False Advertising:
"Victoria's Secret."
Truth in Advertising:
"Victoria Doesn't Have Any Secrets."
A prominently well-known fact to any mother accompanying a son through the mall at Christmas and past the display window.
Copyright 2008
Friday, December 26, 2008
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
Observational Twitter 4
Esoteric:
"Necessity is the mother of invention." Plato
Exoteric:
"If necessity is the mother of invention, laziness is the father." Robynn Reilly
(No men were injured during the making of this quote and any relation to persons living or dead is unintended.....although, didn't Plato just sit around telling everybody he couldn't be bothered because he was thinking? I'm just saying.......)
Copyright 2008
"Necessity is the mother of invention." Plato
Exoteric:
"If necessity is the mother of invention, laziness is the father." Robynn Reilly
(No men were injured during the making of this quote and any relation to persons living or dead is unintended.....although, didn't Plato just sit around telling everybody he couldn't be bothered because he was thinking? I'm just saying.......)
Copyright 2008
Friday, December 19, 2008
A Christmas Story....Not The One With The Leg Lamp
I am reposting this for Christmas. I wrote it five years ago and was reminded of the story by a friend. I hope your Christmas is filled with the joy that comes from helping others, the ability) to find and count your blessings (though they're sometimes buried among the pain and struggle of life), and the hope that came into this world through the sacrificial love of the One who breathed life into us all and calls us to Himself. Merry Christmas.
I don't think I can top the Bumpkiss' dogs or the fish-net leg lamp. I can identify with Ralphie in "A Christmas Story" when he has to suck on a bar of Lifeboy soap. I became a regular connoisseur of the latest "on-sale" bar soap when I was a kid. Lux, Lifeboy, Dial, Ivory. Apparently getting cleaned from the inside out was the way to approach child rearing. Maybe it was a chaser for the bleach I accidentally drank from a Ball canning jar several years earlier. My heart may have its stains but my intestines are clean as a whistle.
It was during this same period my Christmas story takes place. It wasn't humorous but it was definitely happy. I remembered it today when the kids and I were part of the follow-up team for handing out Christmas food and gifts for the company Jamie works for. We volunteered for the privilege because who doesn't want to be part of that kind of Christmas cheer? Of course, I groused about schedule logistics (note last blog) even though I truly, truly wanted to do it. I mean really, WHAT is my DEAL?!
We drove across town to the warehouse, picked up seven boxes of groceries and a few toys, and headed to the home of a single mother with lots of children. The neighborhood was down-trodden but several neighbors stood against the blight with cheery light displays and decorations.
The home sat on a quiet corner, surrounded by a chain link fence. A chewed rope hung limply from a metal pole advertising a dog no longer tethered there. I walked up and tapped lightly, feeling slightly awkward and apologetic. The door creaked open and out peeked little shining faces, obviously excited to see strangers bearing gifts. A teenage son arrived home just in time to help unload the car and serve as translator. His mother spoke only Spanish and I spoke only English. He stared at us through dark-lashed eyes that were guarded with a mixture of suspicion and embarrassment. He couldn't have been much older than my son. I wondered if he would have felt much the same in a similar situation. I sensed his gratitude but also felt the sting that charity might bring to a young man. He quietly complied with my request to let his mother know I had been on the receiving end of a Christmas delivery when I was child. I suppose I wanted her to realize (and him to understand even more) that I knew how it felt on both sides and it was a blessing to give back. Her shy smile showed her appreciation, and discomfort as well. It truly is more blessed to give than to receive.
I wanted to share my own story with them but I couldn't invade their emotional space. He needed me to leave; she needed me to leave; and they couldn't have been more quietly gracious about it. I drove away remembering a Christmas that wouldn't have happened but for the intervention of friends and strangers.
I was ten and my sister and brother several years older. It had been a year of great upheaval. Well, come to think of it, I guess all of our years were years of great upheaval but this one came with even less money. My mother had just landed a good job but found out right before Christmas there would be no paycheck. It was a government job and the policy was to withhold the first check to be used for future severance pay.
The morning of Christmas Eve arrived but there was no sign of Christmas at our house. We had often gotten our tree on Christmas Eve because they were rock-bottom priced then. But on this day there was no discussion of a trip to the tree lot. The pantry was pretty bare and there hadn't been any talk of presents except to say there wouldn't be any. I don't remember being worried that we would eat beans for our Holiday dinner, but I do recall wondering afterwards what the menu would have been.
I think, on that day, I must have been in that beautiful place children live in their minds; the place that helps them believe everything will be alright somehow; the place where magical thinking rules and reality doesn't have a prayer. And it was in that moment that a knock came to the door. My sister and I opened it and saw our mother's friend, "Aunt" Fran. She had her husband with her and much more importantly, to our minds, the most beautiful white-flocked Christmas tree in tow. Now, our trees had been pretty much the bargain variety and we had never entertained the idea of a tree this grand. This was purview of the rich; the domain of the entitled. We were suddenly and at once part of this club of exclusivity! Aunt Fran was the prosperous owner of a nursery school that was much in demand. It was always immaculate and beautifully appointed. Each year, at the school, she prominently displayed her faith in God and her exquisite tree. It would normally have remained up through the New Year but this year she and "Uncle" Austin dismantled it and brought it to our house, along with the ornaments.
We had barely begun redecorating the tree when there was another sound at the door. Representatives of The Lions Club stood on our doorstep with arms full of boxes filled with ham, canned goods, and items far more tempting than beans. They left everything on our dining room table, wished us well and "Merry Christmas" and were gone. Here was food and here was a gorgeous tree. How could it get any better? In a matter of minutes it did. Another rapping at the door brought members of First Baptist Church bearing more food and wrapped presents. I can still see the white tissue paper and red ribbon wrapped around what I knew was a game. I couldn't wait to open it the next day. I don't know what the other gifts were that year but I was the happy recipient of "Sorry" and it's the game the kids and I still use after all these years.
Apparently, Aunt Fran had placed us on a few "needy family" lists and I'll be forever grateful that she did. It wasn't until years later I realized how close we were to having a very different Christmas experience. It was nothing short of a miracle to me and yet it lived up to my faith that all would be well. And for that time and for that day, it was. And that was enough.
I hope it will be the same for the dear family we met today. I pray a bright memory of Christmas miracles lives on in the hearts of the kiddos there and, if only for a short while, a burden is lifted for a weary mother. I hope a tentative young son feels compelled to drop his guard. I think that might be the case. I hugged his mother and then turned to him to pat his arm. He started to lean in for a hug, too, then caught himself. But it had happened, nonetheless, and in that moment, if only for a moment, I think all was well.
May you have the merriest of Christmases, my friends, and may God richly bless you.
With Love,
Robynn
Copyright 2008
I don't think I can top the Bumpkiss' dogs or the fish-net leg lamp. I can identify with Ralphie in "A Christmas Story" when he has to suck on a bar of Lifeboy soap. I became a regular connoisseur of the latest "on-sale" bar soap when I was a kid. Lux, Lifeboy, Dial, Ivory. Apparently getting cleaned from the inside out was the way to approach child rearing. Maybe it was a chaser for the bleach I accidentally drank from a Ball canning jar several years earlier. My heart may have its stains but my intestines are clean as a whistle.
It was during this same period my Christmas story takes place. It wasn't humorous but it was definitely happy. I remembered it today when the kids and I were part of the follow-up team for handing out Christmas food and gifts for the company Jamie works for. We volunteered for the privilege because who doesn't want to be part of that kind of Christmas cheer? Of course, I groused about schedule logistics (note last blog) even though I truly, truly wanted to do it. I mean really, WHAT is my DEAL?!
We drove across town to the warehouse, picked up seven boxes of groceries and a few toys, and headed to the home of a single mother with lots of children. The neighborhood was down-trodden but several neighbors stood against the blight with cheery light displays and decorations.
The home sat on a quiet corner, surrounded by a chain link fence. A chewed rope hung limply from a metal pole advertising a dog no longer tethered there. I walked up and tapped lightly, feeling slightly awkward and apologetic. The door creaked open and out peeked little shining faces, obviously excited to see strangers bearing gifts. A teenage son arrived home just in time to help unload the car and serve as translator. His mother spoke only Spanish and I spoke only English. He stared at us through dark-lashed eyes that were guarded with a mixture of suspicion and embarrassment. He couldn't have been much older than my son. I wondered if he would have felt much the same in a similar situation. I sensed his gratitude but also felt the sting that charity might bring to a young man. He quietly complied with my request to let his mother know I had been on the receiving end of a Christmas delivery when I was child. I suppose I wanted her to realize (and him to understand even more) that I knew how it felt on both sides and it was a blessing to give back. Her shy smile showed her appreciation, and discomfort as well. It truly is more blessed to give than to receive.
I wanted to share my own story with them but I couldn't invade their emotional space. He needed me to leave; she needed me to leave; and they couldn't have been more quietly gracious about it. I drove away remembering a Christmas that wouldn't have happened but for the intervention of friends and strangers.
I was ten and my sister and brother several years older. It had been a year of great upheaval. Well, come to think of it, I guess all of our years were years of great upheaval but this one came with even less money. My mother had just landed a good job but found out right before Christmas there would be no paycheck. It was a government job and the policy was to withhold the first check to be used for future severance pay.
The morning of Christmas Eve arrived but there was no sign of Christmas at our house. We had often gotten our tree on Christmas Eve because they were rock-bottom priced then. But on this day there was no discussion of a trip to the tree lot. The pantry was pretty bare and there hadn't been any talk of presents except to say there wouldn't be any. I don't remember being worried that we would eat beans for our Holiday dinner, but I do recall wondering afterwards what the menu would have been.
I think, on that day, I must have been in that beautiful place children live in their minds; the place that helps them believe everything will be alright somehow; the place where magical thinking rules and reality doesn't have a prayer. And it was in that moment that a knock came to the door. My sister and I opened it and saw our mother's friend, "Aunt" Fran. She had her husband with her and much more importantly, to our minds, the most beautiful white-flocked Christmas tree in tow. Now, our trees had been pretty much the bargain variety and we had never entertained the idea of a tree this grand. This was purview of the rich; the domain of the entitled. We were suddenly and at once part of this club of exclusivity! Aunt Fran was the prosperous owner of a nursery school that was much in demand. It was always immaculate and beautifully appointed. Each year, at the school, she prominently displayed her faith in God and her exquisite tree. It would normally have remained up through the New Year but this year she and "Uncle" Austin dismantled it and brought it to our house, along with the ornaments.
We had barely begun redecorating the tree when there was another sound at the door. Representatives of The Lions Club stood on our doorstep with arms full of boxes filled with ham, canned goods, and items far more tempting than beans. They left everything on our dining room table, wished us well and "Merry Christmas" and were gone. Here was food and here was a gorgeous tree. How could it get any better? In a matter of minutes it did. Another rapping at the door brought members of First Baptist Church bearing more food and wrapped presents. I can still see the white tissue paper and red ribbon wrapped around what I knew was a game. I couldn't wait to open it the next day. I don't know what the other gifts were that year but I was the happy recipient of "Sorry" and it's the game the kids and I still use after all these years.
Apparently, Aunt Fran had placed us on a few "needy family" lists and I'll be forever grateful that she did. It wasn't until years later I realized how close we were to having a very different Christmas experience. It was nothing short of a miracle to me and yet it lived up to my faith that all would be well. And for that time and for that day, it was. And that was enough.
I hope it will be the same for the dear family we met today. I pray a bright memory of Christmas miracles lives on in the hearts of the kiddos there and, if only for a short while, a burden is lifted for a weary mother. I hope a tentative young son feels compelled to drop his guard. I think that might be the case. I hugged his mother and then turned to him to pat his arm. He started to lean in for a hug, too, then caught himself. But it had happened, nonetheless, and in that moment, if only for a moment, I think all was well.
May you have the merriest of Christmases, my friends, and may God richly bless you.
With Love,
Robynn
Copyright 2008
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Observational Twitter 3
Esoteric:
"It's all good." Speculative origins and basically unknown author.
Exoteric:
"Its all good........except for the bad parts and those are horrid." Robynn Reilly - speculative intelligence and basically unknown author.
Copyright 2008
"It's all good." Speculative origins and basically unknown author.
Exoteric:
"Its all good........except for the bad parts and those are horrid." Robynn Reilly - speculative intelligence and basically unknown author.
Copyright 2008
Sunday, December 14, 2008
"Crabby Holidays to You....!"
"O Crabby night, the stars are brightly shining......."
Anyone else feeling a little less than “Jingle-Belly” about the whole Christmas, jam-packed schedule? I don't mean to be grumpy and grouchy. It's just that I'm so good at it I hate to let all that practice go to waste.
Just yesterday, Jamie and I were driving along on our way to his company Christmas party. It really was a worthwhile event this year. They decided to dispense with the over-the-top dressy affair and keep it very low key, using the money they would have spent and blessing six needy families instead. We all brought grocery items and had a great lunch. But that didn't stop us from grousing the whole way there about just another thing to do and how many other "just another thing-s" we had to complete. We were so ridiculous Jamie finally looked at me and said, "What else can we gripe about now?!" "Have yourself a crabby little Christmas........"
The time pressures can bring out the worst, I guess. It put me in mind of a Christmas season long past. Hannah was about four and wanting to be in the middle of every single thing I did in the kitchen. That was fun for the first 32 hours of the day. But now it was 10pm and I was down to piecrust I was trying out, for the first time, in the food processor. Martha Stewart (that self-righteous irritant) made it look so simple the day before on her show. My first crust stuck to the top and was fit for gluing wood flooring to the concrete. The next resembled birdseed and stuck together like Sahara sand. I blew that out and started over, again. In the meantime, Hannah stood beside me saying things like, "Can I do it? What's wrong with it? Can I do it? Why is it wet? Can I do it? Why is it dry? Can I do it? What's wrong, Mommy? Can I do it? Why are you making that face, Mommy? Can I do it?"
I felt my inner Grinch flexing his muscles as I told her, "Hannah! Mommy REALLY needs to do this alone. You need to leave the kitchen now and just let me do this myself!" She reluctantly left muttering, "Well, I don't know why I can't do it." The next thing I heard was a phone conversation from the stairs. There she sat in the middle of the staircase with her Fisher-Price phone plopped in her lap and the receiver pressed to her ear. "9-9-1? 9-9-1?" she asked the phantom operator who couldn't have cared less that she had misdialed. "You need to come and get my mommy cause she's not right!" Boy howdy.
The year before, when she was three, we had guests staying during Thanksgiving. Hannah was up early and yakking away. I told her more than once to be quiet since people were still sleeping. Finally I cornered her in the hallway, stared at her eyeball-to-eyeball and firmly told her she HAD to keep it down. She looked back at me just as determinedly, pointed her finger at me and replied, "You better keep YOUR crabby voice quiet, too!" Checkmate.
So, what the heck's the matter with me this year? Deferred preparations might be part of it. There hasn't been any time to break ground on Christmas around here. December 13th and no sign of the Christmas season at our house. I'm trying to knock everyone and everything out of the way so I can start celebrating joyfully. Reminds me of Sunday mornings when we're running late. The standing joke in our house is to yell at every pokey-joe motorist, "GET OUT OF THE WAY, DANG IT! WE'RE TRYING TO GET TO CHURCH AND WORSHIP THE LORD!!" Beware oxymorons driving down the road. We might run over you, too.
The weird thing is, I have actually loved every single event we've attended this Christmas season. That hasn't been the problem. It's those spaces between the events where I get into trouble. The ones where I actually have to be grateful for four hours of sleep and haul it up anyway; the health issues I can't control; the moments in the kitchen believing wholeheartedly that counters are only a theory (as I haven’t seen them in days) and something else must be holding up this assemblage of dishes and debris; the effort expended trying to decide if Sir Edmund Hillary could have scaled a mountain the size of my laundry pile.
But now, just one day later, there are days like today. I spend time with my love-em-to-pieces teens in my Sunday school class....my pastor/dear friend gently exhorts us from the pulpit.....my perspective shifts. I begin to count my blessings and realize I managed to buy a Christmas tree in three minutes flat last night. No lie. Hannah decorated the mantle and got the decorations out yesterday in my absence. Jamie put the lights on the house. Hunter played a shepherd in a Christmas production and, with the fake penciled-in beard and headdress that looked more like a 40's fedora, managed to emulate a mafia gangster shepherding his sheep and made me nearly drop the camera laughing.
I was also overcome with the blessings of incredible friends we're surrounded by so much of the time, but especially in the last 72 hours of event-laden days and evenings. We've all been running in the same circles but many of us are facing rough challenges: A very needed liver transplant and declining health, offering to donate part of a liver to meet the need and all that entails, sending a precious son to be deployed as a new Marine, waiting on God as a beloved husband and father battles ALS, overcoming cancer and life changes, financial shockers and job loss.....the list goes on. Sometimes I just need God's Holy 2x4 to the forehead to get some perspective.
It has arrived, I’m happy to report, and with it, joy. Joy in realizing how rich we (my family, my friends, and I) are in all the things money can’t buy, how blessed we are by God's gift to us and by those who love us, and how, if you climb to the very top of my laundry pile and lean left, you can see the snow covered Sierras out the top of the bathroom window.
Copyright 2008
Anyone else feeling a little less than “Jingle-Belly” about the whole Christmas, jam-packed schedule? I don't mean to be grumpy and grouchy. It's just that I'm so good at it I hate to let all that practice go to waste.
Just yesterday, Jamie and I were driving along on our way to his company Christmas party. It really was a worthwhile event this year. They decided to dispense with the over-the-top dressy affair and keep it very low key, using the money they would have spent and blessing six needy families instead. We all brought grocery items and had a great lunch. But that didn't stop us from grousing the whole way there about just another thing to do and how many other "just another thing-s" we had to complete. We were so ridiculous Jamie finally looked at me and said, "What else can we gripe about now?!" "Have yourself a crabby little Christmas........"
The time pressures can bring out the worst, I guess. It put me in mind of a Christmas season long past. Hannah was about four and wanting to be in the middle of every single thing I did in the kitchen. That was fun for the first 32 hours of the day. But now it was 10pm and I was down to piecrust I was trying out, for the first time, in the food processor. Martha Stewart (that self-righteous irritant) made it look so simple the day before on her show. My first crust stuck to the top and was fit for gluing wood flooring to the concrete. The next resembled birdseed and stuck together like Sahara sand. I blew that out and started over, again. In the meantime, Hannah stood beside me saying things like, "Can I do it? What's wrong with it? Can I do it? Why is it wet? Can I do it? Why is it dry? Can I do it? What's wrong, Mommy? Can I do it? Why are you making that face, Mommy? Can I do it?"
I felt my inner Grinch flexing his muscles as I told her, "Hannah! Mommy REALLY needs to do this alone. You need to leave the kitchen now and just let me do this myself!" She reluctantly left muttering, "Well, I don't know why I can't do it." The next thing I heard was a phone conversation from the stairs. There she sat in the middle of the staircase with her Fisher-Price phone plopped in her lap and the receiver pressed to her ear. "9-9-1? 9-9-1?" she asked the phantom operator who couldn't have cared less that she had misdialed. "You need to come and get my mommy cause she's not right!" Boy howdy.
The year before, when she was three, we had guests staying during Thanksgiving. Hannah was up early and yakking away. I told her more than once to be quiet since people were still sleeping. Finally I cornered her in the hallway, stared at her eyeball-to-eyeball and firmly told her she HAD to keep it down. She looked back at me just as determinedly, pointed her finger at me and replied, "You better keep YOUR crabby voice quiet, too!" Checkmate.
So, what the heck's the matter with me this year? Deferred preparations might be part of it. There hasn't been any time to break ground on Christmas around here. December 13th and no sign of the Christmas season at our house. I'm trying to knock everyone and everything out of the way so I can start celebrating joyfully. Reminds me of Sunday mornings when we're running late. The standing joke in our house is to yell at every pokey-joe motorist, "GET OUT OF THE WAY, DANG IT! WE'RE TRYING TO GET TO CHURCH AND WORSHIP THE LORD!!" Beware oxymorons driving down the road. We might run over you, too.
The weird thing is, I have actually loved every single event we've attended this Christmas season. That hasn't been the problem. It's those spaces between the events where I get into trouble. The ones where I actually have to be grateful for four hours of sleep and haul it up anyway; the health issues I can't control; the moments in the kitchen believing wholeheartedly that counters are only a theory (as I haven’t seen them in days) and something else must be holding up this assemblage of dishes and debris; the effort expended trying to decide if Sir Edmund Hillary could have scaled a mountain the size of my laundry pile.
But now, just one day later, there are days like today. I spend time with my love-em-to-pieces teens in my Sunday school class....my pastor/dear friend gently exhorts us from the pulpit.....my perspective shifts. I begin to count my blessings and realize I managed to buy a Christmas tree in three minutes flat last night. No lie. Hannah decorated the mantle and got the decorations out yesterday in my absence. Jamie put the lights on the house. Hunter played a shepherd in a Christmas production and, with the fake penciled-in beard and headdress that looked more like a 40's fedora, managed to emulate a mafia gangster shepherding his sheep and made me nearly drop the camera laughing.
I was also overcome with the blessings of incredible friends we're surrounded by so much of the time, but especially in the last 72 hours of event-laden days and evenings. We've all been running in the same circles but many of us are facing rough challenges: A very needed liver transplant and declining health, offering to donate part of a liver to meet the need and all that entails, sending a precious son to be deployed as a new Marine, waiting on God as a beloved husband and father battles ALS, overcoming cancer and life changes, financial shockers and job loss.....the list goes on. Sometimes I just need God's Holy 2x4 to the forehead to get some perspective.
It has arrived, I’m happy to report, and with it, joy. Joy in realizing how rich we (my family, my friends, and I) are in all the things money can’t buy, how blessed we are by God's gift to us and by those who love us, and how, if you climb to the very top of my laundry pile and lean left, you can see the snow covered Sierras out the top of the bathroom window.
Copyright 2008
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Observational Twitter 2
Esoteric:
"That which does not kill us makes us stronger." Friedrich Nietzsche
Exoteric:
"That which does not kill us leaves us maimed, bleeding, and disabled." Robynn Reilly
Copyright 2008
"That which does not kill us makes us stronger." Friedrich Nietzsche
Exoteric:
"That which does not kill us leaves us maimed, bleeding, and disabled." Robynn Reilly
Copyright 2008
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Doughnuts and Fools
A doughnut sang me a song this morning. It had a lovely voice.
Actually, I'm not sure if it was the doughnut or the sugar, or both, but it was effective and soon we had a trio going. I always end up singing lead in these little productions but I'll hum the tune all alone when I step on the scale tomorrow. I'd like to say I just don't know how this happened but I have EVERY idea how it happened.
Sugar signed on as my paramour very early on and I encouraged all courting. We'd break up occasionally but this marriage of passion caused us to work things out quickly. I did get wiser as time went on and finally asked for a divorce. But it seems we're very modern and it has remained way too friendly between us. Bitterness would have been better.
I started out with hope. I was a proud, defiant, skinny-little-anorexic-anemic when I was four. I ruled over food and threatened to pummel it if it got near my mouth. I endured needle jabs to check iron levels, ominous threats, and enemy attacks in the form of spankings in the food wars, but I remained steadfast until one day: I discovered candy at the corner liquor store. Ah, Dominic's Liquor. The siren's call to the local drunks and willing children with left-over coins from our mothers' cast off purses.
It was down the block and across Blackstone Avenue. We navigated the streets regularly, my sister and I, along with the other neighborhood addicts. In the summer our bare feet would be dyed with road grime and we'd choose the painted white lines of the crosswalk to avoid third degree burns from the fry-an-egg asphalt. My heart would flutter a little when Dominic's would loom into view with its welcoming double-doors thrown open wide. What could compete with the cool, loamy smelling, darkened interior of booze and Sugar Babies? The Jim Beam decorator bottles of cars and horses and ladies in skirts were almost as enticing as the row of Necco's wafers, candy cigarettes, tiny wax soda bottles full of dyed sugar water, and little chocolate babies you could chew up. But sleeves of Sixlets and our day-long attractions, Big Hunks, were calling and we rushed to answer.
My best friend of this era was Jackie Doke. For the first six years of my life we lived directly across the street from each other. She was also brazen in her search for the sugar high. She was allowed to walk to the ice-cream store alone. One day she came strolling down the street with two dripping cones, one in each hand. What did she need two cones for? I tried to wheedle one out of her. She must have been anticipating this attack and planning her move. She'd give me one, she said, for a price. Go find something I knew she wanted and the ice-cream was mine. I rushed through my front door and dashed around my room quickly weighing my options. Not the white stuffed cat with the blue glass eyes....my now estranged father had given that to me......hmmm, it would have to be the three-foot-tall walking doll. Yes, that was it. We struck a deal, I ate the ice-cream, and the doll was gone. Jackie's mother, Juanita, called a short time later to return my plastic pseudo-child but my mother was resolute: a deal's a deal. It wasn't my birthright, as with Esau and Jacob, but I did regret it for a long time after my sugar stupor wore off. Jackie and ice-cream will be forever etched in my memory with a near DNA link.
I sometimes wonder, as I look back, if I loved certain people for who they were or for the treats they offered. The two were often inextricable. My paternal grandmother, Nana, always kept a huge bowl of M&M's on her table. The estranged father's future mother-in-law (I KNOW), Ola May, would buy me sweet bananas, which I craved as though I were King Kong. I hope I at least said hello to both of these old ladies as I eyed the objects of my gustatory heaven.
But doughnuts, oh my, they came looking for ME. By the time I was eight we were living in the Projects; that run down part of town relegated to the down-on-your-luck, prostitutes, and drug users. I fit right in. For a nickel I could savor my way into another world. The "Doughnut Man" drove a slow moving truck that steamily idled its way through the neighborhood on cold, foggy mornings. When he spied you he would stop, open the big doors on the back, and slide out steaming trays of fresh, glazed doughnuts. The taste would never be equaled in all my future doughnut exploits and the intoxicating fragrance drifting off those trays will linger forever. I was always and only a nickel away from euphoria.
So, maybe it was all of those things coming back to me this morning as I left a 7am appointment feeling entitled to some sort of reward for due diligence and grown-up responsibility. I knew those were the thoughts of a fool but fools do fool themselves and listen to siren songs. And shouldn't you keep your friends close and your enemies closer? I wonder if a lifetime on your gut is close enough.
Copyright 12/2008
Actually, I'm not sure if it was the doughnut or the sugar, or both, but it was effective and soon we had a trio going. I always end up singing lead in these little productions but I'll hum the tune all alone when I step on the scale tomorrow. I'd like to say I just don't know how this happened but I have EVERY idea how it happened.
Sugar signed on as my paramour very early on and I encouraged all courting. We'd break up occasionally but this marriage of passion caused us to work things out quickly. I did get wiser as time went on and finally asked for a divorce. But it seems we're very modern and it has remained way too friendly between us. Bitterness would have been better.
I started out with hope. I was a proud, defiant, skinny-little-anorexic-anemic when I was four. I ruled over food and threatened to pummel it if it got near my mouth. I endured needle jabs to check iron levels, ominous threats, and enemy attacks in the form of spankings in the food wars, but I remained steadfast until one day: I discovered candy at the corner liquor store. Ah, Dominic's Liquor. The siren's call to the local drunks and willing children with left-over coins from our mothers' cast off purses.
It was down the block and across Blackstone Avenue. We navigated the streets regularly, my sister and I, along with the other neighborhood addicts. In the summer our bare feet would be dyed with road grime and we'd choose the painted white lines of the crosswalk to avoid third degree burns from the fry-an-egg asphalt. My heart would flutter a little when Dominic's would loom into view with its welcoming double-doors thrown open wide. What could compete with the cool, loamy smelling, darkened interior of booze and Sugar Babies? The Jim Beam decorator bottles of cars and horses and ladies in skirts were almost as enticing as the row of Necco's wafers, candy cigarettes, tiny wax soda bottles full of dyed sugar water, and little chocolate babies you could chew up. But sleeves of Sixlets and our day-long attractions, Big Hunks, were calling and we rushed to answer.
My best friend of this era was Jackie Doke. For the first six years of my life we lived directly across the street from each other. She was also brazen in her search for the sugar high. She was allowed to walk to the ice-cream store alone. One day she came strolling down the street with two dripping cones, one in each hand. What did she need two cones for? I tried to wheedle one out of her. She must have been anticipating this attack and planning her move. She'd give me one, she said, for a price. Go find something I knew she wanted and the ice-cream was mine. I rushed through my front door and dashed around my room quickly weighing my options. Not the white stuffed cat with the blue glass eyes....my now estranged father had given that to me......hmmm, it would have to be the three-foot-tall walking doll. Yes, that was it. We struck a deal, I ate the ice-cream, and the doll was gone. Jackie's mother, Juanita, called a short time later to return my plastic pseudo-child but my mother was resolute: a deal's a deal. It wasn't my birthright, as with Esau and Jacob, but I did regret it for a long time after my sugar stupor wore off. Jackie and ice-cream will be forever etched in my memory with a near DNA link.
I sometimes wonder, as I look back, if I loved certain people for who they were or for the treats they offered. The two were often inextricable. My paternal grandmother, Nana, always kept a huge bowl of M&M's on her table. The estranged father's future mother-in-law (I KNOW), Ola May, would buy me sweet bananas, which I craved as though I were King Kong. I hope I at least said hello to both of these old ladies as I eyed the objects of my gustatory heaven.
But doughnuts, oh my, they came looking for ME. By the time I was eight we were living in the Projects; that run down part of town relegated to the down-on-your-luck, prostitutes, and drug users. I fit right in. For a nickel I could savor my way into another world. The "Doughnut Man" drove a slow moving truck that steamily idled its way through the neighborhood on cold, foggy mornings. When he spied you he would stop, open the big doors on the back, and slide out steaming trays of fresh, glazed doughnuts. The taste would never be equaled in all my future doughnut exploits and the intoxicating fragrance drifting off those trays will linger forever. I was always and only a nickel away from euphoria.
So, maybe it was all of those things coming back to me this morning as I left a 7am appointment feeling entitled to some sort of reward for due diligence and grown-up responsibility. I knew those were the thoughts of a fool but fools do fool themselves and listen to siren songs. And shouldn't you keep your friends close and your enemies closer? I wonder if a lifetime on your gut is close enough.
Copyright 12/2008
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