this year..."
We always said "you know - The Shriners?" because we wanted the person at the other end of the line thinking of the guys in funny hats and the little cars at parades. We were told this was preferable to the fact that our contracted client was actually an African American community organization.
I was consistent with my numbers, but I never got the really big sales. I think there was one time where I sold a $128 package, but for the most part they kept the big ticket leads for _______. He would hunch sullenly over his phone, mumbling into the receiver so quietly you rarely heard him until the receiver would go back into the cradle and he’d exclaim “YEAH FUCKERS!” ruining two other potential deals in the process. He would jump up, his chair tottering on the two back legs until they finally settled down on all four, and run to the board to mark himself four slashes for the sale.
We were children, and we acted like it.
I was too young to drive when I first started working there. Some of the other guys drove cars or lived close enough to walk, but I had to be dropped off and picked up each night. My mom would complain that I smelled like smoke, and I would patiently explain how everyone there but me was a smoker, scared she would catch a whiff of Marlboro under the four pieces of Big Red I would be chomping on.
Occasionally a few girls from our school would get hired on, but the constant smoking or our childish leering meant they'd rarely stick around long enough to see two paychecks. We were a core group of four or five teenage boys, with a rotating cast of characters who never really made the cut.
We'd work from 5:30 to 9:00 each night, and a few hours Saturday morning, running through the sales script for whatever organization had hired us out for their event. It was always for the kids though. Economically disadvantaged, disabled, disenfranchised, whatever.
"Hi, may I speak with Mr. Donaldson? Hi, this is Frank Griffin calling for Special Heart for Special Children. How are you tonight?..."
We would walk to the grocery store that anchored the strip mall for snacks during breaks. We'd stop at the drug store for drinks and cigarettes. We'd spend our paycheck at the sports card store, and fight over who got the better rookie cards. We'd brag about the girls we'd been with (or lie about the girls we'd been with, at least in my case), and talk about the beer we were going to drink that weekend until one of the owners would come out of the office in the back and yell at us to get back on the phones.
I don't remember the exact process of how it all came to an end. One day we had a meeting where the tearful woman who ran the shop explained check kiting to us, a term I had never heard before. She explained that we would have visits from the FBI and that they were there to just review her books and that we as the sales group had done nothing wrong. We continued to make our calls, but the two agents in the back office dampened the mood.
No one had been getting rich off the backs of underprivileged kids, she had just been trying to pay bills and cover payroll. Shockingly, the half a dozen teenage boys they had on the roster hadn't been enough to generate a living for all those involved. Instead of seeing it as a lost cause, she scrambled to keep things afloat.
The parent company that she worked for said they were going to work with her and she would be able to avoid jail time if she cooperated fully with the FBI and their internal investigation. She complied on all fronts, and they promptly took her to court. I had left the job by the time she was sentenced but I'd heard that she'd pulled some sort of weekend only jail time for awhile.
A few years later, I was working the counter at a gas station in Utica, Ohio when a lady came in and asked for a pack of Salem 100's. I looked up to see it was her. We chatted for a minute in the awkward way people do when they would really be anywhere else instead of rehashing the past. I asked about her family, and she asked about mine. She started to leave, then stopped and said:
"I'm sorry. I always felt like I let you down. You're just a really good person...a good guy, and I kind of fucked things up for everyone."
I felt this overwhelming desire to tell her I wasn't great at all. I wanted to tell her of all the shitty things I had done just that week alone. I wanted to make up even worse stuff just so she wouldn't feel so bad. I didn't know where this accountability to me had come from, but I was uncomfortable with the label - unhappy to be seen as a person good enough to warrant this kind of naked apology.. I opened my mouth to say some of this, but she smiled and stepped out...the bell above the door cutting off my words.
Monday, May 24, 2010
Soundtrack
A few weeks before Sophia was born, I started an iPod Playlist for the delivery room. I asked Jen for her input and she said "None of that arty horseshit…this is about me" or something to that affect. So, I started through our library looking for things that Jen would love and that wouldn't be horrible for me. After just an hour or so I had 115 songs which I thought would be more than enough to get us through a night in the hospital. I shuffled them up and dumped them on my iPod.
Even by Jen's account, the pregnancy was fairly easy. She had her share of exhaustion and the usual side effects, but had largely been able to avoid the more serious complications that are common. Still, at over 40 weeks, she had been experiencing a few days of feeling really rough and convinced her doctor to see her a few days earlier than their scheduled appointment. After two hours of examination, ultrasounds, and stress tests, Jen's doc told her to get her bag and check in to the hospital at 8:00 that night. Jen cried in relief, knowing that very soon she'd be feeling better…one way or another.
I'll spare you all the push by push replay, but there were a few things worth noting. First, Jen was amazing. From the very beginning until the moment we watched Sophie gulp down her first air conditioned breath, she was perfect. Also, the staff we worked with was great. Jen's nurse laughed at our jokes (we always have jokes), got down to business when needed, and was Jen's champion the whole way. Also, she got down with the Prince that was playing on the iPod.
And that takes us back to the Playlist. We had the music going in the background as we sat in the darkened room watching Jen's contractions on the monitor ("Ooooh, daayuuum…that was a biggun"). It started with Manchester Orchestra's "I Can Feel a Hot One", but then despite the fact that I had shuffled the songs, it mostly went from artist to artist playing songs in blocks alphabetically. We cruised through lots of "B Bands" (Band of Horses, Beck, Ben Folds, The Beach Boys) and then the Garden State soundtrack. We napped through The Mountain Goats and Mojave 3. The nurse came in to get things busy about the time The Postal Service started playing. The moment Jen pushed for the first time, "When Doves Cry" filled the room. Jen finished with the first push and we looked at each other, laughing at the absurdity of giving birth with Prince as the soundtrack. "Pop Life", "Raspberry Beret", and "I Would Die 4 U", one song after another Jen pushed and then we laughed (yes, she had an epidural). The nurse boogied (though professionally) and we talked about how our Twin Cities based friends would be home-town-proud. The assembled grandmothers in the room were less interested, standing on the sidelines with shaking hands clutching their cameras.
Finally the Prince wound down to be replaced with REM, and on Jen pushed. I kid you not, toward the end, with Sophie starting to appear, "American Girl" by Tom Petty was the song playing. And then, finally, Sophie was pushed/pulled into life on the outside. I cut the cord (symbolism be damned), and she was placed kicking and fussing on Jen's chest all the while Wilco's "Please Be Patient With Me" played softly in the background. We toweled off her little arms and legs, alternately amazed and terrified of her, and everything else faded into the background.
I know it might be a little obsessive to pay that much attention to what music was playing and at what time, but a lot of strong memories I have are linked to the music that was playing at the time.
I remember I was sitting in Tyson Downey's CRX in a parking lot outside of Kroger in Brazil Indiana and he was telling me about a song he had heard for the first time. When the weather was just right you could pick up a station out of Indianapolis (not without some static, of course) and this Indy station had promised to play this new song again before 10:00. We sat there in the car chain smoking, our talking stopping as each new song would start to play until they finally played Radiohead's "Creep" and my world got a little bit bigger.
I remember the moment I realized my first marriage was over and a song called "Kerosene Hat" by Cracker was playing in the car. I rushed to turn it off as I drove no where, not wanting an awful moment to ruin a great song for me. (It didn't. I still love that song.)
And I remember walking the streets of Carbon, Indiana when I was probably 13 and coming up on a house that was playing Frampton's "Do you Feel Like We Do". We sat outside on the sidewalk listening to it in the summer night and I remember thinking that it was the best song ever written.
Good and bad, a lot of my memories are wrapped up what was on the radio, and I don't think that's unique at all. Still, I have to admit a pure personal pleasure in being able to tell Sophie one day that she came into this world while listening to Wilco. Since she's a captive audience, I plan on spending lots of time with her in front of the turntable as soon as my mother in law vacates the area that has become partially my den and partially Jen's craft room. I bet Weezy is glad Grandma Helen has been here to protect her so far...
Even by Jen's account, the pregnancy was fairly easy. She had her share of exhaustion and the usual side effects, but had largely been able to avoid the more serious complications that are common. Still, at over 40 weeks, she had been experiencing a few days of feeling really rough and convinced her doctor to see her a few days earlier than their scheduled appointment. After two hours of examination, ultrasounds, and stress tests, Jen's doc told her to get her bag and check in to the hospital at 8:00 that night. Jen cried in relief, knowing that very soon she'd be feeling better…one way or another.
I'll spare you all the push by push replay, but there were a few things worth noting. First, Jen was amazing. From the very beginning until the moment we watched Sophie gulp down her first air conditioned breath, she was perfect. Also, the staff we worked with was great. Jen's nurse laughed at our jokes (we always have jokes), got down to business when needed, and was Jen's champion the whole way. Also, she got down with the Prince that was playing on the iPod.
And that takes us back to the Playlist. We had the music going in the background as we sat in the darkened room watching Jen's contractions on the monitor ("Ooooh, daayuuum…that was a biggun"). It started with Manchester Orchestra's "I Can Feel a Hot One", but then despite the fact that I had shuffled the songs, it mostly went from artist to artist playing songs in blocks alphabetically. We cruised through lots of "B Bands" (Band of Horses, Beck, Ben Folds, The Beach Boys) and then the Garden State soundtrack. We napped through The Mountain Goats and Mojave 3. The nurse came in to get things busy about the time The Postal Service started playing. The moment Jen pushed for the first time, "When Doves Cry" filled the room. Jen finished with the first push and we looked at each other, laughing at the absurdity of giving birth with Prince as the soundtrack. "Pop Life", "Raspberry Beret", and "I Would Die 4 U", one song after another Jen pushed and then we laughed (yes, she had an epidural). The nurse boogied (though professionally) and we talked about how our Twin Cities based friends would be home-town-proud. The assembled grandmothers in the room were less interested, standing on the sidelines with shaking hands clutching their cameras.
Finally the Prince wound down to be replaced with REM, and on Jen pushed. I kid you not, toward the end, with Sophie starting to appear, "American Girl" by Tom Petty was the song playing. And then, finally, Sophie was pushed/pulled into life on the outside. I cut the cord (symbolism be damned), and she was placed kicking and fussing on Jen's chest all the while Wilco's "Please Be Patient With Me" played softly in the background. We toweled off her little arms and legs, alternately amazed and terrified of her, and everything else faded into the background.
I know it might be a little obsessive to pay that much attention to what music was playing and at what time, but a lot of strong memories I have are linked to the music that was playing at the time.
I remember I was sitting in Tyson Downey's CRX in a parking lot outside of Kroger in Brazil Indiana and he was telling me about a song he had heard for the first time. When the weather was just right you could pick up a station out of Indianapolis (not without some static, of course) and this Indy station had promised to play this new song again before 10:00. We sat there in the car chain smoking, our talking stopping as each new song would start to play until they finally played Radiohead's "Creep" and my world got a little bit bigger.
I remember the moment I realized my first marriage was over and a song called "Kerosene Hat" by Cracker was playing in the car. I rushed to turn it off as I drove no where, not wanting an awful moment to ruin a great song for me. (It didn't. I still love that song.)
And I remember walking the streets of Carbon, Indiana when I was probably 13 and coming up on a house that was playing Frampton's "Do you Feel Like We Do". We sat outside on the sidewalk listening to it in the summer night and I remember thinking that it was the best song ever written.
Good and bad, a lot of my memories are wrapped up what was on the radio, and I don't think that's unique at all. Still, I have to admit a pure personal pleasure in being able to tell Sophie one day that she came into this world while listening to Wilco. Since she's a captive audience, I plan on spending lots of time with her in front of the turntable as soon as my mother in law vacates the area that has become partially my den and partially Jen's craft room. I bet Weezy is glad Grandma Helen has been here to protect her so far...
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Indiana
As soon as the guitar started playing I was thinking of Indiana.
I remembered the cold brown of the corn fields with their trimmed stubble poking up through the gray Indiana ice.
I was climbing a thin swaying evergreen tree. I was high in its limbs, and went to reach for the next branch above me when I saw the Blacksnake coiled around it waiting for a bird. I backed down the tree frantically worried that the snake would get scared, loosen itself from the limb and fall on me.
I lived on a lake and we would swim for hours, doggy paddling with cigarettes clenched between our lips, trying to keep them from getting wet.
In Farmersburg, all the big Oak tree's trunks that lined Main Street had been painted white. It was to fend off a particular bug, they said. It always made me think of Tom Sawyer and his fence.
Teenagers, snorting well-timed bumps of crank, chain smoke in their cars and call out to each other as they drive by one another. The local rock stations refuse to play anything but CCR and Billy Squire, so we all listen to cassette tapes of Alice in Chains over and over.
Jesse and I would hike out to the meadow near my house. There was a little pond in the center of the clearing, looking like a mirrored pupil in a large eye. We'd pour gasoline on the water and then light it with a flick of a cigarette butt so we could see the water burn.
I was thirteen when my brother gave me my first beer. I took minute sips when I thought someone was looking at me, but otherwise focused on trying to get the nasty taste out of my mouth. After an hour, it had gone warm, but still I walked around with it, choking down small swallows here and there.
I was in the seventh grade, and somehow found myself holding hands and walking with Mindy Jackson. I spent the next ten years trying to recapture that feeling.
Cat had heard voices, but I didn't know about it until the sod had already stitched itself together over his grave. We stood around the tombstone talking, drinking. We went home and stood around the garage talking, drinking.
I went back once as an adult. Boys I had once known were now playing pool in the bars I visited. Girls I had once wanted to know didn't recognize me, or if they did, they pretended not to. It was OK, because I saw people that I pretended were strangers too. We drank draft beers and told each other we should do this more often.
I remembered the cold brown of the corn fields with their trimmed stubble poking up through the gray Indiana ice.
I was climbing a thin swaying evergreen tree. I was high in its limbs, and went to reach for the next branch above me when I saw the Blacksnake coiled around it waiting for a bird. I backed down the tree frantically worried that the snake would get scared, loosen itself from the limb and fall on me.
I lived on a lake and we would swim for hours, doggy paddling with cigarettes clenched between our lips, trying to keep them from getting wet.
In Farmersburg, all the big Oak tree's trunks that lined Main Street had been painted white. It was to fend off a particular bug, they said. It always made me think of Tom Sawyer and his fence.
Teenagers, snorting well-timed bumps of crank, chain smoke in their cars and call out to each other as they drive by one another. The local rock stations refuse to play anything but CCR and Billy Squire, so we all listen to cassette tapes of Alice in Chains over and over.
Jesse and I would hike out to the meadow near my house. There was a little pond in the center of the clearing, looking like a mirrored pupil in a large eye. We'd pour gasoline on the water and then light it with a flick of a cigarette butt so we could see the water burn.
I was thirteen when my brother gave me my first beer. I took minute sips when I thought someone was looking at me, but otherwise focused on trying to get the nasty taste out of my mouth. After an hour, it had gone warm, but still I walked around with it, choking down small swallows here and there.
I was in the seventh grade, and somehow found myself holding hands and walking with Mindy Jackson. I spent the next ten years trying to recapture that feeling.
Cat had heard voices, but I didn't know about it until the sod had already stitched itself together over his grave. We stood around the tombstone talking, drinking. We went home and stood around the garage talking, drinking.
I went back once as an adult. Boys I had once known were now playing pool in the bars I visited. Girls I had once wanted to know didn't recognize me, or if they did, they pretended not to. It was OK, because I saw people that I pretended were strangers too. We drank draft beers and told each other we should do this more often.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Cool Hair, Lonely Coworkers, and My Brother
When I was a little kid, it was very important to me to be able to comb my hair over to the right across my forehead. My mom or older siblings would comb my hair out straight so the tangles would be gone, but the finishing flourish was left to me and I'd get furious if they tried to do it themselves. So furious, in fact, that I remember it to this day.
---
I once worked with a woman who was recently divorced and was still having some pretty major issues with it. She told me that she had sewn together three pillows to put on what was once his side of the bed so she wouldn't feel so alone at night. I remember thinking how sad that was, and how strange that she would be willing to share this fact with anyone, much less some 21 year old kid she happened to be temping with.
She was transferred to a different department and I didn't think about her again until I saw Body Pillows being marketed. She was a woman ahead of her time. It makes me angry that I didn't see the value in the idea when it was staring me in the face. Lonely people all over the nation were ready to drop $20 for a lump of pillow that approximated a companion.
That, and they're comfy as hell of course.
---
My brother and I were far enough apart in age that we didn't have much in common when we were young. When I was playing with GI Joe's, he was getting to an age where he couldn't be seen playing with them with me (but would when no one was looking). When I moved on to bigger and better toys, he was discovering girls. While I was discovering girls, he was discovering beer. And so it goes with brothers with ten years between them.
There was one night though that stands out to me. I was probably in the Sixth Grade, and Paul would have been home on a visit from the private high school he went to in Florida. I was sitting out on the front porch of our house in Indiana, watching the clouds race by the moon. The sky seemed lower somehow, the clouds just scraping over the tops of the trees, and the moon just out of reach beyond. I had never seen a sky like that before or since.
Paul came home, and instead of going past me to get inside he sat beside me and we watched the sky together. I remember that we talked, but don't recall about what. I'm sure it was of no consequence. I just remember feeling like we were having a discussion of the kind I had seen him have with other men. It was a grown up discussion, easy and unimportant.
I've mentioned it to him a couple times over the years and he remembers nothing about it. It doesn't surprise me that he doesn't remember the discussion, or the fact that it was the first time that he talked to me in a way that didn't project the fact that I was his little brother. What surprises me is that he forgot that sky, and how the night smelled, and how neither one of us could bring ourselves to walk through that front door until we had run out of excuses and could put it off no longer.
---
I once worked with a woman who was recently divorced and was still having some pretty major issues with it. She told me that she had sewn together three pillows to put on what was once his side of the bed so she wouldn't feel so alone at night. I remember thinking how sad that was, and how strange that she would be willing to share this fact with anyone, much less some 21 year old kid she happened to be temping with.
She was transferred to a different department and I didn't think about her again until I saw Body Pillows being marketed. She was a woman ahead of her time. It makes me angry that I didn't see the value in the idea when it was staring me in the face. Lonely people all over the nation were ready to drop $20 for a lump of pillow that approximated a companion.
That, and they're comfy as hell of course.
---
My brother and I were far enough apart in age that we didn't have much in common when we were young. When I was playing with GI Joe's, he was getting to an age where he couldn't be seen playing with them with me (but would when no one was looking). When I moved on to bigger and better toys, he was discovering girls. While I was discovering girls, he was discovering beer. And so it goes with brothers with ten years between them.
There was one night though that stands out to me. I was probably in the Sixth Grade, and Paul would have been home on a visit from the private high school he went to in Florida. I was sitting out on the front porch of our house in Indiana, watching the clouds race by the moon. The sky seemed lower somehow, the clouds just scraping over the tops of the trees, and the moon just out of reach beyond. I had never seen a sky like that before or since.
Paul came home, and instead of going past me to get inside he sat beside me and we watched the sky together. I remember that we talked, but don't recall about what. I'm sure it was of no consequence. I just remember feeling like we were having a discussion of the kind I had seen him have with other men. It was a grown up discussion, easy and unimportant.
I've mentioned it to him a couple times over the years and he remembers nothing about it. It doesn't surprise me that he doesn't remember the discussion, or the fact that it was the first time that he talked to me in a way that didn't project the fact that I was his little brother. What surprises me is that he forgot that sky, and how the night smelled, and how neither one of us could bring ourselves to walk through that front door until we had run out of excuses and could put it off no longer.
Friday, June 20, 2008
Cast of Characters
Bob was from Buffalo. He and his brother Jeff had just moved to the area and I don't remember how I met either of them. One day they were just there, sitting around the porch with us, drinking bottle after bottle of Miller Genuine Draft and chain smoking. Bob was through with high school, and helped get me a job at Pizza Hutt. Jeff was still in school, and used to come to the porch at night with limply rolled joints he bought in the hallways.
Liz was a friend of Angie. High strung and fidgety, she always made a room hum with nervous energy. We clashed immediately. She had known Ang for a long time, but to call them close would have been an overstatement. After a few weeks, she started sleeping with Bob and I think they eventually wound up having a kid. She was always on the fringe of the crowd, and once she started dating Bob, he moved to the outer circle too.
Angie was a mess. She didn't just burn through brain cells like the rest of us, she tortured them like a budding serial killer tortures a kitten. You could hear them scream with every lungfull of smoke or shot of tequila. She had both nipples pierced, and it was the first time I had seen that particular piercing in person. Each night, she would make herself a frozen pizza (her only meal of the day) and would cover every square inch of the top of it with sliced green olives. From a distance, all you could see was the pickled green of the olives with the mechanically cut squares of pimento stuffing. She would eat the entire thing while smoking Camel after Camel. One day, I remember her complaining that she was out of weed. In frustration, she ran her fingers through her hair, and from it she pulled a rather large bud. She had passed out the night before and had rolled in her stash in her sleep. Excited, she ran to get her one-hitter.
Renee was a child. Pretty and innocent and wanting to be neither, she spent as much time around us as we'd allow. At fifteen, we felt guilty in her presence, so we'd try to send her away when we could. I got to know her again when we were both older and a bit wiser and it wasn't until then that I gained a bit of affection for her. Emotionally crippled in ways I was only vaguely familiar with, she was always falling apart or putting herself back together. It was something I found fascinating at the time. She had a brother, but I don't remember his name now even though he was around quite a bit at the time as well. I can see his face though.
Rick was a kid that lived upstairs with his very worried mother. She was a sweet woman who saw goodness in our crew, but knew we were generally not going to be a positive influence on her kid. Rick was kept to the outer circle by her involvement and concern. Good for her. Good for him.
Chris was my best friend and made the move to Texas with me. In life, there are very few real creative geniuses. A lot of people have moments of brilliance, but it is rare to burn bright all the time. Chris was always burning. His personality was so big it wore you down, and he was always testing you, pushing your buttons and limits to see where your boundaries were. People who didn't know him well just thought he was an asshole, and he was that, but for the few that really knew him we knew that was just part of the package and that there was more to it than that. Over a long enough time-line though, most of us came around to the same realization as everyone else. He was just too much to be around for any real length of time.
Sweetpea did things in her life that she could never forget or get past. She would bury these memories as deep as she could, but chemicals have a way of bringing everything to the surface, and there were lots of chemicals around. Desperate and sad, funny and endearing, you wanted to take care of her.
There were others. It was a revolving cast of people that would filter through the porch each night. It was rare to walk outside day or night, and not find someone stubbing out a cigarette butt, looking for something to do and waiting for other bored people to wander by. I haven't seen or heard from any of them in years. Even Chris. I know he's in the state and still playing music, but that's all.
I find myself still thinking about these people on occasion, and I wonder how it's possible that someone who has no close friends now could have had so many back then. Am I so much a different person now? Better? Worse? Obviously a lot has changed for me over time, but I automatically assume that nothing has changed for any of these people. When I wonder what they're doing, I can only picture them doing the same stupid shit as back then, but now heavier or with less hair or with kids hanging on them. In my mind, I'm the only one that is allowed to grow. They have to stay as I remember them.
That's the way I like it.
Liz was a friend of Angie. High strung and fidgety, she always made a room hum with nervous energy. We clashed immediately. She had known Ang for a long time, but to call them close would have been an overstatement. After a few weeks, she started sleeping with Bob and I think they eventually wound up having a kid. She was always on the fringe of the crowd, and once she started dating Bob, he moved to the outer circle too.
Angie was a mess. She didn't just burn through brain cells like the rest of us, she tortured them like a budding serial killer tortures a kitten. You could hear them scream with every lungfull of smoke or shot of tequila. She had both nipples pierced, and it was the first time I had seen that particular piercing in person. Each night, she would make herself a frozen pizza (her only meal of the day) and would cover every square inch of the top of it with sliced green olives. From a distance, all you could see was the pickled green of the olives with the mechanically cut squares of pimento stuffing. She would eat the entire thing while smoking Camel after Camel. One day, I remember her complaining that she was out of weed. In frustration, she ran her fingers through her hair, and from it she pulled a rather large bud. She had passed out the night before and had rolled in her stash in her sleep. Excited, she ran to get her one-hitter.
Renee was a child. Pretty and innocent and wanting to be neither, she spent as much time around us as we'd allow. At fifteen, we felt guilty in her presence, so we'd try to send her away when we could. I got to know her again when we were both older and a bit wiser and it wasn't until then that I gained a bit of affection for her. Emotionally crippled in ways I was only vaguely familiar with, she was always falling apart or putting herself back together. It was something I found fascinating at the time. She had a brother, but I don't remember his name now even though he was around quite a bit at the time as well. I can see his face though.
Rick was a kid that lived upstairs with his very worried mother. She was a sweet woman who saw goodness in our crew, but knew we were generally not going to be a positive influence on her kid. Rick was kept to the outer circle by her involvement and concern. Good for her. Good for him.
Chris was my best friend and made the move to Texas with me. In life, there are very few real creative geniuses. A lot of people have moments of brilliance, but it is rare to burn bright all the time. Chris was always burning. His personality was so big it wore you down, and he was always testing you, pushing your buttons and limits to see where your boundaries were. People who didn't know him well just thought he was an asshole, and he was that, but for the few that really knew him we knew that was just part of the package and that there was more to it than that. Over a long enough time-line though, most of us came around to the same realization as everyone else. He was just too much to be around for any real length of time.
Sweetpea did things in her life that she could never forget or get past. She would bury these memories as deep as she could, but chemicals have a way of bringing everything to the surface, and there were lots of chemicals around. Desperate and sad, funny and endearing, you wanted to take care of her.
There were others. It was a revolving cast of people that would filter through the porch each night. It was rare to walk outside day or night, and not find someone stubbing out a cigarette butt, looking for something to do and waiting for other bored people to wander by. I haven't seen or heard from any of them in years. Even Chris. I know he's in the state and still playing music, but that's all.
I find myself still thinking about these people on occasion, and I wonder how it's possible that someone who has no close friends now could have had so many back then. Am I so much a different person now? Better? Worse? Obviously a lot has changed for me over time, but I automatically assume that nothing has changed for any of these people. When I wonder what they're doing, I can only picture them doing the same stupid shit as back then, but now heavier or with less hair or with kids hanging on them. In my mind, I'm the only one that is allowed to grow. They have to stay as I remember them.
That's the way I like it.
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