Clay Satan

Between the ages of 6 and 12 Mormon children attend something called “Primary.” This is a sort of a baby scripture class for young children taught by volunteering sisters from the church, lovingly known as The Primary Ladies. When I was a kid, Primary was held one day a week at the ward house closest to your elementary school so you could just toodle on over there right after the last bell rang. This made things difficult for me as my church was in the opposite direction from my house. Going to Primary added a good 50 yards to my walk home.

I don’t know why it is that walking is such a difficulty for children. My own son will complain about walking from the car and up a flight of steps to the appartment and then spend the evening dancing like a maniac to Weird Al Yankovic. For me, school to my house was a whole 4 block hike up 9th street, but it might as well have been 4 miles. Even now, when I go to visit my folks, I drive up that street and muse that I probably could have held my breath all the way home if I tried. I can only surmise that I was just a lazy little bugger, with very short legs. On Primary day I would slug my way home, carrying a book bag topping out at 1 1/2 pounds, and be completely spent when I got there.

It could be too that I was spiritually spent from singing, “I Hope They Call Me on a Mission” and “Book of Mormon Stories” at the top of my lungs and making Easter bunnies from Styrofoam craft balls. Somewhere in there we may have actually been taught some stories from the Book of Mormon, but my memories are only of songs and crafts. I loved the song “Book of Mormon Stories” so much that I asked the song leader, every week, to include it in her selections. It had a kind of “Indian war drum” rhythm that I found irresistible. If she asked for requests during music time I would dislocate my tiny shoulder from throwing my arm up in the air to be called on.

“Yes, Wendy. What would you like to sing?” she would say drolly.

“Book of Mormon Stories!” I would chirp like a sparrow on Red Bull.

“Do you KNOW any other songs?” my friend Robbie Vann snapped at me one day.

I did not reply to this remark and chose to silently hate him instead. Normally, I would have slugged him in the arm or quipped back something stinging like, “Shut your fat mouth!” But Robbie had been deemed ‘off limits’ by the kids at my church and we were taking it easy on him for a while. You see, Robbie was in recovery from creating the biggest scandal my church had seen in years.

A few weeks before, our Primary class was in the midst of one of our most important craft projects of the year; The Mother’s Day Presents. This year was the most involved craft that we had seen yet in our young lives because we were charged with making our presents from clay. Not that Sculpy air-dry stuff but real, no fooling, pottery clay that needed to be fired, glazed and fired again before it was complete.

I’m not sure who the rocket scientist was who thought this would be a good project for 8 year old children because, if you’ve ever taken a high school pottery class, you know that clay is very tricky stuff. There are about fifty reasons why your pot could explode when it’s being fired…and they are all your fault. In addition to setting us all up for tear filled failure, said rocket scientist also put Sister Hosh in charge. Not much can be said about her other than she was mean and hated children, especially her own.

This was a four week project because of the various steps and I set out to make my mom a nice ring dish for her dresser. My best friend Lori was a bit more ambitious and decided to make a salad bowl. In the end almost all of us settled on various bowl items because this was a shape that we were all quite familiar with and confident we could achieve. We were told to mold the clay around another bowl to get the shape right. Those of you who have had pottery classes know what happened next. With exception of one, every one of our presents exploded in the first firing.

When we came back in the second week we found none of our own soulful creations but a whole bunch of lopsided, hastily ‘thrown’ pieces that Sister Hosh had made herself upon discovering that none of our stuff had survived in the kiln. We glazed these items half heartedly, with tears streaming down our faces. I painted a little smiling face in the bottom of my bowl in an attempt to put my mark on it somehow, and make it special. It didn’t work.

The one item that inexplicably survived the first firing, as well as the barrage of flying chunks of clay from the exploding bowls, belonged to poor Robbie Vann. Rather than making a salad bowl or ring dish, he fancied his mother would enjoy a nice little molded statue of……the Devil.

Why Sister Hosh saw fit to put Robbie’s little devil in the kiln and go though with the firing process, is a question that will go down with the ages. Surely, she saw what he had made. She couldn’t have doubted what it was because, really, it was quite well done; little horns, malevolent expression, it was all there. Could it be she didn't notice? Or could she have been such a sour soul that she wanted that little boy to hand his mommy a statue of Satan on Mother’s Day? My money is on the latter.

Nevertheless, while the rest of us set to work glazing, the Primary Ladies stood staring at Robbie’s creation trying to decide what to do.

“Well, obviously, it should be destroyed!” Sister Hosh blurted as if seeing the thing for the first time.

“Well, hang on Virginia.” Said Sister Bowcutt, my all time favorite Primary Lady, “I’d like to talk to Dick about this first. I think his dad should talk to Robbie about this before it’s…taken care of. I don’t think he did this…well…on purpose.”

“Why does it have to be destroyed?” Robbie said jumping up from the lame-ass bowl that had been foisted on him. “Don’t throw it away! It took me forever to make!”

Just then, Bishop Call walked in. He was a big man with a perpetual tan and white streaks of hair on his temples, just like Mr. Fantastic from The Fantastic Four. He was the king-daddy of our ward and he stopped by to see how things were going. He often did this on Primary Day so he could talk to the kids and maybe sing a song with us. “Book of Mormon Stories” was his favorite song too, and for this, I loved him.

The women descended upon him and they held a whispered conference while the Bishop examined the Wee Clay Satan. The children stopped glazing and watched the adults. I looked at Robbie and saw that the tears had started. The Bishop was in on it now and I’m sure Rob thought he was permanently barred from the Celestial Kingdom for whatever it was he had done. The whispering stopped and Bishop Call turned to all of us.

“Hi Guys!” he said with a big grin and he walked among us as David walked among his lambs. “Ohhh, I think your mom will love that, Christine. What a pretty color you chose, Lori.”

He stopped, gazed into Robbie’s anxiety ridden eyes and spoke softy. “I’m gonna take this with me Buddy. I think your mom will really enjoy the bowl your making.”

“I didn’t make this!” Robbie said petulantly. “I want to give Mom my Devil!”

Bishop Call put his big hand on Robbie’s shoulder and managed to keep a straight face.

“I know, Son. But, I’m going to take this with me, okay?”

“Okay.” Robbie said, bowing his head.

As Bishop Call left I heard Robbie speak quietly into his lame-ass bowl. “I just don’t know what’s wrong with my devil.”

Neither did the rest of us, really. I’m happy to say that, at that point, no one had told us any frightening tales of Satan and his ultimate plan to hose us all out of getting to Heaven. All I really knew of the Devil was that my big brother had a blow-up plastic pillow sporting a little red guy with horns and a pitch fork and the words, ‘The Devil Made Me Do It!’ I figured the Devil was just really bossy. It could have said, 'The Devil Made Me Do the Hokey Pokey!' and I would not have known the difference.

Poor Robbie. As all the children went home and told the tale of his Mother’s Day gift, we all became aware of the severity of making Satanic Pottery at church. Most of the adults took it well and probably got a laugh out of the story. Others did not and there were very public discussions of “what was wrong with that child.” I know that Robbie’s parents took it in stride because I heard his father, a prominent art professor at the local university, comment to Bishop Call on what a “good eye” Robbie had for physical proportion.

Despite his dad’s encouragement, Robbie took the whole thing really hard. He was quiet and sullen for many weeks as his story was told over and over and, I’m sure, embellished by some of the nastier kids. It didn’t help that he was shaping up to be quite the spiritual power house in our area. When we were in high school he was one of the most seriously Mormon guys I knew and was chomping at the bit to get out into the Mission Field to make more Mormons.

One day, in senior choir class, I callously reminded him of the incident.

“Hey Rob, remember when you made your mom that clay Satan in Primary?” I bellowed.

“Yes.” He said, steely eyed and looking like he wished I had exploded in the kiln with all of the “proper” pottery.

Like me, Robbie’s relationship with The Church didn’t survive in his adult years. He is a published author now with, I think, two novels. I’m waiting though for his definitive biography of his own childhood as a Mormon. Maybe he’ll call it, “Never Make Your Mother a Clay Satan.”

No. I think Erma Bombeck already wrote that book.

I'm With The Band

I have a personal policy to never go any where on St. Patrick’s Day, or what I have come to call St. Drunken Asshole’s Day. Living my life in an Irish theatre company and in the midst of some serious Celtophiles, I have lots of healthy exposure to real, honest-to-gosh Irish-ness without being puked on by a co-ed in a bar. And my mother’s name is McCann, so I feel like I have a legitimate claim in the current fashionable love of things Irish. I have even found that the St. Patrick’s Day wearing of whatever-green-thing-you-can-get-your-hands-on offends my legitimate Irish a little. Being a bit of a godless heathen I even feel a little offended that St Patrick has his own day. I mean, the man was a real tool.

Setting all that aside, I think it is a happy thing that for one day of the year, everyone wants to be Irish. Originally, the “wearin’ of the green” got you strung up in the nearest tree by the British army, but, luckily, that doesn’t happen anymore, at least not in West L.A. Yes, West L.A., dangerously close to the UCLA campus! That is where I went for St. Drunken Asshole’s Day, so feel free to shake your head and chuckle self-righteously.

“Why would she do such a foolish thing?” you say to yourself imagining me quaffing green beer, wearing a green marabou bobble headband and a t-shirt that says, Everyone Loves an Irish Girl.

Well My Friends, welcome to my new weirdness: Josh is in a Celtic rock band.

At 42 years old, I have become a band girlfriend and I hardly know what to do with myself. Not only is Josh in this band, but he is Slugger O’Toole’s chief hotness factor, which means I get the added pleasure of standing in the crowd and listening to the women do a nastiness inventory of the guys in the band.

“These guys are effin’ awesome and totally cute! That one guy could, like, be my uncle, but that guy on the end (Josh) is totally hot! Check out the guns on the (Josh) bass player!”

This was an actual conversation I overheard at Molly Malone’s on St Patrick’s Day at Slugger O’Toole’s very first pro gig... AT MOLLY MALONE’S, ON ST. PATRICK’S DAY! If you live in L.A., then you may know what an institution Molly’s is. If you don’t, then just take my word for it and understand that’s why I had to be there, for my man.

Slugger wasn’t booked to play until 6pm, but the live acts were starting at noon and the bar opened at 8 am. (Hey, it was a Saturday!) Just to be on the safe side, Melissa, Kati, Robyn, Andrea and I got there at 2 pm. Yes, these are stout hearted women and I love them for being there with me. I had tried to excuse them from the madness, but Melissa would have none of it. She wanted to go and she even drove us, bless her!

We got to the bar, and the place was wall to wall drunken humanity. Single file, the five of us elbowed our way to the back of the bar and through the little hallway that leads to Molly Malone’s stage room. It was a big shotgun hall with a sizable stage at the far end. We stood there for a moment, mouths agape at all the twenty-somethings with their glasses of Guinness and neon ‘Come an’ git it!’ signs.

Melissa and Robyn hollered something about getting drinks and I hollered something about waiting right here to stake out some territory. Then suddenly, my friends were gone and I was standing there alone. I took a moment to look around and see what exactly we would be dealing with. The nice thing about being a sober woman in jeans and a t-shirt in the middle of a crowd of incredibly drunk women in mini-skirts is that you are rendered invisible. I was able to stare boldly into the horde without fear of being seen or engaged in any way. That is, until I accidentally made eye contact with a sodden young man standing against the wall. In a flash, he was by my side.

“Hi, I’m Brendon!” he said offering his hand.

“Rebecca,” I said in my best old-enough-to-be-your-mom voice.

“St. Patrick’s Day hug!” he yelled, and I found myself in his arms, feeling very grateful for Tag spray.

He let me go and took a respectful step back. “I’ve been drinking since 8 o’clock this morning, Rebecca. I’m sorry.”

“I’m not judging you Brendon,” I said, judging him.

I found out in the next minute or two that Brendon was 23 and from Texas. I then met his friend Mike, whom he had met 20 minutes prior to meeting me. They inquired as to why I was alone and I quickly told them that I was not actually alone and that my FIANCE was playing in one of the bands; A band girlfriend! Whew hooo! This piqued their interest and we moved into a shouted conversation about the day’s music. Just then, the girls came back, cavalry-like, and Melissa handed me a Guinness. All was well.

After about 40 minutes, a bowl of tasty Irish stew, and yet another Guinness, The Five Stout Hearted Women were feeling pretty good. Melissa had worked a deal with some people at a table, so as soon as they got up to leave, we slipped into their chairs like the little minxes we fancied ourselves to be.

Kati and I settled ourselves against the wall and drifted into a Jane Goodall like study of the fauna. We observed with much amusement as two mini skirt clad co-eds tried to dance provocatively to a Pogues song. Those girls were so sauced that any song in the world was going to sound like “Love Hangover” to them, poor things. A few moments later, another young lady, again in inexplicably tiny clothing, started making out with a guy she had just started speaking with. I commented to Kate that the guy could just do her right there and no one would be the wiser, including her. We both looked away. We were not there to witness the unfolding of a cautionary tale.

After listening to a thoroughly unremarkable band that shall remain nameless, I decided to check the time on my cell phone and saw that I had missed two calls from Josh. I jumped up, squeezed through the maul and made my way to the back door. Molly’s had cleverly set up a makeshift “back porch” in the alley to house the extra porta-potties and the smokers. I called Josh who was at one last Slugger rehearsal before the gig.

“Hi!” he said anxiously, “I just wanted to check in and get a bead on things. What’s it like there?”

“Insane,” I said. “We’re having fun though.”

“Good! You got in okay?”

“Only just,” I said stepping over a gentleman who was lying down on the pavement. “The line is going down the block now. The door guy was nice and let us in without charging Kati a cover. When he looked at my driver’s license he was really happy that he and I were both born in ’65. He must have felt a kinship.”

“How are the other bands?”

“Not very good,” I said. “Good musicians with no stage presence. I’m a little bored, so I think I’ll get drunk now.”

“Um, be careful,” He said. “I’m really glad you’re there. We’ll see you soon. I love you.”

On my way back in, there was a ridiculously drunk girl in a green feather boa, leaning against the door way. She was trying to light a cigarette and was in danger of burning off her eye lashes instead. Like the good citizen I am, I reached out and held her hand up to the tip of the cigarette so she could light up. As she took a grateful drag and shoved her lighter into her purse, I realized that she hadn’t even clocked that I was there or that I had actually touched her. Be careful, indeed.

Robyn, Kati and I did a little step dancing to a folk group called Western Shore. Rather, Kati and Robyn did some real dancing and I did the two steps I know. A few people tried to join us but it’s hard to step dance with a buzz on. After meeting the feather boa girl, I switched to water.

When Slugger O’Toole finally arrived they were ushered in a door at the back of the stage. When the boys walked onto the stage, they were met by the sight of a crowd that had doubled since I had gotten there. Bug-eyed, they set down their guitars and started to plug in. I waved Josh down and he came to the edge of the stage for a quick kiss.

“Good Luck!” I hollered.

“Oh my god!” he hollered back.

I jumped up on a bench against the wall so I could take in the whole scene. It looked like the entire crowd had poured from the rest of the bar into the stage area, and for the first time that day, they had all pressed up to the stage. It was incredible. They were all behaving as if the knew the band, as if they were there to see Slugger O’Toole. I half expected to see “I love Slugger” t-shirts in the crowd. Up on the stage I could see that the guys were just as shocked.

Kati looked up at me, “Where the hell did all these people come from?”

I shrugged and yelled at her to give me her camera. I had to take some shots of the crowd.

When Slugger O’Toole started to play it was clear that they were exactly what the crowd had been waiting for all day. They opened with ‘Haul Away Joe,’ one of the great drunken pub songs of all time. The crowd was on their knees with joy and beer. My friends were standing at the edge of the stage clapping and singing, the mini-skirt co-eds were behind them trying to dance provocatively, and I was standing above it all snapping pictures of the band and their new fans. Josh looked over and smiled at me as I took his picture.

I'm a band girlfriend! Whew hoooooo!

The ol' Razzie-Dazzle

Last night, I committed a cardinal sin in the doctrinal scheme of L.A.: I drove into Hollywood…the Thursday day before The Academy Awards. If you are a reader in the L.A. area, you are now clutching at your temples and whimpering, “No. Oh sweet mercy, no. Why would you do such a thing?” If you are a reader outside of the L.A. area, then you are saying, “Oooooooooh, did you get to see any of the big gold statues???”

The answer to the latter question is; yes! You can’t help but see the big gold statues because you are stuck on Highland for at least 30 minutes…right at the Kodak Center. Not only can you see the big gold statues, but you can jump out of your car and graffito your name on the place where Oscar’s wiener would be…if he had one.

The answer to the former question is; I had to go into Hollywood because I am a presenter for The Golden Raspberry Awards, this Saturday at 7:30 pm, and we had rehearsal at the Historic Ivar Theatre. Did I get it all in there? I don’t know what makes The Ivar “historic,” but that’s what their press says. HISTORIC. Go fig.

What are The Golden Raspberry Awards, you ask? Well, first of all, start calling them “The Razzies” because I’m not the best typist in the world. The Razzies are the anti-Oscars. While the Academy Awards are striving to celebrate the good stuff in the film industry, The Razzies strive to cruelly lambaste the bad stuff in the film industry. To be more specific, The Razzies only attack the incredibly expensive bad stuff in the industry. J.B. Wilson, the nice man who created The Razzies 27 years ago, decided early on that he would never pick on the little ‘indie film’ guys, just the big ‘major studio’ guys who waste huge amounts of money on cinematic poo.

One of this year’s main Razzie Nominees, Little Man, brought to you by the same rocket scientists who came up with White Chicks, played on 3 screens at a cineplex while something wonderful, like Little Miss Sunshine, would play on one screen if you were lucky. Little Man made about $50 million in wide release, by the way. Oh, the humanity!

This is the kind of mind boggling injustice The Golden Raspberries seek to eradicate…with big, sharp, pointy teeth.

Certain actors who consistently make bad decisions, and consistently demand mega-millions for doing so, are lovingly known as Razzie Whipping-boys. Nicholas Cage is currently shaping up to be the new gold plated whip-ee, what with Wicker Man last year and now, whoa mommy, Ghost Rider. Sly Stallone has more Razzie nominations than anyone else in Hollywood, but my all time favorite Razzie Beeee-atch has got to be Ben Affleck.

When Benny-boy won his Razzie for Gigli, he immediately, and inexplicably, went on Larry King Live and bragged about it. J.B. Wilson happened to be watching and had time to quickly messenger Affleck’s Razzie statuette over to the CNN studios, so he could get it while on the air with Larry. (You know how loooong those interviews are.) Well, when they handed the statue to Ben he looked it over and commented that it looked “kinda cheap.”

Well, duh, Ben. The Razzies awards are made by J.B. in his kitchen for about $3.95. ‘Cheap’ is the chief principal of the Razzie code of honor. If J.B. gave us, say, Round Table pizza at rehearsal instead of, say, Pizza Hut pizza, we would all feel like complete sell-outs!

Well, like so many other “winners” before him, Ben decided he would not actually take his Golden Raspberry home. Being the marketing foxy-fox that he is, J.B. contacted CNN, picked up the statue and sold it on E Bay for something like $2500. How brilliant is that?

That is the perfect illustration as to why, although none of us are paid a dime for it, the same people return year after year to perform and present at the Razzie Awards. We love J.B. Wilson and everything he stands for. Have the Razzies made him rich? Oh my, no. He has a great book out chronicling 25 years of bad movies that probably brings some scratch in. Buy it, won’t you? It’s on Amazon.com and the Razzie website, http://www.razzies.com/. (Hell, just go to the website, it’s a good time.) And next time you go to your Netflix account, notice that you can actually run a search for Razzie winners and nominees! Notice how many Razzie flicks Ben Affleck has been in! (Oh fine, he was really good in Hollywood Land, damn him.)

If you watch the MSN.com pod cast tomorrow, you will see me in a pretty dress my mom bought for me. Gracias, Mommy! On second thought, please watch the pod cast because I only look that way one day a year! So, watch it. WATCH THE FREAKIN’ POD CAST!!!

My friend Andrea, an actress who has never won, or even been nominated for a Razzie, loaned me those earrings, by the way. Thanks, baby!

I Don't Like Spiders and Octopi

I have two important safety tips for you, Gentle Readers:

Never read a Natural History magazine while eating dinner.

Never, EVER, let your eight year old son read an article about Whip Spiders.

As to the first safety tip you’re thinking, “Why not? What’s the big deal with the Natural History magazines? Seems a good way to expand one’s knowledge of the natural world, actually.”

Well, smarty pants, I should let you know that Natural History magazines contain pictures of giant octopi eating sharks…head first. Unless you have seen a picture like this before, you have no idea how scary that image is. I would like to contend that no one on the face of the Earth needs to know how scary that image is! Don’t get me wrong, I am a big fan of the natural world. I have been known to actually visit the natural world periodically, when I can find my way out of L.A. and, honestly, I am seldom disappointed by it. But I don’t need to know that a Giant Octopus can eat a shark head first. I don’t need to know that a Giant Octopus can eat a shark at all. My basic understanding that Giant Octopi eat will suffice, thank you.

Octopi turn bright freakin’ red when they eat sharks head first, did you know that? Scarlet! The unfortunate shark in my magazine must have really pissed off Mr. Octopus to deserve what he was getting in that picture, let me tell you.

That octopus was all like, “You piss me off and I’m going to eat your head now. In fact you made me so angry, I’m gonna turn crimson-damn-red so that everyone around here will know that I am eating your fool head! How do you like them apples, Mr. Jaws? Peter Benchly could kiss my ruby red ass, if I had one!” *crunch, crunch*

Now to our second safety tip: Never, ever, let your eight year old son read an article about Whip Spiders.

Do I even need to tell you that the same damn nature mag was responsible for this incident as well? Probably not. In fact, I will go so far as to say that Whip Spiders are going right to the short list of ‘Things From the Natural World That Nobody Needs to Freakin’ Know About.’

My poor boy didn’t need to know. My son did not need to know that Whip Spiders are out there…waiting patiently for a chance to enter his bedroom in the dead of night and spoon up behind him in bed. It is of no consequence to him that Whip Spiders do not live on the North American Continent. No, it is of no consequence that they live in Australia because THERE’S ONE NOW, ON THE BEDROOM WALL!

Did you know that Whip Spiders get their name from their elongated, worm-like body shape - up to about 20 mm long, but only about 1 mm wide? They are common in forest habitats and can readily be seen in gardens on summer nights, suspended on delicate silk lines in spaces among shrubbery. They specialize in feeding on wandering spiders, usually juveniles. The Whip Spider sits at the top of a few long silk threads that run down below it among foliage. When a wandering spider walks up one of these handy silk `bridges,' it gets a nasty surprise. The waiting Whip Spider uses toothed bristles on the end segment of the last leg to comb out swathes of entangling sticky silk from its spinnerets. These rapidly entangle the struggling victim so that it cannot escape.

So, you see, Whip Spiders eat the children of other spiders. Whip Spiders eat children. Nope, my son did not need that information.

If any of you are thinking, “Why did she let her kid read that article?” then you don’t have children.

Those of you who do have children are thinking, “Quit your bitchin’, he was reading!”

I have decided that Nature, in general, is unsuitable for reading material. All the nature we need to be aware of is happening in the cat box as we speak, and it needs to be disposed of. So put your shoes on, because we are going on safari to the trash shoot.

Keep an eye out for pissed off octopi.

Voice From the Grave

It’s definitely a mixed blessing, revving up the ole’ blog again. On the one hand, I have really missed it. I’ve felt empty about watching my site gather Ethernet dust. I felt real pangs when I received nice comments from people who stumbled onto it, started to read, and then realized the last post was, what, six months ago?

On the other hand, I have now succumbed to the bitch-slapping army that has been abusing me, calling me lazy and whining about being abandoned. Listen guys, I’m really happy you like the way I write, but when I started the blog, I made no promises about faithfulness. C’mon baby, don’t tie me down - that spoils the excitement. As bloggers go, I’m not the type who cuddles afterwards. I’m more the type who messes up your sheets and then buggers off if there ain’t nothin’ good in the fridge.

“Where, WHERE have you been?” you screech at your monitor.

Well, it’s a long story, but I’m anxious to make the whiney people sit through it, so here goes:

In September, I started rehearsal for a new play. It was hard because one of my fellow actors was really misbehaving during the process, and then REALLY misbehaving during the run of the show. It made for a difficult few months in the place I am most at home; my theatre. I was extremely angry, all the time. This was new for me, guys. I’m always happy at The Banshee and for the first time I was sitting in rehearsal imagining new ways of harming a fellow human being, not only because he (now you know it was a boy) was making things hard for me, but tripley hard for a couple of the other actors. He was playing on their insecurities and being, well, mean. You know, acting is difficult, filthy work, and the last thing an actor needs is another actor behaving like an utter dick. That and an STD, an actor doesn’t need that either.

I did let my artistic director know that it’s unlikely I will ever set foot on stage with that guy again, which could be difficult since he is our only “old guy” in the company. Oops, more indiscretion! Oh well.

And my doggy was sick. Yes, Charlotte, my remaining doggy, developed serious glaucoma in her left eye. I won’t go into the details, but I will share key words: veterinary ophthalmology, $$$$, surgery, failure, medications, insurance, ha, ha, no insurance, $$$$, more surgery, failure some more, suckers! , pain, more pain, one more surgery, $$$$$, blind after all, and cancel wedding.

The more astute readers amongst you will have noticed the words, “cancel wedding.” Well, Josh and I had decided to get married. We had a date, I bought a dress and pretty jewelry, we reserved the chapel (I know, I know), my dear friend Robyn volunteered -VOLUNTEERED- to be the wedding planner, and family had been notified. But after poor Charlotte’s eye saga, I broke down and called a halt to the whole thing. I just couldn’t see going on with the planning when I essentially had added to my personal debt by four grand. I had to let the girly, girly, girly-girl, that had sprung to life in me so suddenly, die with tears streaming down her cheeks and the words, ‘My dress, my pretty dress and veil…do I still get the ring? Arrrrg.’ on her lips.

Are we giving up? No. Will we reschedule? Sure. But I had also realized that I had gotten way ahead of the game. I had skipped over a sort of “organic” part of the marriage process in my enthusiasm, so we will just have to see how it all goes. The dress will keep and so will the jewelry…Robyn might not though. Perhaps I can cryogenically freeze her for a year or two, so she will still be fresh and willing. Hmmmmmmm.

Wanna hear the kicker? The day I told Josh I couldn’t go on with the whole thing, my shoes arrived. My lovely, ivory satin, sling backs with tiny sparkly buckles came in the mail…and they fit perfectly. I wore them around the apartment for half an hour and then put them away. Classic sling backs never go out of style, right? RIGHT???

Then it was Christmas….and that happened.

The Banshee is in production again with Henry the Fourth; Part One, but I bowed out in order to stay home and have some time with my son. He is as adorable as ever and killing me ever so slowly. But that is what our children do; they sweetly and lovingly suck the life out of us until we are dried out shells of our former selves. Then they eat us, like Doritos. It’s a good way to go, I think. Better than a tsunami.

Josh is in Henry though, so I see little of him right now. The upshot is that he’s had to grow his hair long... and he has a beard. He comes home from rehearsal all riled up because he has been sword fighting! He will, no lie, walk in the door, take his pants off and show me his fight choreography in his boxers. I sit on the couch as the music from The Pirates of the Caribbean begins to play in my head, and I wonder how I got so freakin’ lucky. I don’t know why he looses the pants as soon as he gets home; it’s just one of those things that make Josh, Josh. Besides, why the hell would I question something like that?!

So, there it is. Maybe I’m back, one post a week. Thanks for missing me, it was unexpected, really. I’m not making any promises though, so don’t leave a tooth brush here or anything.

Becky In The Straw-Redux

***I posted this story last year just after Thanksgiving and it turned out to be quite a hit. By way of apology to all of the readers out there who have been asking me where the hell I've gotten to, I re-post Becky In The Straw with my sincerest wishes that you all have a terrific and safe holiday. Don't give up on me, please.

My dad is a contractor. Not a “build a house” kind of contractor but a “do just about everything else” kind of contractor. Need ridiculous amounts of sheet metal ductwork? Talk to my dad. Need something torn down? Rebuilt? Refurbished? Talk to my dad. Need an electrical generator fixed, rebuilt, torn apart and put back together? Got one you wanna sell? Talk to my dad. In fact, my dad has the distinct honor of being known all over the Inter Mountain West as “That Guy In Utah Who Can Help You Out With Your Generator.”

When I worked in his industrial fastener shop, as a kid, every week someone was driving into the parking lot in a huge motor home, with tears in their eyes, looking for my dad who would then spend about an hour banging on the stock generator in said motor home. He usually sent them off, fixed-up and happy, without charging them a penny. Even now, at 80+ years old, my dad is toodling about Utah, Idaho and Montana, with my mom in tow, buying and selling generators to ranchers, farmers and private citizens who must have alternative power in the winter, or risk freezing to death.

I worked full time for my dad, that one point when I dropped out of college, and it was the happiest work experience of my life. I would sell nuts and bolts at the shop while dad and his small crew would build things, fix things and basically solve minor engineering problems for the common folk of Ogden. Mom would meet us for lunch at Ted’s Café and the three of us would split a piece of banana cream pie for desert. Life was very, very good.

When I was very small, maybe 8 or 9 years old, my dad would haul me all over the area to visit his regular clients, one of which had a turkey farm. To me, it was a fascinating place. There were vast fields of huge, mean, white turkeys, irrigation ditches with various forms of squishy wildlife dwelling in them and there was the processing plant. My dad must have done a good job at keeping me away from the actual slaughter-house because all I remember is the bologna and hot dog room. I used to sit in there for hours and watch the young men squirt liquid turkey goo into 6 foot long tubes for boloney. I wonder what those young men thought of me, sitting there on the stinky floor, silently watching the hot dog machine twist thousands of feet of turkey goo-tubes into wieners. They must have felt sorry for my dad, who had such incredible ability to keep those machines going and yet his little girl was born “simple.” Poor guy.

My brothers and sister have very different memories of the turkey farm. Leslie spent one hellish day working in the processing plant, a day that is not spoken of in my family. Poor Kelly spent hours inside of huge boilers, welding in the stench of "turkey-guts-past." This was after he had to clean them out. It’s a wonder that Kel can stomach turkey at all except that, I think, deep down, he likes seeing them dead and stuffed. It’s part of his healing process.

My pastoral view of Wight’s Turkey Farm came to an abrupt end one autumn when my dad took me with him to work on the pumping system that delivered water to the turkey enclosures. Dad was working on the wiring in one of the pump houses and the irrigation ditches were lifeless in the cold weather, so I got bored. I think it was after the fifth or sixth time I asked him if he was done yet that my dad came up with something that would keep me occupied.

It is important to note here that my father is not a cruel man. He is one of the sweetest and most “straight up” guys in the world. He is charitable and kind and he loved me then as he loves me now. What he did that day, he did because he thought it would be fun for me. I swear to god, he thought it would be fun and in no way was punishing me for being a pain in the ass.

To keep me occupied, while he finished working, my dad handed me a stick, picked me up and put me in one of the turkey pens.

Did I mention that these turkeys were mean?

At first, they ran away from me. Cool! I thought. I’ll just chase them about, check out what they eat and get a general view of life from the inside of a turkey pen. But after a few minutes the turkeys started showing an intense interest in me and sort of, well…surrounded me.“This,” I thought, “is why daddy gave me a stick.” But I didn’t want to hit the poor creatures! My dad had often told me how turkeys are the dumbest domestic animals of them all because of how they were bred and that wild turkeys, on the other hand, were extremely smart. Meanwhile, the turkeys were coming closer and I began to reflect on the size the animals. You see, Mr. Wight’s birds were, and still are, known for their size. For example, one could purchase a 36 pound hen from this farm. A 36 pound HEN! The turkey gang that was in the process of sizing me up in that moment was alive, on the hoof and about 4 feet tall. So the damn things were looking me in the eye!There was only one thing to do.

“Daddy!” I yelled.

“Gobbagobbagobbagobbagobbagobba!” replied the turkeys.

“Daaaaaaaaaddy!” I yelled again.

“Goooooooooobbagobbagobbagobbagobbagobba!” mocked the turkey gang.

**This really happens, by the way. Turkeys are suckers for the old “call and response.” They will do it all day. The UCLA cheer squad has nothing on a field of turkeys.

“DAD!” I screamed.

“GOBBA!” said the turkeys.

I was getting no where and the turkeys were starting to pick at my jacket and my shoe laces, so I took another look at my friend the stick. Just as I was deciding once and for all that I could never hit a defenseless animal, I felt a sharp, stinging pain…on my ass. I clutched at my bottom and felt blood trickling down the back of my thigh. One of them had actually pecked a hole in my pants and taken a chunk out of me. I gazed around, in horror, at their fleshy pink heads, their vacant, blood thirsty eyes and started swinging like Pete Rose.

I’m sure it didn’t take long for me to thrash my way through that sea of angry turkey flesh but it seemed like forever. It seemed as if I had to smack them over and over to get them out of the way and I was sure that they all knew the taste of human blood now and they wanted more. Breaking out of the mob, I sprinted across the pen and hit the fence at about 35 miles an hour. I didn’t have to climb as it collapsed in my mad scramble to get the hell out of there.

I reached the pump house where my dad was working and he looked up at me, disheveled hair, breathing hard and my eyes the size of pie plates. I think I stood there for a whole minute, in silence, while he assessed the state I was in.

“I tore the fence down.” was all I could say.

“You did?” he said carefully.

“They came all around me. I…one of them bit me hard.” I said.

There was a long pause.“Did you use the stick?” he said.

“Yes!” and I began to cry.

We walked back to the pen with Dad’s hand on my shoulder. I just let the tears run down my face until we reached the fence. Dad surveyed the damage.

“You tore the fence down.” He said. Did I detect a faint smile?

“Sorry.” I said.

“Watch this.” And he picked up two fence posts and jammed them back into the ground, good as new. He rifled around in his pockets and handed me his keys. “I’m almost done. Go start the truck and turn the heater on. Wait for me there.”

I did just that.

My dad is a World War II Navy vet, not to mention a child of The Depression, so a warm, fuzzy apology was not really in his skill set. I knew he regretted what happened though because he let me drive the truck off the farm that day. My legs were too short, so he sat close and hit the clutch as I shifted and we bounced and lurched our way to the gate. I laughed until I was incapacitated. That’s how he let me know he was sorry for the turkey incident.

I did have a cool little scar on my butt for a long time after that. I’ve never seen it but last time I had word of it was in college when my boyfriend, ummm, found it and asked me how I got it. That was when I realized that my father had gifted me with a story that I could use to reduce my friends to tears of laughter. Last Thursday, I realized it’s the best Thanksgiving Day tale, ever.

Thanks, Daddy.

...And Puppies For All

I saw the most extraordinary thing this morning.

I had to drive through mid-city this morning because I didn’t need to be at work until 10 am. The freeways were out of the question, so I planned to leave the valley at 8:30 and hit the surface streets, anticipating a horrendous drive. My former hubby stopped by my apartment while I was eating breakfast, and since he often travels the by-roads of LA to meet up with his clients, I asked his advice as to which route I should take to get to the west side.

“Oh, I would just take the 101…oh wait…what time is it now? 8:20? Oh no, no, stay off the 101. You could ah…well that’s if I’m going to Venice, but you’re going to LAX so… wow, there is no good way to get over there this time of day. Sorry.”

And there it is. There is no good way to drive to the west side of LA at 8:30 in the morning. Armed with this information, I filled my commuter mug with A LOT of coffee and got in the ol’ RAV.

The news on NPR was too grim for words, people. Darfur, shootings of school girls, more attacks on gay rights and Republican intern scandals, crikey! By the time I got to the Sepulveda pass, I was already in a really bad mood. Then there were numerous attempts on my life by people in large black SUVs with those “bluetooth” thingies attached to their heads. It’s as if they had met for coffee this morning and agreed to squish all diminutive women in blue RAVs, drinking out of old Disneyland thermal mugs. Bad, bad behavior on their part!

I tried, really tired, to take solace in my mid-city commute that I normally love so well, but there was no joy in watching the swarms of kids crossing Highland and pouring into Hollywood High today. I couldn’t take my usual peace of mind from seeing all of the elderly Jewish gentlemen standing on the sidewalks of La Brea, gesticulating wildly with their prayer shawls dangling below their jackets. Even the extremely tall hip-hop dad whom I love to see crossing Washington with his five, yes five, little girls in braids was not enough to warm my heart this morning. My mood could only be described as ‘pissy’ and it was showing no signs of improvement.

Less than a mile away from my office, after yet another run in with a killer Land Rover, I was stuck at the wonky intersection at Jefferson and Sepulveda. Something was wrong with the light and the other drivers, having listened to NPR I’m sure, were all behaving badly. Culver City’s finest had arrived and were trying to direct traffic, and I was using my inner dictionary to come up with the most brutal string of obscenities I could think of, when I looked in my rear view mirror.

The man behind me was in an ancient tan Impala and bore a striking resemblance to one of the oily haired swamp fellas from ‘Deliverance.’ Instantly, I despised him. First for his lack of hygiene, then for his ancient, gas guzzling car, and finally, for his daring to breath the air within a fifty yard radius of me and my sour mood. It could have been Mother Theresa in that car and I would have found a reason to hate, hate, HATE her.

Just as I was considering backing into the poor devil, for no good reason, the most beautifully cared for auburn Pekingese sat up in his lap. Mr. Deliverance looked down adoringly at the puppy and pressed it into his chest, as said doggy lovingly licked him under his chin. It was obvious, in that moment, that every ounce of caretaking ability the man posessed was invested in that spotless little animal. My heart grew three sizes as I watched him snuggle the creature that was so clearly the light of his life.

I then heard a shout outside my car and looked to see a Culver Cop angrily waving me through the intersection. Before I proceeded, I stole one more glance at the odd couple in the car behind me. The last I saw of them was the man planting a firm smooch on the top of the doggy’s head and the doggy’s eyes closing tight in pooch ecstasy. It was love at its purest, my friends; the seemingly unlovable, being loved completely and without prejudice. Bearing witness to this healed all of my wounds. Cecil B. DeMille couldn’t have done a better job with that miracle.

I see now that Pekingese Love is the answer to the world’s ills…but I’m at a loss as to how we can implement it. Perhaps it’s time to send Pekingese pups to the Christian Coalition? Maybe puppies can become standard equipment for 2007 Land Rovers? Could we drop little Pekingese paratroopers over the Taliban forces in Afghanistan?

Donald Rumsfeld needs a puppy. Oh yeah, we’ll definitely send a Peeky to Rumsfeld.