I Wanna…Blog Some

I thought that swimming naked in Nancy’s pool when I was keeping an eye on her house while she was out of town a few years ago was a freeing experience, but I have discovered something even better!  Naked gardening.

For those not in the know…I have a little private garden outside of my bathroom.  

Here’s a picture from when it was for sale last year:

See the area outside of the window?  That’s my private garden.  So private that I can walk out there nude and even my husband doesn’t give me the look (Is that you Ethel? Where do you think you’re going?  Ethel, you put your clothes on!–remember that from the song The Streak?).

I go outside and water my newly planted bougainvilleas.  I planted dark pink and red to match my towels.  And today I decided to pull weeds.  Naked.  I had no idea how liberating it would be.  To feel the sun shining on my ass crack as I’m bent over to pull the shorter weeds.  Ahhh….

The only downside was I think I was bitten by something on my right butt cheek.

It made me think about how much I love to be naked.  And how few people have seen me naked.  Then I started wondering if my friends would feel the same way about me if they knew what was hiding beneath the clothes.  I always think that for people that aren’t used to my particular sort of physique it would be like looking straight into the sun.  Maybe if you’ve seen The Shape of a Mother the state of my body would not come as much of a surprise.  Or maybe…maybe…you have a body like mine.  I like the word "fluffy" but it’s not really fluff (well, since discovering the Fluffernutter some of it might actually be Fluff).

Fleshy.  Bumpy.  Scarred.  Striped.  Pale.  Droopy.  Dimply. 

Is it easier to accept people when they keep who they really are hidden?  Is my naked body who I really am?  Can I start answering my door naked and not scare off everyone I know?  Maybe we will see.  For now I will finally enjoy pulling weeds.   

Hot Mamas (working title)

This story takes place in the parking lot near a restaurant that has two (!!!) Happy Hours. This is from the perspective of a security guard that has been hired to serve and protect a strip mall in the middle of Central Phoenix, Arizona, in the United States of America.

Hmmm…this is interesting. I am feeling the vibe of three cougars that want me. I think I saw this in a video once called “3 MILFs and A Security Guard.” Man, this is my lucky night! But wait. I think I remember something about a gang of women in this neighborhood. Armed and dangerous is what I think the work memo said.

What to do? What to do? I think I’ll drive "donuts" in my little golf cart while I think about it.

Spins security guard issued golf cart in the parking lot between the roasted chicken restaurant and an upscale grocery store while thinking intently about what to do next.

Have MILF fantasy come true? Protect empty parking lot? MILF fantasy? Serve and Protect? Make these fine ladies’ dream come true? Make sure the world is a safer place for posterity? Wow, spinning these circles in the parking lot isn’t really helping as much as I thought. I better call my supervisor for advice. Sure, it’s after 1 AM, but I just can’t figure out what to do on my own…

“Hey, dude. Yeah, sorry to wake you. Um, dude there’s a van in the parking lot at my 20 that has three Mothers I’d like to—I mean three females. Well, they are just sitting in the back of a van. Yeah, “loitering” that’s it, that’s what they’re doing. WAIT. Wait a minute. Ok, hold on….One of them is getting out of the van. Hold on. If I have to disconnect dude, call the police…she’s going to the vehicle next to the van. I can’t tell if she’s breaking in. Hold on. She’s getting something from the back. Might be a body. Ok, hold on. Wait. No. No, it’s a chair. She’s getting a chair. It’s one of those folding camping kinda chairs. Oh, man. I think they must be camping. Ok? So, camping isn’t allowed? Oh, neither is loitering? Ok. I got it. I’ll go have a talk with them. If you don’t hear from me in a few minutes call for back up.”

Drives small golf cart type vehicle over to van now occupied with two females with a third female squatting in camping chair by open back end of van.

Security Guard: Um, what are you doing?

Mouthy Woman #1: We’re just sitting here talking because the lovely food establishment closed and we didn’t want to go home and wake our sleeping children.

SG: Well, I called my supervisor to ask him what our policy was about this sort of thing and he said that loitering and camping out are not allowed at this shopping center.

Mouthy Woman #2: Well, did you ask him what his policy was on doing donuts with your go-cart?

Only Reasonable Woman: Well, we were just talking. (Shoots “look” at MW2)

SG: Well, my supervisor said you need to leave. There’s a Denny’s right down the street.

MW1: No shit asshole. There are two right down the street. But we don’t want to go there we want to stay here!

ORW: We are just talking for a few minutes. (Shoots a “look” at MW1)

SG: Well, if you could just wrap this up soon…

MW2: What if we are here until we sober up because some of us were at both Happy Hours and it wouldn’t be safe for us to get in our cars and drive home right now???

ORW & MW1 both shoot “look” at MW2 and start to move like they are going to pounce on her if she opens her mouth one more time.

MW1: But of course that isn’t it. We are really just here because we want to play out our Three- MILFs-Take-A-Hot-Young-Security-Guard-In-The-Back-Of-A-Honda Odyssey Fantasy…(purrs)…come on in and join us…

SG: Well, ma’am, I am sworn to my duty and must not stray from my obligation to serve and protect this strip mall here in our fine city of Phoenix, in the grand state of Arizona, in these here United States of America. Ma’ams, please put your clothes on and just go. I must not succumb to your feminine wiles. Please just go before I am weak.

Security Guard turns his golf cart around and drives away.

MW1&2: We’ll leave when we’re good and ready…

Mouthy Woman #2 puts fold up chair back in her vehicle, Mouthy Woman #2 grumbles about the mistreatment of law abiding citizens just needing a break during summer break with kids who have swim lessons, play dates, and other activities, while still needing to fry up bacon in a pan and make him feel like a man, and Only Reasonable Woman is glaring at both Mouthy Women and reminding them if they weren’t spending so much time mouthing off to the security guard they’d probably still be allowed to sit in the back of the van and talk longer. And after some consideration the women decide to leave when they damn well are ready to leave. And in approximately 1 minute and 28 seconds they all decide it’s time to disband and go home, nearly 3 hours after the restaurant they met at for a craft swap had closed.

Those MILFs totally wanted me. It’s too bad I have my sworn duty. But thank God I have saved this shopping center from the perils of such dangerous vixens.

*                *                *                *                *

The above story was loosely based on actual events. I would like to thank James Frey and other authors that have gone before who have paved the way to embellish to make a story way more interesting. And as basis for the character, Mouthy Woman #2, I would just like to say that I still got it and can still manage to potentially get into trouble even at the age of 40!

When ex-con and former nun reproduce.

*               *               *               *

I’ve been tagged by my friend who is a very eclectic parent to write a six word memoir.  6 words?  Was she fucking kidding me?  First I had to set up a table in Word so that I could keep track of word count.   Then it took me twenty minutes to figure out what font and color I wanted for the headers.  How many rows or was it columns that I should make.  Did I want bold borders on just the top or all of the boxes.  Then I managed to spit out nearly twenty 6-word mini-memoirs.  Some were pretty generic:  I like to make people laugh.  So do a lot of people.  Big deal.  I kinda liked, "I am woman.  I wanna roar!"  because roar could be sexual or just mean that I want to be heard, I want to matter, etc.  And I do want to matter, be seen & heard, and I can be kinda loud when I’m…you know…

I talked to my husband about the challenge.  He wanted my 6 words to be "The coolest girl he ever met" because that’s kinda what he said that one night when his then girlfriend was passed out and I was totally flirting with him (after giving his girlfriend a lot to drink because I knew she would pass out and I could then totally flirt with him).  The initials T.C.G.I.E.M. are inscribed inside of my wedding ring for "the coolest girl I ever met."  But, I told him that if I used what he wanted it would be a biography and not an auto-biography.  He hated all of what I had written so I kept trying.  The dear even managed to come up with one for himself. 

I talked to my son about the challenge.  He was pretty quick to respond with his 6 word memoir.  And he did help me come up with one for myself and also the importance of why I needed to hurry:  "My son tried to poison me."  6 words, and the truth.  I took a bite of his snack before finding out all of the ingredients.  It was apples dipped in honey peanut butter, grape jelly, taco bell taco sauce (mild), mozzarella and parmesan cheese.  I am still alive, but might not be for long if I keep sampling his cooking.  

I talked to daughter #1.  She thought it was a great idea and wanted to try writing one.  But only if I let her type it out herself on my very lovely and delicate laptop computer that no one is allowed to touch!  When I suggested she write it out on paper first or let me type it in she stormed off.

There are rules to this tagging thing.  I am supposed to tag others.  I got my own family, but I’ll try to get a few others to try as well.   

Here’s my list:

Kristy @ Random Thoughts…she’s one of my friends from the kids’ school.  We might be totally different in some ways (she doesn’t drink, swear, she doesn’t rat her hair, she gets ill on one cigarette…), but she lets me be me and she even trusts me sometimes with her children (how was I supposed to know that Sex & The City was going to be at the very next screen at the drive in when I took the kids to see Kung Fu Panda?  Did Chloe have many questions?).

MB @ Misplaced Mama…she’s another friend that might seem very different from me.  Mostly because she is young and beautiful and likes to eat vegetables and do yoga.  And yet she’s also just as foolish.  She had her third child recently.  I think she’s learning about how much a third can kick your ass, but I know she’ll pull through.  She’s a great writer and when she’s really famous for that I will tell anyone that listens that she once baked me the best chocolate cake ever. 

I am cheating since my other tags don’t have blogs…remember, the family members?  I will just post theirs here.

Here are the rules:

1. Write your own six word memoir

2. Post it on your blog and include a visual illustration if you’d like

3. Link to the person that tagged you in your post and to this original post if possible so we can track it as it travels across the blogosphere

4 .Tag five more blogs with links

5. And don’t forget to leave a comment on the tagged blogs with an invitation to play!

Here are the ones from my family members:

My Mom is very very crazy.

-The Boy

age 10

Fuck you, Mom.  I hate you.

-Daughter #1

age 6

(she didn’t really say this, but she

had that look in her eyes

as she stormed off)

Smell my raspberry breath mother fucker!

-Husband

(It’s from a defining moment in his life

when he was wrongfully accused of stealing

a raspberry flavored soda)

Sometimes I’m afraid to say things out loud.  Afraid to write them.  Afraid of thinking them.  What will it mean if I say that it has been just over one year since my boy has had a seizure?  Am I inviting trouble?  Is it ok to celebrate or is it premature to feel relief? 

Just before his last seizure my boy had gone 6 months without having one.  We had felt so confident when he reached that first 6 month milestone.  We were happy.  We really thought the doctor that said his brain just needed to heal was right. 

And then one night when we were happily over confident we–me and my old man–were asking our son to fall asleep so we could get on with watching a movie we thought might not be appropriate for his 9 year old ears, Borat.  It seemed that our kid knew we were trying to keep something from hi and he was practically refusing to go to sleep.  Getting restless.  Talking to us from our room (where he slept for over a year since we were his only seizure monitors).  “Go to bed son,” we kept repeating over and over.  Finally quiet.  Finally we didn’t have to worry about this completely inappropriate anti-semitic (did I mention my family is Jewish?) film being repeated to our kid’s 4th grade class.  It was quiet.  Almost.  I didn’t hear it.  My husband did.  I’ll never know how he could hear it and what to listen for, but he got up and then said with urgency, “I think he’s having a seizure…”

In an emergency, and every seizure was to us an emergency, I cannot function.  Cannot remember how a cordless phone works.  Cannot dial 911.  Cannot understand being put on hold by 911.  But somehow manage to eventually have 911 dispatchers on both home and cell phones and get neighbors from across the street to help us know what to do next and cry to and make confession to. 

The Confession.  That was knowing that I was not going to be able to not tell someone–everyone–my husband–that I knew my son did not take one of his medications that morning.  I thought I wouldn’t have to tell anyone because that night we were supposed to stop giving our son one of his meds.  We had been lowering the dose for several days and this was to be the first night without it.  But I knew that he did not take it that morning also.  I gave my son his medications at 6am, but I had to pee really badly and said, “Here take these” and wandered off to pee.  It wasn’t until much later that I was cleaning up and noticed that the pills were gone, but the liquid medication mixed with grape kool-aid to mask the taste was still in the cup.  No biggie since that was to be the last dose anyway.  No biggie if it hadn’t been for the glitch in our plans to watch a very funny movie that I had seen already.  It was the first movie I had seen after.  After.  After my son was sick.  And I had laughed.  Laughed hard when I really needed it. 

But not this night.  This night I cried to my neighbor.  I cried because I knew I had to say I forgot to make sure my kid took all of his meds.  I cried that I thought this was over.  I really did.  I had gotten comfortable with the idea that my son was done having a brain that made me feel completely helpless.  And I was wrong.  And there he was moving uncontrollably.  I missed the beginning.  That was when he sometimes opened his eyes really wide and looked at me as if to say fearfully, “MOM!  What’s happening?” right before he could say nothing and only jerk his hands, arms, head, and sometimes forget to breath.  This night I just saw the jerking movements.  This night he didn’t forget to breath in a way that might require CPR, but we had taken those classes before he had left the hospital, just in case.  This night we still panicked, but probably didn’t need to, but that was our habit.  The neighbors, the fire department, and the EMTs were all in our bedroom.  They watched with us as our son “came to” and went through a very typical phase called the postictal phase–when the person that had a seizure has slurred speech, can’t walk a straight line, and is very sleepy.  The slurred speech and difficulty walking took my head and my heart back to the hospital and back to a time when I didn’t know if my son was ever going to be the same again.  He had come back to me, but I worried that this time might be different and this time my son would never speak the same again.  He hadn’t started playing basketball at the same level as before he was sick, but what if this time he wouldn’t be able to even hold the ball again.  All of this right after I was sure we were done with all of this. 

Here we are now.  We didn’t celebrate the second time our boy reached the 6 month milestone.  We knew better.  We’d done that and got fucked over.  So this year thing.  What do we do?  Are we allowed to talk about it.  We saw all these relatives recently and so many of them hadn’t seen us since before our kid was sick.  So many people asked, “How is your boy?”  One of my uncles let me know that he keeps a picture of my kids on his desk that was taken at the hospital.  And when he and the others asked how he was I felt so odd saying what was the truth.  

He is doing well.  It has been a year since he had his last seizure. 

He is doing well.  It has been a year since he had his last seizure.

Oh, we did finish watching Borat the day after that last seizure.  We got some sleep after a night in the ER and an IV full of Dilantin (for the kid, not me), then we debated about whether we should watch the rest of the movie.  My boy said no because he thought the movie caused the seizure.  I told him that if anti-semitic humor caused his seizures he could probably make the news or at least Entertainment Tonight. 

I survived the plane ride to Albuquerque.  It was a bit rough and I did have to hold someone’s hands to calm nerves twice.  I didn’t have time for my usual liquid courage (margarita and/or shot of tequila), and it didn’t help when the faceless voice told all of us that because of the turbulance there might not be any beverage service.  Great.  One of the times I needed hand holding was when the plane seemed to be going down…slowly, but sitill down.  Well, that was the descent into Albq. so I was able to stop panicing a little.  Then the nice man next to me started talking to me and that kept my mind off my paranoia.  My neighbor noticed I was practing reading things off big note cards.  He asked if I was giving some kind of lecture.  I told him I was performing a wedding ceremony and we started talking about his son’s wedding.  All nice stuff.  And all very distracting.  And I ended up avoiding the usual, "if I survive this I promise to be a beter person" crap.

Once in Albq. we ate the yummiest foods, got together with great relatives, performed a wedding ceremony (!!!–my first-!!!), heard a near gun fight out side of our hotel window, and helped one of our kids perfect the skill of getting to the toilet to puke.  It was a great experience.  We had even more fun visiting Las Vegas, New Mexico (the Other Las Vegas). More on that later. 

Glad to be home now.  School’s out.  Swim lessons begin.  Arizona road trip to plan!

A little music for the occasion:  Point Me In The Direction

The Wedding.