This is My Body, This is My Blood

Healthy Until Proven Sick

There was a rule in our house that went something like this: Unless you puke, pass out, have a visible (to others) rash, or your fever is over 100 degrees, you're going to school/church/whatever you're trying to get out of doing. For some unknown reason it was automatically assumed we were faking if we complained of not feeling well. We even had a name for it: Falsey Judas (pronounced folzee judiss) I'm sure there was some biblical correlation but it was lost on me. Still is. Probably why the whole Baptist thing didn't stick. But what did follow me into my adult life was that somehow acknowledging sickness is a weakness. A bad thing. And I am guilty of accusing my own children of faking illnesses. Not that they never did it, but I felt like shit those times the school called to ask why I sent my sick kid to classes.

In all fairness, I've held myself up to the rule, refusing to take to my bed or visit a doctor unless I can't manage to stand without falling over. It's not a martyr thing. If it were I'd be bragging about doing <insert job> even though I can barely function. No, I do the opposite. I hide how bad I'm feeling. Which is probably why the ER nurses were shocked that my ex-husband had dropped me off at the hospital with cracked ribs--when I was seven months pregnant--and I acted like it was perfectly fine for him to dump me off at the door. What's a few cracked ribs when people are dying in other rooms?

I divorced that man, but in a twist of irony, ended up marrying B, who is a bit of a hypochondriac. Not that he was sick a lot, just paranoid about getting sick. Any little skin blemish was probably melanoma. An elevated PSA guaranteed prostate cancer. If he forgot something he instantly assumed he was doomed to Alzheimer's. The guy had more doctors than I have teeth. So when he complained of allergies I pictured Felix Unger--the ultimate anal retentive honking/snorting/sneezing wimp from The Odd Couple. And I completely discounted B's symptoms as blown out of proportion (if you'll excuse the pun).

Enter the Karma King in the form of some unknown pollen that suddenly decided to waft its way into my universe after never having had so much as a single dot after rolling in poison ivy. Over the past few weeks I've nearly scratched my eyeballs out trying to assuage the constant prickling. I wake with my nose stuffed fuller than a grocery bag on dollar day at the Goodwill. My blotchy wet face looks like I just watched Brian's Song, Beaches, and Philadelphia back to back with an Old Yeller chaser. And still I remained in denial.

M: You want some Benadryl?
Me: Huh? Naaaah. I'm fine.
M: You sure? I think your allergies are getting worse
Me: Ha-choo! Snort. Sniff. I don't have allergies. Never had 'em.
M: Uh, I think you've developed an allergy. Shall I change that pillow case?
Me: (peeling cheek away from where it's crusted to pillow) It's just a little cold or something. I'll be fine.
M: Whatever you say, Ellie. (Discreetly handing eyeball back to me.)

So I guess I owe B an apology for poo-pooing his allergy symptoms. But I swear I heard a chorus of voices whisper behind me as I swallowed those pretty pink pills this morning. Folzee Judisssss!

Mommy Python's Easter Leftovers

A couple days after Easter the butcher at Albertson's talked me into buying a big fat ham. "Only forty-nine cents a pound," he says. "I'll cut it into a couple manageable hams and seven or eight steaks."

"I really just need a pound of bacon."

"You sure? I bought two myself. Put em' in my freezer. That's a great price, miss."

"Okay. And one pound of bacon."

My oven quit working last month so I had to cut the hams into smaller ones in order to cook them in my toaster oven. Two weeks later I'm running out of recipes.Yesterday I felt a kind of deja-vu as I tried once again to insert ham into our daily menu....

M: Well, what've we got for breakfast?
Me: Well, we've got egg and ham; egg bacon and ham; egg bacon sausage and ham; ham, bacon, sausage and ham; ham egg ham ham bacon and ham; ham sausage ham ham bacon ham tomato and ham;
J (singing): Ham ham ham ham...
M: Have we got anything besides ham?
Me: Well, I can make ham egg sausage and ham, that's not got much ham in it.
M: I don't want ANY ham!  Why can't you make egg bacon ham and sausage?
Me: THAT'S got ham in it!
M: Hasn't got as much ham in it as ham egg sausage and ham, has it?
J: Ham ham ham ham...
M: Could you do the egg bacon ham and sausage without the ham then?
J: Lovely ham! Wonderful ham!
Me: Shut up!
J: Lovely ham! Wonderful ham!
Me: Shut up! Bloody teenagers! You can't have egg bacon ham and sausage without the ham.
M: I’m sick of ham!
J:  I'll have your ham. I love it. I'm having ham ham ham ham ham ham ham baked beans ham ham ham and ham!
Me: Shut up!! Baked beans are off limits for you.
J: Well could I have his ham instead of the baked beans then?
Me: Urggh! We still have half a ham and three ham steaks in the fridge.
J: (Singing elaborately...) Ham ham ham ham. Lovely ham! Wonderful ham! Ham ha-a-a-a-a-am ham ha-a-a-a-a-am ham. Lovely ham! Lovely ham! Lovely ham! Lovely ham! Lovely ham! Ham ham ham ham!

The dogs had a hell of a feast today.

Cleaving

She reached out to him, unable to curb the urge to stroke his face, run her fingers through the curls on my son’s head. Her seasoned hands lingered as she combed yet he held still under the weight of her longing and patiently allowed it. It was almost as if he recognized her need and became for one moment her boy. Her lost child.

R's son isn’t dead, nor is he missing. In fact he’s alive and well in New York where he teaches jazz to city kids while she moves from place to place trying to find her true home. But the truth is he is her home, the child who has outgrown the reaches of her arms. As mothers we are keenly aware of the inevitable separation from our children yet we also know that our wombs are not temporary containers, our breasts never empty, and our arms are not built for letting go. We may grow older, but we're not barren: it's just that in later years we mother from the outside in. Wasn’t it only days ago I passed a nursing mother in the park and felt my own bosom swell with the memory of those nourishing moments?

Skin never forgets.

I stood silently as R caressed J’s head, not wanting to intrude on what was a very private moment between this mother and my child. I recognized the sadness in her tender touch and felt it as my own, knowing my turn will come all too soon. Watching my beloved son, my last child, unmoving beneath her needful hands, I know that the separation when it comes, will be unbearable.

For now I bask in his powerful light and hope that someday I, too, will find borrowed children willing to bear the weight of my lingering hands through their hair and upon their faces when I can no longer reach him.

Foaming at the Mouth

I'm doing it again. I always eventually end up rehooked on the stuff but every once in a while I feel a need to swear off my precious albeit expensive daily habit. My current  dry out attempt comes on the tail, uh, actually the head of a morning when I woke feeling like my skull was a bloated pimple locked between two giant teenage thumbs. Yeah, it was that bad. All that suffering due to drinking my second latte too early the previous day, thereby creating a caffeine-starved headbanger by sunrise the next morning. Call me a hothouse flower (M does) but as much as I love my coffee, I'm way too sensitive to its effect on my body to indulge in the stuff.

I hate giving it up. Not just because I love coffee, I love the ritual. Grinding the beans, measuring the grounds, foaming the milk, wearing the sexy white mustache as I crawl back into bed to check my email. Tea just doesn't do it for me. Or chai. Or yerba mate'. And decaf seems like such an oxymoron.

Sigh.

So in order to cheer myself up, I've decided to shop around for what I can buy with money saved from not supporting the $11.00 a pound beans I go through every ten days or so. That's $33 per month, not counting visits to Starbucks. Add those in and we're up to about $50 a month or $600 a year. Just think.  I could buy a lovely pouch and still have money left over to get His and Hers matching suits in case Dubya is re-elected. Or I could buy a swing and a cool outfit. (NOT worksafe!) Maybe I'll order one of these for everyone on my Christmas list and feng shui my house with some origami and bonsai .  Or I could just save it all for a rainy day.

In the meantime, I'm eyeing that bottle of Vicodin left over from my surgery that I never used. I say it's time to pop this throbbing zit in style.

Angels Here Now

We are, each of us angels with only one wing; and we can only fly by embracing one another. --Luciano De Crescenzo

A few years ago I told a dear friend that my only god is wonder. I still consider that to be true. Yet despite my agnostic tendencies, I do believe in angels. Not the kind with haloed heads who announce messianic births or save humans by reaching through the flimsy membrane of afterlife to pluck them from certain death. I'm talking about those who have reached through the tender veil of my heart and plucked me from uncertainty itself. People like Anthony, who ask the kind of questions that force me to think (and who better start writing again soon or I'll kick his toga-wearing ass). People like M who believe that love is its own reward, generously rewarding me with his. People like I, in whose laughter I've nearly drowned. And people like J, who called on Easter morning to say she was thinking of me, knowing what it once meant, what it no longer means.

J and I grew up under different cloaks of religion, but both our young lives were heavily influenced by men who hid behind a thin curtain of theology. She walked the Halls of Kingdom while I sweated under Tents of Revival. Our fathers were holy men whom we loved deeply, though each of us eventually lost our respective religions*. Though we hadn't yet met, J and I both refused to swallow spoon-food doctrines that included shaming and condemnation. Each of us walked away from religion in our teens to begin a private search for that which is sacred. We didn't yet know we would someday recognize it in each other. Or find it in ourselves.

When I was a child, Easter was the day my dad gleefully shouted, "He is risen!" from his place on the pulpit. Pastel-robes sang amens and hallelujahs in perfect refrain to my fathers praises while they patiently waited their turn to shine. Although the congregation always enjoyed their pastor's Easter sermon more than the fist-pounding, hellfire and damnation lectures, it was the latter that filled collection plates to overflowing. Guilt fetches a high price but so does a new Easter ensemble. Tithe envelopes were lighter, thanks to people shelling out shiny J.C. Pennies for the annual Easter Fashion Show.

One of the things I most loved about Easter was that every year Mom sewed six new dresses to match her own. Not quite as nice as store bought, but at least no one else had worn them before and that was something in a family our size. I got a new bonnet as well, though often it was recycled from the previous year, whereby the elastic cut a line under my chin. (Several if I got too close to N, who would snap the string like a Wiley Coyote Acme slingshot before I could get away.)

But the best part of Easter wasn't the new outfit. It wasn't the coloring books we received in Sunday School either--I preferred the huge green fronds we got the Sunday before, which we'd bring home to take turns on the sofa as queen while our sisters obediently fanned us. It wasn't the ham dinner, eaten on the "good china" with utensils usually saved for company. It wasn't even the colored eggs we were allowed to paint--as long as we renounced the Evil Pagan Bunny and his profane insult to the celebration of Jesus' resurrection. No, the best thing, what I loved most about Easter, was by far the music. Happy songs like Break Forth, O Beauteous Heavenly Light, Christ the Lord is Risen Today, Alleluia! and my absolute all-time favorite church song, Up From the Grave He Arose! I sang louder on Easter than any other Sunday of the year, belted those hymns like nobody's business, despite N whispering at me to tone it down lest the whole cemetery rise up to join Jesus, sinners and all.

God forbid.

I sometimes blame my recurring low-grade depression on the feeling I get when I'm no longer able to imagine a net of faith to catch me if I fall from the daily highwire I walk. No one to pray to other than my dead relatives. No Rising Star to save me from my sins. Not that I fault my upbringing for creating a disdain toward organized religion--frankly the multitude of deities and mythology handed down throughout the centuries is awe inspiring. I'm fascinated by the way people claim their god is the biggest, strongest, most powerful--and the onliest. But just like the Easter Bunny, there came a day when I no longer believed in an almighty god* who ordered children slain or chose sides between men at war any more than I believed in a god that would choose to heal one person and not another, despite both having prayed in equal doses of unbridled devotion.

For a while I tried swapping my Old Time religion for a New Age religion, but it still boils down to giving my power away to some unknown, unscientific thing rather than be accountable for my own life.

Which is why I choose to believe in angels that are here, now. People like J, for instance. Lots of girlfriends have come and gone in the last 40 years and only two have remained steadfast in our mutual love for one another regardless of time, distance, or the interweave of romantic relationships. J is one of them. To reach for her in my darkest moments and feel her loving presence is to touch the face of god. I'll take that soft human cheek, that warm hand, that soothing voice, over an empty tomb any day. Because this savior is real, and for me, the only who has ever made me believe I could fly.

*Please know that I respect your right to your beliefs do not fault you for having them, so please don't leave comments damning me to hell or trying to convert me. If there is an afterlife, my Dad is already at God's feet, begging mercy upon my wretched soul. (You can bless me when I sneeze, though--I happen to like that little ritual.)

Hairy Conniption

I think it was Jack Kornfield who said, "If it'll be funny later, it's funny now." I wish I'd remembered his advice last week before I had my little snit in Fantastic Sams. Or, at the very least, while I was in the midst of it.  Maybe then I wouldn't have ripped the black plastic cape from around my neck and flung it, then stormed out of the salon with hair that was still wet on one side, partially blown-dry on the other.  And maybe I would have had the sense not to promise I'd tell you about it now that I've had a chance to reflect on my little tantrum.

The thing is, I'm not normally someone who goes around making a scene. I don't send overcooked steaks back to the kitchen, flip off people who cut in front of me on the freeway, or get upset over a whole carton of spilled milk, let alone a few drips. I'm one of those sickening polite people who make nice at four-way stops and tip waiters and waitresses extra when I notice the reason I got poor service is because management gave them too many tables at once and everyone else is harassing them.

So what happened? Well, it may have had something to do with the fact that I was a teensy bit stressed, trying to edit 40 chapters in the time it normally takes me to do ten. Or that J was home on Spring Break and I couldn't pry him away from his computer to spend five minutes with me. Or maybe my Inner Bitch was just sick and tired of being nice, popped out when I was paying attention to my hair instead of her.

Normally I go to Pierre for cuts, but he charges $50--ten dollars a minute-- for the time it takes him to magically whip my fine hair into a fabulously layered bob. That's a lot of money, no matter how I try to rationalize it by reminding myself I don't spend money on Cable or drive an S.U.V. and I shop for clothes at thrift stores. But it was still more money than I had to spare this month, so I decided a little in-betweener trim at Fantastic Sams wouldn't hurt, in a just-this-once kind of way.

Here's where budgetary constraints stepped in front of common sense, as would have been apparent to any other person who walked into the salon and asked who was best with razor cuts, only to be met with blank stares.

"I only use scissors," said one of three girls chatting in their chairs.

I suppose I should have been concerned by the fact that there were no customers in those chairs, but instead I just stood there. One of stylists disappeared into a back room and returned a few minutes later with Goth Girl, an overdyed black-haired young woman with more piercings in her face than orifices. Orifi?

But she was holding a razor, so I took that as a good sign.

Me: So you're good with razors?

She: Yeah.

Me: I'm looking for someone who's confident with razor cuts, knows how to work with fine hair. I have that
Meg Ryan kind of cut, see? (Just making sure she knew I was referring to hair, not wrists.)

She: I can do that.

Me: Okay, then.

She: You want me to shampoo you?

Me:( Puzzled look.)

She: It's included in the price.

Me: I know...I was just wondering how you'd cut dry hair with a razor.

She: (Shrugs)

You can tell a lot about a person by the way they touch you. Ever shared a handshake that felt like squeezing a dead fish? Well, that was Goth Girl. One of the reason's I pay Pierre an ungodly sum for haircuts is because his boyfriend, Pauly, gives great head--an invigorating shampoo that's right up there with good sex and great massage in terms of physical satisfaction. GG, as I now like to call her, acted as if she were mixing vomit into my hair by the way she barely touched my head. It was over faster than sex with a parolee on his first day out of prison.

When Pierre cuts my hair he does it quickly, but every single movement is precise. He parts my hair in a hundred different directions, snipping, fluffing, turning, razoring. He's Edward Scissorhands dancing with my blond head in a haze of dizzy-dazzling  perfection. GG, on the other hand, was more like cave woman, lightly lifting hunks here and there, chopping with no apparent attachment to outcome, though not in a Buddhist kind of way. More like an I-don't-know-what-the-fuck-I'm-doing kind of way.

"So, how long have you been doing hair?" I asked as she poked around my head unenthusiastically.

"A long time. I've only been here two months but I got out of beauty school practically a year ago."

She snipped off a HUGE shock of hair, leaving my pointy left ear completely exposed. I watched in the mirror, horrified.

"I think that's short enough," I said. "I only wanted a trim, remember?"

She set down her razor. "Okay. You want me to blow-dry you?"

"It would look better, don't you think?"

Again with the shrug.

Sometime during the next several minutes--it's all a blur to me now--I began to seethe. I was pissed that she'd lied about her abilities and more pissed that she hadn't listened to me. But what really pissed me off, was that I'd been stupid enough to sacrifice my self-worth for the sake of $35 measly dollars, a mere drop in the bucket when compared to how good a fabulous haircut can boost one's confidence. And how terrible a bad haircut can make you feel, based on the way The Bitch tore off that cape, leapt from the chair, crying, "This was a huge mistake! My hair...it looks..God, look at it! I've got to get out of here, now!" At which point I ran out (although being the nice person I am, threw $15 at the receptionist on my way past her).

I drove home with half-wet hair, intermittently crying, screaming, sulking. I went straight to J's room and demanded he turn off his computer for five fucking minutes and talk to me because I needed to vent goddamnit. He turned around in his chair and listened patiently as I told him what happened. Then he said exactly the right thing, in the exact tone of voice, not a bit condescending which, if he had, I think I would have imploded on the spot.

"Mom, you're hair actually looks good. I think you should finish drying it. You know--style it yourself how you like it.'

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"I suppose I could try." When I stood he snuck a glance at his monitor but quickly looked back at me. "Thanks for listening, kiddo. I feel better now. Sorry I had such a fit."

"Mom, that wasn't a fit. Throwing chairs, cursing, threatening to shove a blow dryer where the sun doesn't shine, that's a fit. And I would have paid good money to see that--especially coming from someone with a Compassion Badge on her Girl Scout sash. What you had was merely an episode."

He was right. Jack Kornfield, too. My hair turned out okay (not great, but not like I have to wear a hat every day, either) and I ended up laughing about it by the third retelling. Plus, I figure by the time it grows back I'll have the $50 bucks socked away in order to see Pauly & Pierre, neither of whom I'll tell this story because they'd never forgive me for whoring around at Fantastic Sams between visits. I haven't even forgiven myself yet.

Forgave Goth Girl, though. That was the easy part.

Both Ends Burning

Sorry, folks. I'm working on a deadline to get a manuscript out the door by the end of the week, so won't be posting until it's done. If you're so inclined, light a candle for me that the recipient of said 340 pages loves what she reads. Thanks for your patience..I'll be back next week. Ellie

Gone Fishin'

Sorry, folks. I'm working on a deadline to get a manuscript out the door by the end of the week, so won't be posting until it's done. Thanks for your patience.

I'll be back next week with a story about a certain person who had a little, shall we say "meltdown" in a certain not-so-fantastic salon yesterday. Ellie

Butt Out

I don't remember when I started backing out of the bedroom rather than let my (ex) husband see my rear quarters in bright daylight, but I do remember when the Keister Complex was first planted in my mind. And I blame two of my sisters for first hoeing the row... We pedaled our bikes to Babbling Brook, a creek that ran under the road about a half-mile from our house, so named because of the sound it made as the water tumbled out of the culvert into a small pool, which fed into a meandering creek. N rode out front on her shiny blue three-speed.  Dad had bought her the new Schwinn from Postema’s Hardware store.  I think he got it for her because she looked after V and me and was like a second mother to our little brother, D, ever since our Mom had gotten sick.  D’s crib was moved into N’s bedroom and he became almost a permanent appendage on her thirteen-year-old bony hip. But on this particular summer Saturday, one of the church families had taken the baby for the afternoon. A yellow bucket dangled from my handlebars, banging against my thigh as the three of us rolled out for our frog-a-thon; a contest to see who could catch the most frogs. My bike was a yard sale bargain I’d painted completely black with rustoleum, even the spokes, because I’d decided it’d look cool. I was wrong. With its flat black finish it looked as if I’d ridden it through the coal yard. Dad wouldn't spring for a second can a spray paint so I was stuck with one ugly-ass bicycle. Upon reaching our destination, we threw our bikes in the tall grass and readied for the contest, rolling up our pant legs.  The deal was, we'd score one point for a toad, since they’re so stupid and slow, two points for a green frog, and three points for the rarer leopard frog. V, quick as a snake’s tongue snatched up a frog before N and I were even in the creek.   Using my eagle vision, I spotted a pair of frog eyes peeking out above the shimmering surface and withing seconds had him clenched in my fist.  N, although four years older than me, wasn’t as fast as either of us.  By the time she caught her first toad, V and I each had another frog squirming frog in the other hand.  As we dropped the slimy amphibians into the plastic bucket we’d brought along, it suddenly occurred to us that we’d forgotten a cover to keep our catches from escaping. “Ellie, you sit on the bucket,” N suggested. At first I refused. “No way. Then I don’t get to catch any.” “Don’t worry, we’ll take turns.  You go first.” Realizing that last turn would give me the advantage of knowing how many I'd have to beat, I grudgingly lowered myself onto the bucket.  Imagine, if you will, having a litter of wet-nosed puppies jumping up...no propelled against your  nine-year-old ass every few seconds.  Every time N or V caught another frog, I’d carefully lean to one side while they quickly slipped it into the bucket.  It reminded me of how my dad would lean like that when he was driving the car and we’d all yell, “No, Dad, please, don’t! Oh, man, somebody roll down the window.” After half an hour of literally frog sitting, I got to where I could almost predict when and where the next frog would hit. And I was beginning to doubt my older sister's promise. “Hey, it’s my turn to catch some more," I complained as a nubby toad tried to weasel its way between my bare legs.  "V, you come sit on the bucket for a while.” Standing in the creek with her eyes squinted agains the sun's reflection, she ignored my request. “Sorry, I’m not wide enough, Big Butt.” N giggled. "Then I quit!”  I spat, starting to stand. “That’s okay,” N said, walking toward me.  “We’re sick of this anyway.” V counted the frogs as I released them back into the cool water. “Wow, seventeen!  That’s the most ever.” “Yeah,” agreed N, her hand on my back.  “And we couldn’t have done it without you."  I smiled, basking in my older sibling’s approval, then jumped on my hideous bike and started for home taking the lead with my strong legs. Behind me I heard them snicker at the wet spots on my generous backside, knowing I’d be the butt of this joke for a long time to come. And I was right.