Digital Trails: Results of My Cyber Surveillance

If you're on the internet, surf the web, send texts, update your Facebook page, use email, call on your cell phone, use a credit or debit card, watch TV, download movies, order through Netflix or pick something off Hulu, there exists the very real chance of cyber surveillance.

You don't even have to be somebody.

I listened to a program on NPR this morning on what type of information is gathered from our online interactions, and do you know what this data on us is called? Collected intelligence.

And though I know this is serious business, and we are right to demand details and origin of requests for anything on us that is done without our knowledge or consent, I have to feel sorry for anyone official who is assigned to monitor my digital discards.

Collected intelligence?

If you say so.

More like oh my gosh if I have to survey this woman one more minute I am going to stick my head in a blender. Someone, please, send help to this poor woman now. Also probably likelier I should apologize to them than them to me for, you know, the undisclosed spying.

I imagine their Captain's log on me would go like this:

-6:45 AM Subject calls school, inquiring as to whether or not this is last week of school for children, or if next week is. School promises to send school calendar to her again, via email.

-7:30AM Logs on to computer, attempt made for four minutes to clean out email, opts to log into twitter instead.

-7:45 AM - 8:55 AM  *ALERT! ALERT!* Continuously bounces back from twitter to Facebook, as if she is looking for important communication. UPDATE: False alarm. Merely checking and hoping for retweets and likes.

-9:05 AM Child's school calls. Child has forgotten lunch at home, please bring. She will bring right over.

-9:20 AM Logs off computer.

-9:29 AM Logs back on computer

-10:03AM Target calls. Wondering where client is since store opened three minutes ago and she's not at door. Bags of sliced apples on sale, two for a dollar.

-10:33 AM McDonald's emails. Did she receive BOGO McCafe coupon in mail? They missed her this morning.

-10:45 AM Returns books to library. Tape receipt of overdue fines shows would have been cheaper to purchase DVDs.

-11:55 AM Child's school calls. Where is lunch? Subject promises and swears she'll bring lunch to school in two minutes.

-11:57 AM About to leave house to bring requested lunch, but runs back in to Google "Are round toed shoes still in style?" before she walks into child's school.

-12:01 PM Uses drive-thru at McDonald's for Happy Meal. Subject asks to speak to manager when drive thru clerk won't allow NonFat Iced Mocha as substitute drink with Happy Meal.

-12:03 PM Pays for $2.99 Happy Meal with debit card. Order total comes to $11.31 as subject decides she needs two NonFat Iced Mochas.

-12:12 PM Delivers lunch to school. Parks in Bus Zone Only lane. Throws bag of McDonald's to child. Child has eight minutes left to eat.

-12:25 PM Subject drops off four bags of clothing to Goodwill, completes receipt for said donation online, as husband has requested for tax keeping purposes. Decides to just have a look-see inside, returns to car with more bags of clothes than what she removed from home.

-12:59 PM Subject returns home and google searches for Dunkin' Donuts rant she saw referenced on twitter. Disgusted enough to watch it twice. Decides depressing nature of Dunkin' Donuts link is reason enough to search for "funny kitten videos."

-1:46 PM Decides to forego dishes in sink and do yoga instead. Googles RodneyYee Beach Yoga youtube. Gets distracted by 'Ron Yee Illicit Affair' headline. 30 minutes pass as well as allotted time for yoga. Only enough time for quick microwave cheese bread before school pick up.

-2:20 PM Remembers how children arrive home hungry from school. Opens refrigerator, sees three slices of deli turkey. Runs to store, buys rotisserie chicken for dinner. Feels hungry therefore determines children also feel hungry. Runs back and gets two more deli chickens. Pays with credit card. Earns a penny off a gallon of gas up to fifteen gallons due to spending history on deli chicken. 

-2:30 PM Realizes husband has to be two places at same time and makes several frantic call and hang ups to husband's cell phone. Uses up what is left of air time, unable to leave message telling him only way to pick up son # 2 from swim and son #3 from soccer is to break the law. *ALERT! ALERT!Subject arranging illegal activity! UPDATE: Cancel alert, she just wants him to drive really fast.

-2:55 PM Texts teen son to apologize for being ten minutes late to pick up. Can he start walking home and she'll meet him half way? Subject sees son walking home and decides to creeper stalk from behind while texting him "This is Freddy Krueger."

-3:20 PM Teen son eventually picked up. Subject drops teen son off at gym. Goes in and pays monthly dues that are two months late. Realizes she is trying to pay with library card. Runs out to car for credit card. Pays with debit card instead. Gets home and realizes she paid with debit card. Calls gym back and asks for balance transfer to credit card not debit card. She is told change must be made in person. Rushes back to gym, stopping to drop youngest son at soccer on way to dropping middle son at swim on way to pick up oldest son from gym on way to pay gym fees with credit card. Chicken for dinner from this afternoon's stop at grocery store is botulising in trunk.

-3:39 PM Does google search "Chicken. Death. Children. How long."

*NOTE TO INFORMATION RECORDER: Suggest we terminate surveillance at this point. Data gathering resulting in unusual amount of recording material, labor, and time required for documentation. Subject's activities of no sound interest to anyone and appear to be without importance to any organization.

"...internet companies such as google, facebook, and yahoo are taking what they learn from search requests, such as Like buttons and using it to analyze a browser's preferences, tailoring ads and suggestions to their interests. Web surfing, tracking devices on mobile phones, companies defend this data mining as a consumer benefit." ~ Edmonton Journal

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The Pinality of it is...

Recipes you tell yourself you'll make. Beautiful shoes that will kill your feet, manicured fingertips that look like the ocean at sunset and will last two days tops at your house, arrangements of flea market pictures you'll never find above your kitchen stove -- you'll even stare up at the ceiling at night, wondering how you can ask your husband for a second honeymoon just so you can wear that layered chiffon wedding dress you just saw.

Welcome to the world of Pinterest, where we lose our minds and foolishly tell ourselves we can do things like cut our own bangs or bling our own jeans. Our eyes say me likee, but our effort says not in this lifetime. Pinterest is like a magazine full of only things you like, not a glossy paper one full of occassional seductive items -- nope, pinterest is something you can stay up until l3 o'clock clicking through and seeing what other people find appealing. It's better than going through their real life medicine cabinets because you know in an instant what they're really about.

I tried Pinterest months and months ago, but just as I said above, it became all too quickly obvious that the world would know what I was truly like -- so I got rid of everything I had up there. Because the everything I had up there was all 10 Ways To Beat Depression, and 15 Ways To Cook Chicken in Twenty Minutes. Also lots of shoes that my bunioned feet will say no to and clothes, coats, hairdos, inspirational quotes, crafty things that will never materialize -- all responsible for too many nights of Pinsomnia.

What was I thinking during that Pinterest phase? Pinterest makes me crave bacon wrapped anything in the middle of the night and has me convinced I look good in sleeveless breezy summer dresses that go waaaaaaay above the knee. A soft blue skimmer, really? After a week of 1 a.m. bacon wrapped meatloaf snacking??

It just didn't happen for me and Pinterest, though it isn't totally out of my life, I still haunt the site because it is eye candy, but I now enter that Pinterworld with the appropriate mindset -- that of Pinality.

Pinality -- the true reality of your pinteresting ways, in your world. First of all, you won't do, wear, buy, make any of the things you've pinned on your Pinterest board -- like saving every single paper towel cardboard tube and plastic cups so you can cobble together makeshift iPod docking stations for your kids.

Or spraying  brown sugar and water mix in your hair to give yourself caramel highlights.

And second of all, the pinality of it is, it'll just make you wake up with ants in your hair and bacon crumbles in the corners of your mouth.

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photo credit: Bunches and Bits {Karina} via photopin cc

The Grim Reaper Finally Got Him

I assure you, our guy did not look this good

I've tweeted about our scraggly bedraggled blue betta fish for over two hundred years now.

Made jokes about building him a tiny little fish wheelchair. Poking fun at the way he'd lay half on his side, half upright, he'd appear asleep or dead, both looking the same.

I'd harass him at dinner and bring him over in his fish bowl over to watch me filet whitefish.

I was so wrong -- but I only did it because I knew he'd last forever.

Why? Because three or four years ago while downstairs one day, probably again fileting whitefish, I heard my three boys upstairs shouting for me. "Mom! MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!"

Slapping the boning knife down on the plastic cutting board, I leaped the stairs two at a time. I ran into the boys' bathroom where GoldFish Massacre III was now playing, in technicolor. Seems the separating mesh screen that kept our two pet betta fish apart had fallen to the side.The reason for the screen is the aggressive nature of the betta fish breed. My children stood, wild eyed, fingers in their mouths, as red betta fish was now pulling off scales one by one from blue betta fish. The fin brothers were going at it.

Have you ever seen betta fight? I'll tell you this, they're known as Siamese Fighting Fish for a reason.

It's nasty, dude. We had to painfully watch them circle one another while they took sneaky nips at each other and yanked each others' fins off. They moved, darting so fast, I just couldn't get them off of each other fast enough.

Amid my children's horrified screams, I hurried to remove at least one of them from the bowl, but with all the float like a butterfly sting like a bee Muhammad Ali stabbing and jabbing going on, it felt like forever trying to pull them to safety. The brawl was only seconds, but it was enough for our little blue guy to feel the brunt of it. From what was left of BlueFish, clearly, RedFish was winning. I frantically fished them both out (ha!) and kept them permanently separated after that. All I could think was how here we had moved to the suburbs, and my kids somehow end up with ringside seats to a Mexican cockfight.

While Mr. BlueFish did not emerge victorious, he did emerge with his life, albeit one fin shorter. Barely surviving his war torn state, we were sure we'd be playing taps for him before the sun came up to greet the day.

Well, if 7 a.m. the next morning didn't have us sounding like Gomer Pyle because, Sergeant Carter? Surprise. Surprise. Surprise. BlueFish was Christmas Miracle healed! And it was RedFish that had put his weary head down, never to Siamese fight again.

BlueFish had lived.

That was three years ago. Mr. BlueFish kept going, and we kept feeding him; me occasionally changing his water (though admittedly, I could've been more conscientious). Every day he'd call up his Siamese warrior genetic coding and play his game of "Ha! Try and catch me won't you, Grim Reaper!" We'd walk past and bend over his little bowl, whispering little fishy words of encouragement like "hang in there." I kept him on his toes by taunting him with translucent whitefish filets waved before him. There'd be weekly family updates on BlueFish.

That fish is the longest fish we've ever had alive, Mom.

I know. I don't know how he keeps going. Every time I look at him, I think he's dead.

Or depressed. Depressed or dead. That can look the same. (*thanks worldly wise 10 year old.)

Our family kept watch as BlueFish fought the good fight, heroically working his one remaining fin, it serving him like a broken oar to swim circles in his little environs. He became my cooking buddy, keeping me company in the kitchen as he sat in his bowl right next to the sink.

All plodded along well, until late Sunday night. I went to sprinkle in his black poppy seed-like shrimp krill just as I had done every evening for the past 877 nights and gasp! ... no need.

At the bottom of his round home, amid the blue and black speckled gravel, lay a lifeless glinting sliver of flesh. I gently shook the bowl, though I had a sinking feeling there'd be no movement other than his limp body in the resultant waves. Nothing, not even a pathetic attempt at a one-finned last wave good-bye to us. BlueFish had gone to a better place, one with cleaner water, where those without two working fins can swim. In a straight line.

We miss you, BlueFish. Now who am I going to wave this whitefish filet in front of?

**We miss you, little guy -- you were a scrapper. And will live on forever in what is now our family's rally call when times get tough, "What are you?! BlueFish or RedFish?!"

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photo credit: Cherrie 美桜 via photopin cc

The Most Handsome Man in Milwaukee

Remembering the 80's.

It wasn't just about neon cut off sweatshirts, rolled down ribbed socks, or lace up granny boots ...don't be so shallow.

There was l.o.v.e. in the air ... and never was there more of an asymmetrical haircut couple more truly meant for each other than me, and the most handsome man in Milwaukee.

A true story, for 80's week at the fabulous FunnynotSlutty: where we make you laugh.

True Confessions

My post, along with my confession, at Aiming Low today: What I really thought when they showed me my baby for the first time.

Just keepin' it real. Hopin' it doesn't scare any mama wannabe's away.

**Don't forget to enter to win one of 8 great prizes. The Great Two Year Blogoversary Giveaway, Here.

But Why Did She Do It?

I know, I know; it was well over two weeks ago that Angelina stuck that leg out like she was Inspector Gadget, "Go Go Gadget Chicken Leg" while presenting at the 2012 Academy Awards.  But I can't stop thinking about it: what was she thinking, exactly?

I think I know. Please stop over at my post today, on Aiming Low, and we can all get some rest, knowing what Jolie Pitt was really doing that night.

I thank you. You all are the best.

 

Aiming Low: where mediocrity is our goal.

Yeah. It Hurt A Little.

Months ago, as I sat staring at the dream like photography and honey sweet posts on a blog of a young mom's rural life that I had stumbled onto, I decided to finally send this writer an email, and tell her how much I enjoyed the peek into her simple, self sustaining farm life. Many times, I would be the only commenter on her site, other times I would be one of two or three others.

I didn't say too much, I only mentioned how much I appreciated the beauty and skill of her photography along with the quaint narration of their daily life. I loved the pictures of the rusty red pick up truck they had taken to the farmer's market and brought home sunflowers that she arranged in an old milk pitcher on their vintage barnwood table.

It was all so pretty, gauze-like, and so much more delicate than my own life.

I thanked her for the simplicity of her posts, and told her I admired the peaceful and non material way she and her husband  had chosen to raise their children.

Sometimes I hear back after I send an email like this, sometimes.

Some will respond with a brief, "Thank you! Glad you enjoyed it!" and sometimes the responses back have grown into wonderful ongoing friendships.

But what I received in return to my email this time flattened me.

Stumped me about the human condition. Made me ask what has happened in someone's world that a sincere expression of gratitude for their writing and their blog, results in a reply back like this:

hey alexandra.

so can i tell you that i really don't know how to respond to this?

i started to write a long note about all my struggles as a mom and that i can totally relate to what you wrote and that i have felt the same thing when reading other mom's blogs.

then my husband came by. read over my shoulder and said your e-mail was clearly a joke. or that you mistook me for another blogger because no one reads my blog and if they did, how could they possibly feel that i'm doing everything right. (oh yeah...that's my guy! ;-)

so now i'm kind of confused. and really tired after a long, frustrating day. and i need to go grocery shopping. so i just thought i'd write back and say hi. thanks for your note. i really hope i don't make you depressed. really.

and if my husband is right and your e-mail was a joke...oh well. joke's on me. not the first time and certainly not the last i'm sure.

either way.  hope you had your fun. i'm wishing you all the best...

Socks the breath out of you, doesn't it?

I sent a reply back, apologizing, and assuring her that my admiration was authentic.

I never heard back.

I remember reading a tweet, "if you have a thin skin, 'tis best you steer clear of the internet."

'Tis best to toughen up, too, because this one...yeah, it hurt a little.
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 Photo Source

Holiday Letter Discussion

Did you just run screaming to the other room as soon as you saw this?

It's the Annual Christmas Letter. Also not so fondly called, The ALCL (Annual Lying Christmas Letter), The ATSL (Annual Truth Stretching Letter),  The ABCL (Annual Bragging Christmas Letter.)

People love to write these. People say they hate to get these, but secretly, like a train wreck, we can't help but look. Some of us make an evening out of it; gathering up friends, lighting a fire, pouring the Pinot Grigio, and start ripping open the fat envelopes.

We write these, we receive them, but no one talks about them. You know, truth talks about them. Like, how they are *gulp* ridiculed. Yup. Made fun of. Passed around and taken to coffee klatches as a source of mirth and entertainment.

Is there no one to tell the writers of these letters that the chance exists, if they're not aware of it, of becoming the subject of tonight's mom's wine night out?

I will do it.

I'm at the halfway point in my life where I have to start knocking things off my bucket list. Holiday Letter Discussion is number 5 on that list.

Let's begin with assuming that everyone's got a good heart. I know I know, but let's just assume. You don't want to be boastful, right? You don't want to make everyone feel like they're the most underachieving family on the planet, do you? You want us, the ones on the other end, to know you wish us well and are thinking of us this holiday season. If we start at that point, then the rest will be a walk in the park.

How To Send Holiday Letters Out That Won't Make People Follow Up With a Request To Be Removed From Your Mailing List:

oAsk yourself, who are you writing this letter for? Really ask it.

oDo not write longer than one page. No buts. One page. End of it.

oNo $8.00 words, no matter how recently you learned egregious. Thank you.

oIf you've had the best year ev-er, if your husband is making money hand over fist, if your golden child finished up his third PhD in 18 months, we'd rather not hear about it.  Plain old happy news, like a new baby, new job, your first home, a first lost tooth on your kindergartner, your teen making the football team, your first writing gig; all good stuff we'd love to share your happiness over. But if you've had a bang up year and your home has increased in value over $100,000 again! Some things are best kept within the family.

oIt's easier for some of us to share happiness than others. For me, happiness and good things often feel foreign and like I stepped into that weird scene with the Gwyneth in Sliding Doors: Ooops! Wrong life! So, your effusiveness (that's only a 4 dollar word, not 8...) may sit with me as bragging. Bragging. Not catching up, but bragging. Bragging.

oThis suggestion is serious: be sensitive to your audience. Really. If you know of someone who has been trying to find work for most of the year, please don't send out a letter telling them how many times you've been promoted in your own job, or how may headhunters are after your awesomeness. Not nice. Same for a couple struggling with infertility; don't type up sentence after sentence on how everyone in your family is a fertile myrtle and gets pregnant just from the wink of an eye...Must be the water! LOL! This will only be LOL to you.

oWe know you want to make it fun, but Changing fonts and Shifting color changes leave me feeling like I've got an undiagnosed brain tumor. It does. And then I'll be too worried about getting an appointment with the neurologist before the New Year to pay any attention about your trip to Graceland.

oSelf deprecation is a great tool. Somehow, I'll listen about little third grade Tommy's history making ACT scores if you tell me how both you and your husband swear he's not from your litter and was dropped off by aliens.

oCount your adjectives:  if you've used wonderful or great more than 3 times in one page, time to stop.

oBottom line: you can't disguise bragging. We know.

I promise you that if you follow these suggestions, your Holiday Letter won't be turned into party fodder. Stick to these points, and no one will guess that you're telling us just what a GD good year you had. Even if you sign it, Here's to 2012! Though we can't imagine a better year than 2011 was!

Happy Holidays!

A Good Scare Will Shut You Up -- A True Halloween Tale

I awoke that morning in March 1989, with the very same thoughts I had had all month long.

I lay in bed, uncomfortable, but not wanting to get up. It had been a month since my grandmother passed away, and the heart ache of living without her still felt like a fifty pound weight sitting on my chest.

As I stared out the window, full of sorrow for myself at the thought of what this first year without her would be like, I felt the energy leaving my body, even after ten hours of sleep. 

I sighed as I looked at the clock on the dresser that faced me. In the middle of the dresser there was a pink bedroom lamp, and next to the lamp there was a framed picture of me at eight years old sitting on my grandmother's lap.  The sunshine was coming in now, strong -- and there was no need for any lights to be on. The brightness of the room made me remember what my grandmother would always say when we'd put the lights on in the house on a sunny day, "The sun is out! What a sin to have the lights on when we have the Lord's light!" She'd then furiously walk through the house, flicking off every light switch with her determined hand.

As I thought of her I pulled the covers up to my nose, and knew the thirtieth day of beginning my mornings in sobs was seconds away. The familiar bottom lip trembling began, and right on time, the floodgates opened.

My tears were hot and they spilled out of the inner corners of my eyes with no forced effort from me. I was home alone and gave in to the luxury of loud, heaving cries of emotional pain that felt so good.

How I wailed, how I self indulged; "Oh, grandmother, what will I do without you? What will I doooooo? I miss you so much. I don't want to do anything but just lay here and cry..." The clock on the dresser said seven, I disregarded it. I didn't care about anything. This was how it had been for four weeks now.  

I was full throttle on with self pity. I had been crazy about Shakespeare in high school and took to memorizing any lines that spoke to me in my sophomore angst. I knew even back then, with the melodramatic mindset I was developing, that there'd be plenty o'times a Shakespeare quote would come in handy in my lifetime. Like just this very morning, "My grief lies all within and these external manners of lament are merely shadows to the unseen grief that swells in my tortured soul." 

Dude knew what he was talking about.

I continued on with the wails and chest thumping and thoughts of how no one had ever suffered a broken heart like this. 

Remember Smokey Robinson? You think Smokey was singing about losing a girl in "Just To See Her Again?" No...no no no and no. You would be wrong. He was singing about my grandmother. 

I lay in bed, ten feet deep into my one woman show of offering up croaked bars of "...I would give anything...just to see her again..." and decide to call in sick to work -- once more -- and spend the rest of the morning wallowing in this personal pain. "Why, gramma, why?? WHYYYYYY???"

As I enter round three of woe-is-me, the pink bedroom lamp on my dresser begins to flicker off and on like a strobe light. I gasp and stare wide eyed, incredulous at what is happening. Time felt suspended, and what may have been a just a millisecond felt more like minutes.

I have always been a kid, then later on the type of person, that responded quickly to a good, swift kick in the ass.

I shuttup.

Tears, gone.

I knew who it was. I spoke to her, tremulously, "Okay, gramma, okay..I'll get up. I'm scared. I'll stop. I'll get up..."

Just to make sure I did get my sorry wallowing butt out of bed, she then decided to knock down the picture -- the one of us together -- to the ground.

Holy cow, you've never seen anyone throw back covers and jump out of bed faster than me that morning.

"Okay, Okay, Okay, I'm all done with Smokey, no more Shakespeare. Loud and clear." I raced through the house, got dressed, found my shoes, grabbed my keys, and slammed the door behind me.


Up and at 'em. From bed to door in twenty minutes flat.


And this is my true Halloween Tale for you today.

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween!

from,
Made Up Blue Hair Costume Lady
Unnerving Faceless Phantom
War Machine (random character from IronMan)
Brain Man
and Made Up Mullet Hair Costume Man
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Living Through Childhood Halloween Nights

Happy to be at FunnynotSlutty today, where I get to go on and on about how Halloween nights of old done me wrong.

But, you can get the details here.

Thanks for following along, I have so much fun telling these stories.

**If you're new here and following over from FunnynotSlutty: so happy to have you. Please check out the Best of Page, and I hope you leave with a good laugh at or two.

Totally at my expense..

xo
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FunnynotSlutty is:
Funny not Slutty features comedy for women created by female producers, writers, humorists and comedians. FnS Original Productions have been featured by Funny or Die, BestViral.com, TVGuide.com and Internet Video Magazine.

We Make Women Laugh

Crazy Lady Will Fall For Hard Luck Story If You Keep Her Company

I hear tell thar's a woman in town who'll feed us if'n we sit with her a spell

At 5:15 every morning this week, the kids and I have been woken up by some crazy a** relentless tapping on our front glass door and windows.

After sitting up and freaking out the first few days I finally dragged my coma sleeper husband's body out of bed by his arms and pulled him down the stairs. You'd think he'd be more at the ready to protect his castle. He quickly summed up the rhythmic tapping:  it's birds. Red Cardinals.

Birds who are pecking on our windows, and the glass front door. And doing it without stopping. Tap. pause. TapTap. pause. Tap.

I called our Nature Reserve Center and I was blessed with this bit of *isn't nature AWESOME!* explanation for the birds' predawn calling.

They are attacking their own reflection. These Cardinals see their glorious threatening reflection in our glass front door and are defending their territory from themselves. Can you imagine that bit of inner dialogue? ::Must.Attack.Self::


Holy Moley and I thought I had issues.

The conversation naturalist at the reserve center quickly became concerned: clearly, I did the right thing by calling. I could feel the joy she had at how indispensable her services were. She told me with intensity I could feel in her voice that what I needed to do was place masking tape in a big X over all the glass fronts to our house. Now.

My family is used to me doing things that appear to make no sense on the surface; but I had a live voice on a phone line with me this time, one that others could hear, too. Forest Ranger Mary was shouting directions: "Just X out all the reflective surfaces on the front of your house! The birds could get hurt!" I didn't want any birds hurt, I wanted to sleep, too, so I X'd away at our reflective surfaces. From space, our house must've looked like a pirate's treasure map.

We went outside to see how bad it looked.

Oh, it was bad.

Painful mortification for the two teens, for sure.

Tearful pleading from the 9 year old, "the school bus will be here any minute, mom, please take it down!"

My husband's lovely affirmation of love for me, "why the surprise, boys. It's your mom."

I stood on the sidewalk in my slippers, staring at the front of our house, shaking my head, oh...it looked like a crazy woman lived there.

"It looks like the hobos got us, mom, with those signs they leave for each other, like in the book you read to us."

Yup. It did. Exactly like train hoppers saying, "stop here."

Hobo signs were used by hobos to talk to each other, letting them know of what they could find in a home. They'd carve signs into a tree, or fence, or garage, or assemble a sign with sticks and stones, using coal or chalk.

Could be about hospitality found there:

A cross made with two sticks meant the hobo could talk Jesus and get a ham sandwich in return.

The letter "M" meant "a hard luck story gets them every time."

 
A diamond shape with an upraised stick "arm"  meant RUN! gun on premises.

 

Here's a hobo sign you'd never see outlined on our driveway....

Maybe something more like this:

With this one right below it:

The old boys would be putting this one up, if'n they came on a Saturday and my husband was home.

 This sign here I would save them the trouble and put up myself:

Before you start thinking I'm a bit out there worrying that hobos will find us, let me tell you, I googled it: The Knights of the Road today communicate via cellular phones, and e-mail.

And, you know, instagram.

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I Scare Nice People

I am laughing as I type this.

My husband is reading over my shoulder, telling me I should call today's post, "Things I Like To Do." Or "Things He'd Like To Forget."

I think "I Scare Nice People" -- best possible title ever.

Because anyone who has been reading me for awhile knows-- and we've been over this before: not that there is any one thing wrong with me, just several little things....nothing enough to be called a red flag. Just a few light pink flagettes here and there.

I like to scare nice people. I like to scare the nicest people of all, like my husband.

It's something I can't help....to turn him into a dancing bug-eyed fool, few things bring me more joy.

Before anyone jumps on me about his age! his heart! what will the children do?? I can promise you that I know his family history and follow his most recent physical exams, checking that BP, heart rate, cardiac risk factors, are all well within normal bounce back from scared s***less fright range.

The most recent exhilarating episode fell right into my lap, perfectly timed, while we were home on a weekend night watching BatMan Begins.

In this movie, there is a heart pounding 20 second segment where the breathtaking Cillian Murphy, playing the mentally unstable Scarecrow, drives an asylum patient into madness.

He could be a Victoria's Secret angel (or mine)

It is cinematography wonder; filmed in broken, twitchy frames showing close ups of an unevenly stitched burlap sacked head. It is the unexpected beauty of Cillian Murphy inside that bag, with him being so sadistic mastermind certifiable, that makes this scene just the horror that it is.

So much scarier in a dark living room at 11 PM

It took all of half a second for me to know just what I'd be doing before the film was over.

I excused myself to go to the bathroom and left my husband sitting in the dark--watching the horror of the psychoness of Scarecrow unfold.

Quietly, I went upstairs instead. Once on the second floor, I pulled a pillowcase and scarf out of the bedroom closet and tiptoed back down to the bottom of the stairs, just ten feet from where my husband was watching Scarecrow drive some poor hanging on to sanity by his fingernails asylum patient to the edge of his psychological cliff. I sat on the bottom step and placed the pillowcase over my head, tying the scarf loosely around my neck. 

I slipped my shoe off, and threw it, hard, against the staircase wall.

And then I waited.

I knew my husband would come check on the noise. I had to press my lips hard to keep from laughing in delirious anticipation.

When I heard him call my name, I just about yelped out in glee.

At the sound of him getting up from the sofa, I had to bite my thumb to keep myself quiet.

The sound of his footsteps coming in my direction had me holding my breath and chewing the inside of my cheek.

HE WAS COMING.

I tucked myself into the corner of the stair, crouched into the very wedge, pillowcase over my head, scarf securely around my neck, excited beyond words. He was just steps away now. It was dark, he took one step up and stumbled into me.

I heard the "what the..?" and then....THEN, I felt his tentative hand reach out and perfectly land on my clothed head.

Sweet lord make it stop!!

OH! The long awaited prize of his yell.

How I live for that first yell when things are moving too fast for his brain to understand.

Not able to hold back my laughter, I pulled off the pillowcase, blessedly in time to see him blinking faster than a strobe light and dancing in place as he tried to figure out what was going on.

He mumbled something about one of these days this will all take its toll.

In my defense, he was George Clooney grey when I met him.

Honest.
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But, Do You Really Want To Be Normal?

I like to take my children places and not tell them where we're going.

They call it kidnapping. Tomato, tomahto. They pretend to hate it. I don't think they really do because in the end, it always turns out to be a memory.

Determined to wring the last loveliness out of summer, I blindfolded the three of them and drove to an undisclosed location, I took them to a place where they found themselves waiting to ride a zip-line.

Don't google it - the first thing that comes up is a video called "73 Stitches and What Went Horribly Wrong!!"

Predictably, the sixteen year old was mortified when he realized our destination, "Mom ... look around. Do you see any other moms doing this? Show me where you see some other moms doing this. You won't. Why? Because it's crazy. You're crazy."

"Honey," I asked him in surprise, "Have I EVER said I was normal? Have I EVER been normal? Why are you even wondering why other moms aren't doing this? Have I EVER done anything that other moms do?"

Without having to think too long, the fourteen-year-old and the nine-year-old answered, "She's right, you know."

And so their day of being held without ransom began--and ended--with the nine-year-old summing it up this way, "Just another day of life in a house like ours."

That's right.

Too much time has been spent in my life, trying -- and failing. To be normal. Normal, I am not.

Tonight, I offer you this evidence; as I am sitting here typing, I am snacking on a head of lettuce. Whole, like an apple.

Oh, stop it--it's been washed.

Sometimes my children will come downstairs to find me running in place. Why? Because I like the tingly feeling in my legs when I'm done.

They no longer even notice the sound of my feet pounding on the carpeting at 11 p.m.

But, let's just say, for the sake of looking at all possibilities: let's say if I were given the choice of being NORMAL. Would I take it?

I couldn't say with certainty that I would.

I've got layers like an onion, I know, I know: I think I want to be normal and lament not fitting in; but then, at those moments when I'm being clear blue honest with myself; I'd have to answer "no."

Where would our zip-line moments come from, if I were normal?

Where would the memories of the mom who'd run in place because she liked the feeling, come from?

They'd miss a shopping cart with four heads of lettuce in it for the week.

True enough, there are some days where it's impossible to believe that not fitting in can ever be a good thing. But trust me on this ... stay WHO YOU ARE, you will not be sorry.

Some day, your kids will begin to tell a story about you, and they won't be able to finish that first sentence without a laugh they can't control.

My children ask me at least three times a day, "Are you okay? You're acting weird again." I'm used to their question.

They will ask, but there is no trace of alarm in their voice.

I have thrown in the towel on blending in, I surrender, I know I will never be the one that slips through without a notice.

I will, instead, one day be one-hundred-and-three-years old, sitting in a double diaper that has been soaked through, laughing and talking to myself while I stare out a window in wonder of the life I've had; and if one of my children happen to be there blessing me with their company, I will stifle a laugh with my gnarled fingers and whisper to them, "Remember that time I may have peed a little on that five point harness when the zip-line took off??"
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You Can Tell A Lot About A Person By The SWAG They Keep

Having a blog requires the decision on how much to disclose, post, reveal.

I decide if it doesn't hurt anyone, it's fair to post.

Why pretend to be something you're not, is what I tell myself. So I go ahead, and hit publish.

This past Sunday, while unpacking from BlogHer --  and, yes, I see the eyes popping out of your head as you say, "BlogHer? Wasn't that like two weeks ago??!!" Yes. Yes, it was. Moving on.

As I was unpacking, I began to notice quickly, a pattern in the SWAG I came home with from the fabulous San Diego expo center.

Items like this lay across the top of my suitcase:

Right next to this big red box, we see:

Underneath all of it, we have scattered packets of:

Between the T shirts and underwear, there are:

• Calcium chews
• FiberBars
• Boxes of Quaker Oats cereal

And all that this SWAG tells about me can be summed up with this one item:

Anna Lefler's The Chicktionary FootFile (BEST SWAG ev-ER)

Where was the sexy? Did I come home with the Edenfantasys swagbag containing -- among other things -- the big purple beastie? Did I have languid Skinny Cow glue-on eyelashes? Was there any hot and technical social savvy information from intel, samsung?

No. Because no matter how far we travel from our homes, we're still with ourselves.

And my SWAG proves it.

On the full plane ride home, after munching on the sample boxes of cereal I prided myself on having been practical enough to pack, I reached into my bag o'swag and pulled these out to wipe my hands down:

Edenfantasys AfterGlow moist towelettes, for after those raucous times

Based on the SWAG I brought home, I may think of myself as a dork, but the guy sitting next to me sure didn't.

And All I Could Think Was, "Oh, Boy..."

photo credit: cafemama via photopin cc

If you have yet to grow a human and then birth it, perhaps 'tis best that you just click out of this post now.

I will absolutely understand.

All right then, the three of you brave enough to stay, may I ask you to please not let me know what a fantastic ItWasLikeATripToDisney! labor and delivery you had, because not all of our stories are like that.

With all that said, let me tell you that today, as I was looking for some "rockin' the bump" pictures, I came across labor and delivery photos of me 16 years ago.

Holy Moley, I've got the wild eyes of a steer that knows he's about to get roped and branded in these pictures. Hog tied and bound and no way out.

I remember thinking just those exact thoughts, too, as I lay on the labor and delivery bed: there's no way out of this one, and oh, boy. Oh, boy but you've really got yourself into a jam this time.

Some women will say that during their delivery, they felt as if they were a beautiful flower slowly blooming and opening, one lovely petal at a time.

Some women is not me. I felt like somebody was playing a game of wishbone, and I was the wishbone. I didn't care who won, just snap it and get it over with.

It was Easter Sunday, 11:55 p.m., and I felt the beginning of contractions announcing that our first baby was coming! My husband and I excitedly grabbed the overnight bag I had sitting outside the front door for a month now, and left for the hospital. The pang of muscle bands across my stomach tightening visibly, I could see contractions happening close enough together that I knew I'd be admitted once we got there. I was 35 weeks pregnant and had been on bed rest since 31 weeks for pre-term labor caused by pre-eclampsia. Also known as scary blood pressure numbers. But I was doing well on medications, and we were given the good to go once some real action started up, and it had indeed "started up."

In fact, funny thing this, I felt great and ready to take this on: stronger, taller, faster -- almost Canadian. My body was making the world's greatest hormone drugs to prepare me for birth, and I had this. Megadoses of somethingcon Triptocon or whatever hormone coursed through my blood and I felt like Trinity in Matrix.

Bring it. I am Predawn History of Womankind, Clan of the Cave Bear united with all mothers past, future, present and step aside hear me roar.

Because of the pre-term labor, I had been on strict bed rest for my last trimester and had missed the Lamaze classes that all Ob-GYN Doctors order first time moms to attend, so they know what to expect during labor. My husband had attended solo, made no notes, but he had brought home the birthing tapes from class for me to watch. Reclining on the sofa one lazy afternoon while on bed rest, on my left side, of course, I fast forwarded through the footage for all of half an hour. The whole stack of six tapes. I can surmise the information in three basic steps: grunt, push, smile. And step four: *highfive* all around.

The woman on the video slipped a squealy one out in three seconds, 1 - 2 - 3 grimace, frown, and congratulations!

Let's do this.

1:00 a.m. Sunday night: I'm hooked up to a contraction monitor. Yeah. Definitely. I'm admitted.

7:00 a.m: The next morning rolls around. Still no baby but I felt like Queen of the Amazons.

11:00 a.m: No baby, but I am starting to feel a few inches shorter.

12:00: High noon at the O.K. corral. No baby and I'm ready to get the heck out of Dodge. I wanna go home. Tell me what to do.

1:00 p.m.: Our Doctor finally stops in. The nurse had called her, and after the Dr. checks me, I am told I am "progressing" nicely. Which feels like the gold stars Mrs. Sprowell gave me on my second grade spelling tests. All is great, save for one little logistics matter of position.

Seems that our little baby is in love with my spine because he can't stop looking at it. What our little guy needs to be doing is looking at mama's hoohaa.

I was in what I learned then, was something called "back labor." What my voice of experience today more accurately calls The White Hot Poke of Fire with the Devil's Trident aka the sole reason for the invention of labor and delivery pain meds.

"We've got to get this baby turned around," my Doctor snaps.

"OK, Doc, have at it,"  I reply.

"No," she zeroes in on my eyes. Pointing at me with her chin, she barks, "YOU need to get this baby turned around. Now, get up on all fours and rock back and forth on the bed. I'll help you from the front -- ready? NOW. (pause) I said NOW. (longer pause) Let's go... like they showed you in your Lamaze classes."

Me: *blinkblink* "Errr... Doc? I didn't make it to Lamaze classes, remember? The bed rest?"

"Oooooh," she says a little too *I wash my hands of this* for me, "That explains it. Listen, honey, if you don't get this baby out in three seconds, you'll be a C - section, he's starting to go back up."

Back. Up?? Oh hell no. And so, like someone who had lost their mind and was sitting in an imaginary rocking chair at NutHill Acres, for all its worth, I rock -- and the nurses start kneading my belly. And something starts to click THANK GOD because OH MY PRECIOUS LORD IN HEAVEN OF ALL THINGS HOLY TAKE ME NOW BECAUSE I AM NOT GOING TO LIVE THROUGH THIS.

I know I asked to die, because I remember the Doctor telling me she hadn't lost a patient yet, and she wasn't going to begin with me.

"But what if I ask you to, what if I give you permission to, what if I BEG it of you?!?!," I pleaded in between desperate pants.

"Still no." She wasn't interested in any life bargaining deal.

I grab at my husband's arm, "Promise me you'll marry right away, as soon as I'm gone, because you don't know a thing about taking care of a baby. Promise me."

And then I saw the look in his eyes. It was one of mind separating from body. He wanted out as badly as I did. Only, he could bolt, I couldn't -- and, I remember being so jealous of that. I had nowhere to go and there was something big stuck between my legs and I wasn't going anywhere.

"Doc," I gasped between the lightning bolts Zeus was aiming with incredible accuracy at my tailbone, "I know our silly little naive birth plan asked for a natural birth, which embarrasses me now -- but I changed my mind. I'll have the epidural now, please."

The nurse looks at the Doctor, the Doctor looks at the nurse, the nurse looks at the other nurse. They all look at my husband. My Doctor breathes in, then slowly exhales out her words, "Your labor has progressed too fast. It's past the point of an epidural being safe. I can't give it to you."

I'm sorry, what was that Dr? Did you just say NO EPIDURAL??

"Say what?"  Now it was me aiming my laser beam eyes at her. "Nuh-uh. Game on, doc, because this baby is coming out and it's coming out now," I battle cried and called out the cavalry of sisterhood since women first huddled around each other with the first cave birth, Charge!

The rest of the story is on warp speed. I remember looking at the military hour clock on the wall: it read 13:05. We had been there 12 hours. The television sitting on a chained shelf next to the clock was on and Barney and Baby Bop were singing about "Going on an island adventure." Before those two arrived at their imaginary purple destination, a 7 pound 4 ounce baby boy with eyes so blue they took my breath away had luge sledded out of my body.

I did it. With a lot of hooting and hollering, and learning the new word, perineum, I had done it.

My first request? "Give me that phone, I am calling my sisters and letting them have it for not telling me a WORD about what this was like."

And I called the both of them, and they laughed, and then they told me I'd forget all about it and do it again.

Which I did.

Two more times.

Did I forget the part about how this was one of the best days of my life?

Because it was. I'm misty eyed right now, thinking about it.

Sometimes I wonder what's wrong with me.

Tell me a highlight of your birth story: what didn't you expect? (You can't say survival)

**and P.S? I hope it's all right that I spared you the details about blood pressure plummeting and needing a blood transfusion and 103 stitches put in places I didn't know I had and words like tear, and degrees of said tear. What's the point, right? I'm still standing (though sitting is harder). And it was totally worth it. A thousand times over. Well, at least a hundred.


photo credit: astio via photopin cc

People's Restroom Habits

 

"Just a minute, you need to use the papers!"

Had you gone through my mother's white clutch purse in the 70's when I was growing up, you would have found something like this.

A snap case containing EMERGENCY toilet seat covers. I can see the case so clearly in my head and still hear its crinkly contents being unfolded as if it were yesterday.

Not a single butt of any of my mother's six children had EV-ER touched a bare toilet seat.  There was always a film of safety between our behinds.....and what we imagined microscopically lingered on the surface.

Alighting on this germ-laden environment, with no protective layer, we could promise you, would result in the worst case of dogscoot ever.

Durn dogscoot.

On any outing, with six of us in tow, it wouldn't be long before one of us (nine out of ten times, me) would announce, "I have to go to the bathroom!"  and off to the races it was, with my mother digging around in her purse for the bright blue package to hand us, shouting orders in her thick Spanish accent, "Rrrrememberrr tooo pooot down dee paperrrrrs! Dere arrrre sooo manies off dee gerrrrms! Make sure tooo help your leetle seester! Pongan el papel!!"

And so we would place our onion skin papers down, a ritual that had become as natural as setting a table, because we knew she was right.

If, per dreaded chance, there were none of "dee papers," well, then, instructions were clear and never to be broken. No toilet seat was to be sat upon bare nekkid. By ANY one by ANY part of the body.

You were to hover. You were to coat your hands with miles and miles of paper towels and do the hiney-hover.

By age six, I had developed killer triceps that would make any yogi master seethe with jealousy.

Whatever you have to do, do it! Just don't for the love of all that is holy touch that toilet seat!

Even if we'd all be out for a walk, and no one would have the need to relieve themselves, if my mother were to pass a sign--anywhere, gas station, storefront, restaurant--that read "CLEAN RESTROOMS," her eyes would grow wide as if she had just been blessed with a  holy vision and the paper passing would begin. "It's a clean bathroom, we must go! GO! GO!"

A clean bathroom.

I had learned to accept what my memory has filed away as "eccentricities" of my mother.

But I am now that woman. The one that is always in search of the ever elusive clean restroom.

I can't even begin to describe the level of cleanliness that a public restroom must meet,  before I will use it or allow my children to use it.

We will look and search and hunt until the color of our eyes turn yellow to find a clean bathroom before we squat or stand before a filthy toilet.

Forget gas stations.

Pffffffffffft to grungy diner rest stops.

Ain't gonna happen.

The back of an old supermarket? Puh-leez. A-1 best quality untouched by any germ butts here.

I have learned to be a bathroom snob. I can appraise a bathroom in less than  a second, and give it a raised eyebrow, or pursed lip, or sharp gasped evaluation. Based on how many huffs and puffs, or one or two eyebrows up, the children know whether to proceed or not.

We will dance the jig of leprechauns on St. Patrick's Eve and hold it like Beckham before we enter a dirty bathroom.

And Port-A-Potties?

That's when mama counts on her BFF,  StadiumGal.

Wire me up.

The Mrs. That Almost Stayed A Miss

Thank you to Amanda @It'sBlogworthy for inspiring this post. Though her story worked out to be a marriage proposal on bended knee at dawn on the beach, mine? Well, mine had destiny nervous for a few moments....

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I was unaware that the man I had been dating for a year was going to be the man I married. We hadn't yet spoken of marriage, which suited us both fine. He had made no promises nor given any hints regarding a possible future together, so I couldn't claim to be misled or disappointed.

He was content with dating, and he was an affable enough fellow that I continued to date him. He was employed, respected the practice of personal hygiene, and had no addictions. Given all that, continued dating with no end in sight would fit into my schedule.

It was my birthday and he had called to ask me out to dinner. At the time, he was traveling internationally, and our times, when together, were spent doing nice things at nice places with nice food.

I knew he would have a special dinner planned since he was home for just a few days. I was anticipating romance, attention, and perhaps a gift from abroad. He was coming to pick me up at 6:30 p.m. As I waited for him, I thought of how I was ready to sit, talk, be wined and dined, celebrated and toasted to.

He arrives, 6:50 p.m., and his face has a look of grief and concern, as if he's lost something. He is also unusually quiet. I ask if everything is all right, he answers yes, that it is, but nothing more. He is twenty minutes late, which is not like the punctual man he has been for over a year. But I don't want to start the night off on the wrong foot, so I say nothing. But, things feel odd and tense and he doesn't smile to see me. We go in his car, and I promise to not bring up being late unless it happens a second time. If there is a second time.

While he is driving, he looks straight ahead and makes no mention of his trip to Germany, though he was gone for ten days. I attempt conversation, but I feel as if I'm in the car with a coyote; all I hear is "yup. yup. yup." to any question I ask.

Well, perhaps he has jet lag, I think to myself. We drive along, but I don't know about this night, which is starting to feel like a duty he's fulfilling since it's my birthday. I'm hungry, I have to go to work the next day, and I've got a new dress that I've bought for tonight on. But he doesn't notice that red is my color, nor how the gold button earrings play up my dark hair. I decide I will enjoy this meal, be just as affable back, and celebrate being with someone on my birthday.

We arrive at the restaurant, he parks, and then asks me to wait--sitting in the car. He always hops over to my side of the car and opens the door. Now I know, this is the farewell wrong place, wrong time speech we're leading up to.

I oblige, count to sixty seconds, then step out of the car. I see him in the vestibule of the restaurant, fingers jostling in his front pockets and well, you don't want to know what this looks like to me.

He then steps toward me and I see him, with his lips pressed tight. He walks as stiff as a robot, and together with the furrowed brow leftover from when he first picked me up, I can't read a thing about him. Is it agitation? Is it avoidance? I let him catch up to me and we walk alongside. I slide my arm into his, and he jumps twenty feet in the air.

I withdraw and drop his arm like an electric wire. I take a deep breath. I do not want to bicker in a parking lot on my birthday with a new dress and a growling stomach. I can make it through this dinner, I'll order something light, like whitefish since anything else will sink like a rock. We enter the restaurant, and the hostess seems to know him. She places her mouth inches from his ear and I imagine her whispering, "Tonight. Dump her. Got it?"

His tone back to her is a nodding rushed yes. They are in deep communion. He turns to me and asks me AGAIN to wait a bit, this time in the front hallway. He and the hostess whisper back and forth again and we're shown to a table. He keeps his hand in his pocket, I attempt to reach for the one he has resting on the table, and he pulls back as if I've extended a lobster claw.

Without warning, he stands from his chair and says he needs to check something in the car. I have now entered "whatever" land. I can no longer enjoy my meal, and think, OK. nice guy and all, but I just can't see what is going on between us... I know I should try and read between the lines but there's a lot of lines to read here.

A few minutes pass and he returns, his hand still in the front pocket. We eat a silent dinner. I say it's time for me to get home early, I have to be at work at 7:30, and I saintly offer him an excuse of how he must have jet lag.

He looks at me, his eyes wide with shock. I think, This can't be good. I can't believe he is HAVING A GOOD TIME??? You're kidding, right?This is SOOOOOO not a good sign. All I can see is red flags. Red flags all over the place.

He tells me he wants to take a drive to the lakefront. I agree, thinking maybe we'll talk and he can come clean about the hostess taking my place. And it's the least I can do, because I already know this is the last time for me too.

We drive there, and I see a white horse and carriage waiting. I am jealous of the couple that will be celebrating their love to the romantic clip clop of horse's hooves, because I know it won't be us. Then, turning his body in an awkward broken movement, he takes my hand and walks toward the carriage. His other hand won't leave the front pants pocket. Now I'm the one with the furrowed brow, but mine is out of confusion. We climb into the white cab, I move to sit closer to him. I make the mistake of having hope and I reach for the dang hand in his pocket. But he's not having any of it and digs it back in deeper.

In one last moment of dreaming out loud, I convince myself his madness is jet lag or traveler's fever. I make up that last one because, how can I explain all that is going on like a poorly written screenplay. No continuity of thought! I want to shout.

But if he was protective of the hidden hand before, he's grown thrice that level now. I mentally steel myself for the coming weekend of me and two quarts of Ben & Jerry's Death by Chocolate. It's not like I haven't had practice with those kinds of weekends before. I know I'll be sad, but as always, like a phoenix I will rise.

We're sitting in a beautiful red velvet interior of a fairy tale carriage, and I can't immerse myself in any of it because he continues with his pocket patting fetish. I am ready to jump out of the horse cab by now, but it's moving too fast. It's also getting cold outside, dark... and I've got new black T-straps that match this new red dress. And so I sit.

I will finish this night, and I will cherish this buggy ride. I close my eyes, and I relish the sound of the horse's hooves on the quiet street.

And this is where it gets strange.

There is a five star hotel up ahead and the driver is pulling the horse to enter the circle drive. My date jerks his hand out of his pocket, I check it to see if he's been hiding a bandaged injury all night but instead of gauze and stay clips I see a small, white box.

My date's face is set like stone, locked and looking straight ahead with a determination for what, I don't know. He licks his lips and I wonder why he feels he needs to give me a goodbye present as he leaves me for the hostess. I take the little white box he offers and snap it open it to see what I'm Sorry jewelry looks like. But there is no consolation gift inside.

In the darkness of the cab, with the streetlight hitting it just right from behind, there is a miniature firework of sparkles sitting inside black velvet. A breathtaking diamond solitaire shoots light from the middle of a gold band. It is an engagement ring, where a pair of modestly priced gold earrings should be.

My mouth crowns open as everything begins to make sense. I begin to laugh, then cry, then I apologize for the way I was never going to see him again but he asks me to wait. I say, "pocket petting, scared, worried." I think of all the perverted pocket padding this poor man did to ensure the ring hadn't fallen out, all the up and down and walking ahead so he could check to be sure the ring was still in the pocket. The poor sweet man.

The rest of the evening splits into a surreal memory. I remember staring at the ring in the moonlight (really ... it was a full moonlit night) and being so very surprised. I marvel at the planning he did from abroad and the secrecy of the night and the chance that he took. We had never discussed marriage, I could have said no.

Later that night, as I finally held his long sought after hand, I asked him to tell me the reason he had decided to propose in that way, with me not suspecting a thing. He answered, "If you knew it was coming, where's the romance in that? I wanted you to remember, always, whether you said yes or no, I wanted you to be remember."

Which I do, in more than just receiving the ring, but in him, and who he was, and how he made this plan of marriage more than a proposal, but a gesture of showing what I meant to him.

And his reason is why this picture exists, showing me as a Mrs., when just hours earlier that birthday evening, I thought that he would be returning me home, vowing to stay a Miss.



My response that night, through grateful tears of relief: "Oh, thank God, I thought you were crazy." Which is, Yes.

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