If Not Irony

I was profiled at the Blues Fest. Twenty-five thousand people, they choose me. It's like Arizona around here.

Actually it is like Arizona around here. I'm talking weather, man. The North Shore...the last place on earth. But the first to benefit from climate change. I haven't seen a parka since April, or heard the furnace kick on. No ice on the birdbath, no frost on the tomatoes, it's downright miraculous. It's a bird! It's a plane! It's the fucking sun! I actually have a tan.

Not that my tan had anything to do with it. Tan or no tan, the ticket nazis took one look at me and stopped the presses. I wasn't strip-searched or anything, but the experience was revealing nonetheless. Afterward I interviewed a few onlookers.

"What is it about me?" I asked.

When the laughter subsided, one guy was kind enough to explain.

"You look like an ornery aging stoner," said my husband.

Thanks for the honesty, hon.

I'll give him the "aging" and the "stoner," but I object to the "ornery." This was Blues Fest, man, I was downright mellow. Blissful, even. I think the "ornery" has more to do with being of Finnish extraction. Finns are born looking crabby, they can't help it. It's their facial genes. At least this was true in my case.

I remember Great Aunt Helen from Tennessee teetering over my crib, exclaiming,

"My stars, what an interesting baby, but why is it scowling?"

I was sitting lotus reading a Life magazine upside down to show off. I was two if I was a day. I'd learned early on that showing off reaped its share of rewards -- candy, money, drugs. Great Aunt Helen from Tennessee was always good for oodles of shit, having married into the Greyhound Bus Line.

Following in her footsteps, I myself eventually developed a relationship with the Greyhound Bus Line, but mostly it had to do with various attempts to get the hell out of Dodge at certain junctures in a long and disorganized life. Now I've finally accepted the fact that I'm stuck in Dodge for the duration, there's nothing to be done about it, my stars, shut the fuck up and pass the pipe.

I wonder, does anybody ride the bus anymore?

At one point during Blues, I found myself inside a police vehicle the size of a bus. In fact, it was a bus, a tricked-out RV with surveillance cameras and state-of-the-art computer equipment and two darling little yellow Tasers lying in a corner peacefully minding their own business. And there's me, your garden-variety recently-profiled ornery aging stoner, being given a guided tour of Command Central by an Actual Cop, while other Actual Cops mill around outside actually chatting. Surreal is the word that comes to mind. This unique experience came about compliments of the next door neighbor, an Actual Cop now retired, who, apparently, has a sense of humor, if not irony.

I myself have been retired since my twenties. And if anyone along the way had told me that one day I'd be Actual Friends with a Cop, I'd have had to wait for my laughter to subside before asking for a wee pinch of whatever it was the clairvoyant was ingesting just then. Those were the days, man.

Those were the days. Once upon a time I used to be in my forties. Before that I used to be in my thirties. Before that, as mentioned, I actually used to be in my twenties, if you can believe it. At one point in my twenties, before I retired, I went through a bi period: I didn't shave my legs or armpits, but wore tons of eye makeup. It was the Seventies, man. My Friend the Cop says she used to be bi, too, only with this difference: she didn't shave her legs, just her armpits. Or was it vice versa? I didn't ask about the eye makeup.

I wonder, does anyone grow her body hair anymore? In America, I mean.

The morning after Blues, I woke up to the phone ringing.

"Who could be calling at this hour?" I scowled. It was noon.

But it wasn't the phone, it was the new dryer. Apparently my husband had thrown in the towels before heading to the golf course (if anyone along the way had told me that one day I'd be Married to a Guy Who Golfs...). Now the towels were dry and the dryer was communicating this information. In the key of C. I know C when I hear it. I'd been hearing it for days, man.

So once again it was the usual knockdown dragout, but we survived Blues for another year. Now it's back to Dodge, where the appliances send text messages and the tomatoes are ripening and I'm still bi, only with new guidelines: I drink beer and wine. Simultaneously. With tons of eye makeup of course.