Losing It

The other evening I'm driving my daughter home from gym, she asks if I was alive when the Titanic went down.

The girl has no sense of time. Or timing. I nearly sideswiped a 14-foot U-haul in the next lane, its side panel festooned with scenes of the Southwest. I started thinking about cacti.

My daughter seemed sincere enough in the question, sucking down an endless rope of red licorice, eyes glazed after 45 minutes of giants on the high bar. She got her giants back last week. Now she's lost her back handspring on beam.

In gymnastics, it's not uncommon to lose skills, then get them back again. My daughter has lost her back handspring a number of times. The worst is when a girl loses a skill in the middle of a meet. You want to holler "Stop the presses, for crissakes!" and run out onto the floor and start looking for it. Thank the gods this has never happened to us. Although after one particularly low score on floor during the State Meet (one of those judges is a fat fucking nazi, everybody fucking knows this), my daughter lost her dimple. An arguably useful skill in gymnastics, as in life. She didn't get it back for over a week.

Until my daughter discovered a passion for courting death and dismemberment while flipping in ever-increasing complexity through the ethers, I was gymnastics-challenged. Oh, I knew the headliners -- Olga, Cathy, Nadia, Mary Lou -- and the events -- floor, beam, bars, vault. And I knew the Holy Grail they all sought, the elusive "10." But other than this Olympic fair-weather interest, I was clueless. I didn't know jack. Make that jill. I didn't know a rip from a hole in the ground. As in, what do you think of when you hear the word "rip"? Most likely a jagged bloody hole in the center of your daughter's palm caused by constant chafing of her grips isn't on your short list. Now that I think of it, a rather stigmata-esque wound, but...

I digress. If anyone slogging through this blathering rag is in the least interested in learning more about this not-for-the-faint-of-heart sport (as they say around the chalk barrel, "If gymnastics were easier, they'd call it football"), head on down to your friendly neighborhood video store and rent the narratively-weak but quasi-realistic film "Stick It." Which is what the girls say when they land a particularly difficult skill.

As in, last month my daughter was sticking her backhand on beam. Now she's lost it. Again.

Speaking of the short list. Things I've lost: money, friends, face, my way, that vintage Forties gabardine suit jacket I gave to some Guggenheim-endowed broad I never saw again. Things I've lost recently: perspective, skin tone, facility on the uptake, ground.

I don't know, maybe it's the Age Thang, but I've lost my reserve, too. It's depleted. Nada. Gone off the reservation. Like that Titanic crack? In the car the other night? I started weeping. Silently, but copiously. Which made it even more fucking difficult to see the road. Add that to the list: I've lost my night vision.

I've lost my waistline. My ability to draw the line. My ability to toe the line. My talent for one-liners. There's a fine line between my current M.O. and early stage alzheimers. Knock on wood, it runs in the family. Although nobody ever copped to it. But my grandmother, bless her little thrice-divorced soul, spent her last days rolling through the corridors of the nursing home in her wheelchair, smiling beatifically and giving the other inmates the "queen wave." As opposed to the finger, something I'd be inclined to do. Apparently she thought she was a float in a parade. Or afloat. Whichever, there are worse ways to bow out. So to speak.

Lately it appears I've also been losing the ability to speak (that voice in the background is my husband muttering, "This is a problem?"). I do all right with dogs and preschoolers (everyone knows cats have no talent for languages), it's adults who render me speechless. Not to mention adolescents, who simply render me. Like meat. Maybe I'm taking my cue from Mister Ed, who wouldn't say a thing unless he had something to say. A noble enough philosophy.

Except, I do have something to say. Ask anyone who knows me, or who's willing to cop to it. And if not? They can just stick it. I've been pretty much trying to say what I have to say since I uttered my first words. Which, according to my daughter, were something along the lines of "Ooooo! Wa-Wa!", burbled delightedly as the lifeboat was lowered into the icy waters of the North Atlantic while the band played on.

Sticks and Stones

My daughter's school received a bomb threat last week. No shit. "I have a bomb!" was found written on the wall of the girls' bathroom. With lipstick.

So. Back to our regularly-scheduled program.

Still, it gives one pause when the phone rings and an authoritative male voice on the line says,

"Good Morning! This is Harold Houdini, Principal of Animal House Middle School! I'm calling to update you on a situation we have here in the building..."

It being only 11:15 a.m., I groggily reply, "Hell-o...?" I'm thinking the dude's calling me personally, probably because my daughter is so special. But then he ignores my greeting and continues with the update, at which point I deduce this is a recording.

Speaking of which.

We're in Rewind. Once Again. Up North. Rewind back into prehistory. Back to the Stone Age. Back to the foggy dawn of evolution. When Man as we know him first appeared. And Woman, as she might have been, disappeared.

Once again, as happens annually this time of year in this neck of the woods, Neanderthal Days are upon us. Hard-ons with weapons are roaming the countryside, shooting their wads at anything that moves (flies flees runs trips falls panics freezes), congratulating themselves on their masculinity. Their virility. Their bravery. Their record-setting weenies.

Meanwhile, let me congratulate certain young offspring of these tiresome throwbacks, a growing number of whom are refusing to take part in this antiquated male-bonding charade their fathers are attempting to shove up their lily-white asses. Who've shown they possess a latent intelligence gene deep in the mire of their genetic code, demonstrating that the capacity for compassion, for comprehending the larger picture, for thinking outside the box (or the scope of a high-powered rifle) is still possible in this sad sad world, despite enormous odds and no support from the homefront.

Speaking of which.

Several days after the "bomb threat" at my daughter's school (which resulted in a 45-minute lockdown with students scarfing emergency treats and discussing Britney Spears' parenting techniques while Harold Houdini and the Powers That Be determined the threat was a hoax), an item appeared on the front page of the state's biggest newspaper:

"Hunters Bag Half-Ton Moose! Largest On Record!"

There I am, negotiating a patch of sun with my morning coffee, attempting to greet yet another new day in this sad sad world, and this is what greets me. On the front page, no less. You could hear the impact as I fell headlong into my annual bout of Hunting-Seasonal Depression. I wanted to scream. I wanted to holler. I wanted to tear out my hair. I wanted to tear out into the woods and shoot the nearest hunter I came across. I wanted to shoot him and shoot him again and shoot him once more and watch him die in agony and then have my picture taken next to him and call the state's biggest newspaper:

"Woman Bags 200-Lb. Animal Abuser! Smallest Dick On Record!"

But this, of course, will never happen. Why? Because I'm one of "those."

I don't own a firearm. I never have. I never will. I don't kill people. I certainly don't kill animals. I'm a vegetarian. I try to buy cruelty-free products. I try to read labels. I believe all sentient beings have the same rights when it comes to pain and suffering. Just because some being isn't human, doesn't mean I have the right to torture it or mutilate it or murder it or eat it or wear it or hang it on the wall. What in god's name do these hunters think an animal feels when it dies in this way? How can these people live with themselves? Are they truly that morally bankrupt? that pathologically self-centered?

I'm no saint. I don't live perfectly. I have blood on my hands. But I try to live intentionally. I try to live in awareness. I try.

Consequently, I'm a joke. A bunny-hugger. A chicken. A sissy. I'm un-American. Unpatriotic. Holier-than-thou. A laughingstock. "Who does she think she is?" I've been hearing that ever since I can remember. "If we are what we eat, then you're a fruit!" or "...a vegetable!" Been there, heard that. Believe me, it's a lonely job being the Sally Field of Animal Rights in this neck of the woods.

So. You're a Carnivore and I'm a Veg-head. So fucking what? These are names, Stupid. These are playground taunts. These are words. They could be written on the side of a building with spray paint. On a driveway with chalk. On a bathroom wall. With lipstick. Words will never hurt me. Words will never hurt you. But as any preschooler knows...any gut-shot half-ton moose plunging panic-stricken through the jackpine knows...there are many many things that will.

They're Here!

September 24th marked the First Anniversary of this blog. The "paper" anniversary, if I'm not mistaken. How cosmic. But let's not break out the champagne just yet. Like all ecosystems, this blog has proved to be as cyclic as the next guy, because...

We've got skunks!

Yup, plural.

The Gentle Reader may recall that last year at this time, I was knee deep in the Bizarre Bazaar, our much-heralded neighborhood garage sale, which proved to be the hit of the garage sale season in this neck of the woods. "Woods" being the operative word here. Somehow, Pepe LePew found his way from the wilds of Sherwood Forest to a cozy bunker beneath our bump-out, where he hunkered down and forthwithly delivered a Life Lesson on the snout of our beloved canine, earning her the moniker "Stinkface" and my husband a tale to tell at midnight around the campfire about the time he live-trapped a skunk beneath the birdfeeder and relocated it into the Witness Protection Program out in the Township.

Now it appears the perp may have text-messaged a couple of his homies back in the hood, because, ala the immortal words of Heather O'Rourke in "Poltergeist II,"

"They're ba-aaack!"

Having skunks is not the same as, say, having the mumps. Or spots on the tomatoes. Or even mice. Such issues will eventually resolve themselves, or one can choose to ignore a situation and Just Live With It. Either way, you return to Life As You Know It. Having skunks involves your having to Deal With It, Asshole. You cannot live with skunks, or ignore them. Skunks will not resolve themselves. Having skunks is not a passive state of affairs. It is active in the purest sense. And you'd better act soon, because that plural will grow more and more plural, faster than you can say Something Fucking Stinks Around Here!

(Did someone mention this blog? Whatever. Back to our regularly-scheduled program.)



A week ago, our neighbor called to say she'd seen a skunk walking up the hill into our sideyard with a suitcase.* Later that same evening, I glanced out the patio door and caught two of the new squatters drinking martinis beside the St. Francis statue. These dudes know a patron saint when they see one. Our dog, who displays a similar color palette, was standing next to me at the time. She froze, eyes bugged, ears flattened, tail crestfallen. I could almost hear her memory chips ka-chunking into place to form that one coherent thought,

"What the fuck?!?"

The good news is that, much to our relief, Stinkface, er, Daisy has shown she has at least one functioning brain cell (the average for most dogs). This time around, she's giving the skunks wide berth. Good girl! Want a treat? While her instinct (in-stinked?) is too strong to let her stay inside the house and view the interlopers through a protective glass shield, out in the yard she will, nonetheless, get as far from the birdfeeder as possible and, remaining still as a (St. Francis) statue, spy on them in the darkness (skunks being, the Gentle Reader will remember, nocturnal). Ever the great covert operative, Daisy thinks she's spying. But if I crack the window, I can hear the skunks snickering amongst themselves about the Wuss in skunk's clothing over by the woodpile.

Living with skunks under the floorboards is a unique experience. Like having a conscience. All your actions take on new meaning. Now that I think about it, skunks are like the Voice of God. Don't fuck up, or God will get you! God knows all, hears all, sees all! God prefers peace and quiet and blackoil sunflower seed! And most importantly, the First Commandment, GOD DOES NOT LIKE TO BE SNUCK UP UPON!

With skunks deployed somewhere in the vicinity of your personal whereabouts, you can't get away with it, whatever it is, so don't even think about it. See what I'm saying? God.

But this time around, things will be different. The dog has learned a valuable Life Lesson. The neighbors are considering an electric fence. My husband is installing a mini Barcolounger in the live-trap and perusing old cookbooks for just the right skunk-friendly recipe. And I'm surfing Ebay for a portable morphine drip and thanking my lucky stars the neighborhood didn't schedule Bizarre Bazaar II.

Because, believe me, they've been asking. "They," as in some of the garage sale aficionados from last year, who've been requesting a repeat. As in, "They're (wanting to come) ba-aaack!" But they should know by now the sequel never lives up to the original. I mean, just look at "Poltergeist." And actually, now that I think about it, skunks do have alot in common with... OhMyGawd! Forget the champagne,

We've got poltergeists!





(*She also mentioned the three bears playing pinocle on our front porch, but that's a whole other story.)