I come today bearing this photo of a tree frog that Corb took, the other night. We discovered it clinging for dear life, stuck halfway up our front door, after a rainstorm.
I also come bearing a secret.
( Read more... )
Today at work, I was talking to my favorite grill chef, Scally, as I stood in line for lunch. Scally's a big whale of a guy, even-tempered and garrulous, with a tiny little mustache under his big snout that wiggles when he smiles. He also makes one heck of a tuna fish sandwich, too. Nice and toasty, just the way Jesus likes it.
"Had a nice 4th," said Scally, wiping the blood from a fatted calf onto his greasy apron. "Served the family up some steak. Easy to make, too. Not much work, and oh, was it nice going down with a can of beer."
"Hey, Scally," I said, suddenly remembering something. "You're a good cook, right?"
Scally's tiny mustache did a little wiggle. "If you say so, Ted."
"I have a friend who says that corn tastes best when when it's boiled for three minutes. Three minutes, exactly. No more, no less. Is that true?"
Scally shrugged. "That's not how I make it. I think corn tastes best if you keep it in the husk and fry it up on the grill. Cooks in its own juices that way. All you do is to run the husk under some water, wipe the water off so that it's not too soggy, and then throw it on the grill for about seven minutes or so. Perfect that way."
"Really?" I asked.
"Nothing better. Give it a try!" he said, and gave me that day my daily gruel.
"You know how my mother-in-law makes it?" my friend David said at the lunch table, as he wrestled with a squished plum. "Places an ear in the microwave for about five minutes. Sounds scary, but tastes just fine."
Hmmm. Maybe there's more than one way to skin an ear of corn. "Interesting," I said to David. "I might just have to post about corn, again."
"You should," he replied. "After all, the internet is for corn!"
"Just what you need!" I exclaimed. "Now you can wrap your body at night around the images of your favorite transgendered rock stars!"
"If you think they're different, you should see my new favorite, Cinema Bizarre. They're from Berlin!"
Of course, at this, the real patriot in me flared up. "Why can't you support good old-fashioned American groups?" I said. "This is simply un-American! Did you know that when our forefathers founded American, they only listened to good old fashioned American rock music? None of this foreign crap! You should do the same!"
"What kind of rock music did they listen to?" asked Ashes, curious.
At last, a chance to share a teaching moment with my child. "Oh, all sorts! They all had their own rock bands! George Washington was a member of that seminal sixties band, the Wooden Teeth! John Adams had his Beer Bellies! And Benjamin Franklin was the founding member of Benjamin and the Frank-tones."
"What about John Hancock?" she asked.
"We don't talk about his group," I said, sternly.
It's something we've been doing since before I had kids, when I was a kid, actually, around 16 or 17. And it's one of those things that grows more enjoyable, in many ways, with each passing year. I've grown quite dependent on these Independence days.
Of course, things change over time. My grandmother, a staple of these celebrations for so many years, has been gone for five years now. And last year, the party had been cancelled, owing to an illness. My parents own the place with two friends, Cathy and Jim, and Cathy's mother has stopped going, because she spends most of her time in bed, now. Corb couldn't go this year, because he had to work, and I missed him.
Still, it's the touches that endure that I cherish. Chili at two, followed by a paddleboat ride across the pond in the mid-afternoon. Games in the patio of the beach house, and hamburgers at around five. Conversations on the deck. And then, at night, sitting on the beach, watching the firework displays and bonfires taking place across the bay.
Each year has changes and additions, too, of course. This year, my friends Pauline and Jo-Anne. Both of them are heading off to Vermont with us in a few weeks, and they're good company. Jo-Anne knows the value of banter. I like banter. I really enjoyed my conversations with Jim's nephew John, who has been going for many years now, but I've never really spoken to, in depth. It was a nice discovery.
This year, we didn't light a bonfire, but we did have fireworks displays on either side of us, closer than we've ever had before. Our gold standard has always been a fireworks display that Jim's father, who passed away many years ago, set up about fifteen years ago. These were almost as good, although in a laissez faire sort of way, since we had nothing to do with them, directly.
The best part of time is the night time, I think. Sitting in the darkness, in a flimsy folding chair, watching all that's going on around me. Scattered bits of song. Laughter and bickering. Watching the fireworks burst forth, random flickers of light.
I kind of like to think that the ghosts of prior celebrations like to join us at that point. Watching, as I am, those that are assembled, watching all the changes that have taken place. Watching how folks have gotten older, how relationships have changed. Under cover of the darkness, time becomes timeless, years start to blend. This one speck in time becomes bigger than it is, spans the decades, unites for just a moment.
It's the moments of unity that I enjoy most. Under the firework sky.
The good news for me is that, finally, after ten days of unrelenting rain, New England is actually seeing sunshine, today. That means that the annual July 4th celebration at my dad's beach house can actually take place, which makes me happy. I hate it when certain traditions can't be observed.
The bad news is that Corb can't be a part of it. He has to work all week-end long, until around one tomorrow. And of course, he's not that happy about it.
On the plus side, seven days from now, we both have two weeks vacation time coming to us. The first week is just going to be for the two of us, and we've decided to call that part of the vacation "The vacation location that must not be named." So, we're keeping it a complete secret, just between the two of us.
The second week will be with the kids, and right now, it looks as though we might be renting a place in Vermont. However, that's kind of tentative, as it involves my friend Pauline and my oldest, and both are them are kind of being iffy about things. That's okay, though. If it doesn't happen, we have a plan B in mind for the kidlets.
In between, we have all sorts of other things we have to take care of this month. My mom and dad are having a 45th wedding anniversary. Josie's celebrating her 40th year of existence. And, between now and vacation, I have a ton of work that I have to wrap up.
It almost makes last month look easy.
Other than that, this has been a good week-end. Did a ton of cleaning, and wrapped up the first draft of Chapter 17 of "Pictures of You." Then had a nervous breakdown about the plotting of the book last night, and thought about rearranging the last few chapters entirely. This morning, though, I realized that there was a reason that I plotted things the way I did, and so now I'm back to the original outline, with a few twists to the next few chapters that I hadn't originally intended.
Ooops, Pauline's at the apartment already. Time to start the day. Ciao!
WHAT I'M READING: Naked, by David Sedaris
WHAT I'M WRITING: Plotting Chapters 18-20, Pictures of You
Corb is currently sitting on our balcony with the heels of his feet jammed into two giant pink grapefruits.
Nope, you read that correctly. And no, I couldn't possibly be making something like that up.
Two grapefruits stuck to the bottoms of his huge size 14 hams.
"They're eating away at the dead skin, and making them smooth," he explained to me. "I read about it in a magazine."
Ah. That explains everything.
Apparently, it works on elbows, too.
So here I sit, writing this entry on the balcony, while Corb sits beside me, with his dead skin slowly being eaten away by citric acid.
Anyway, I couldn't let the absurdity of this situation go by without commenting on it, but what I really meant to write about tonight was this string of high profile celebrity deaths that have plagued this nation, recently.
No, I'm not talking about the lesser lights that have dimmed. That informercial guy, for example, or Fred Travelena. I'm sorry, I feel very bad for the families, but my idea of superstardom is not some guy pushing Oxy-clean on the cable in the wee small hours of the morning. As for Fred Travelena, I remember him from TV game shows. An impersonator, right? So I guess, in that respect, we've actually lost 300 stars in one day. Talk about "Night of a 100 stars"!
No, I'm talking about the biggies. Ed McMahon, Farrah, and of course, Michael.
This past Sunday morning, political junkie that I am, I was getting my weekly fix and happened across George Stephonopolis and his round table. Peggy Noonan was talking. I actually like her: she's the one conservative commentator that doesn't make me want to throw my television set across the room, in part because she usually treats the "other side" with a bit of decency and respect. Other commentators from both side of the political spectrum would be wise to take a few tips from her.
Anyway, she said that the reason that people are making such a big deal over "these three" is that, in this day and age, we're never again going to see stars as big as they are, ever again. To illustrate this, she talked about Michael Jackson performing the moonwalk at the Motown 25th anniversary awards, so many years ago. "I saw it, and my daughter saw it, and my mother called me up on the phone, and she had seen it, too," she said. "You just will never get that kind of commonality, ever again."
I don't know. I well remember a day when the old timers used to talk about Hollywood legends such as Bette Davis and Humphrey Bogart, and say things like, "You'll never see stars like that again." Or, as Norma Desmond once said, about silent movie stars, "It's the pictures that got small."
But have our stars gotten even smaller, since then? Kristen Chenoweth aside, is our shared experience so diminished that there will never again be stars such as Ed, Farrah, or Michael again?
No, I think not. Stardom is forever, after all. It's just the mediums that change. First there were silent pictures, then the talkies. Then came the rise of the small screen. And these three were from that age, certainly: the age of television. Ed McMahon was broadcast into our bedroom every evening for thirty years. Farrah made her claim to fame in one short year on ABS. And Michael, for all his recordings, truly made the small screen his own, particularly on MTV. Who hasn't seen Thriller at least a dozen times?
Now television is, admittedly, fracturing into a million different pieces. But there will be common denominators to replace it: the internet, certainly, and whatever the next big thing is.
Still, it makes me wonder. Will we be talking about William Hung in such hushed tones, upon his passing, thirty years from now?
Ooops, gotta go. The dinner buzzer just went off, and Corb has just gotten up from his seat to get everything ready. The heels of his feet are covered in pinky pulp! I tell you, this night just keeps getting better and better.
Have to say, I'm really happy this month is coming to an end.
About three weeks ago, I printed out a calendar for the month, and then circled everything I had to do. Honestly, the month looked absolutely impossible.
First off, I had agreed to call a show for two weeks. Then I headed off for a two-day work trip in New Jersey. After that, I had a two-day work trip to New York. Both trips involved travel by car, which meant hours behind the wheel.
The whole month was capped off by an all-day volunteer event yesterday. My company was helping to build a playground in Providence, and that involved waking up early on a Saturday followed by hours of hauling tarp-fulls of mulch. These are two things that Teds hate.
By the end of the day, every muscle in my body was aching, I was covered in mulch and sweat, and all I wanted was to go home and take a long bath.
That's when my cell phone rang.
( Read more... )
First he's missing for a week, supposedly hiking in the Appalachian mountains. Next, his car is found at an airport in Atlanta. Then he says he's been to Argentina...now we learn his wife asked him to separate after she discovered he'd been unfaithful, and finally, he reveals himself to the world, with the news that he's spent the last five days "crying in Argentina."
I remember the last time I cried for five days in Argentina.
You all remember it, too. Don't you? I'm positive I journaled all about it. Ah, memories!
It was while I was still married to Josie. I was a big cheese at the time, the mayor of Eldredge. One night, when I was supposed to be busy raising taxes, wifey caught me at a halfway house in flagrante delicto with three calls girls, a midget, and beloved Broadway icon Liza Minelli.
First, Josie was shocked. Then she was mildly intrigued. Then she asked Liza Minelli to sing "New York, New York" for her. Then she tried to figure out what fit where. And then, she told me that the town of Eldredge wasn't big enough for the two of us. At least, for two weeks.
My heart broken, I did the only thing I could think of. I packed up the call girls, the midget, and Liza in a wrinkled brown duffel bag, and booked the next red eye headed straight for Buenos Aires.
One hour later, there I was, bawling my eyes out at my favorite hovel down Argentine way, drowning my sorrows in a cheap bottle of Rio Ricardo and crying like there was no manana.
Suddenly, there was a knock on the hotel room door. "Who is it?" I asked, and stumbled over to open it.
There she was, in all her glory. Eva Peron.
"Are you crying for ME?" she asked, looking like she was about to hit me with a descamisado.
I shook my head.
"Oh. Okay." She turned around. She left.
Liza unzipped the duffel bag, climbed out, and started singing "I've Never Been to Me." I returned to drowning my sorrows, while Liza played on.
"I've been undressed by kings," I thought to myself. "And I've seen some things, that a woman aint supposed to--"
(Tape is deliberately erased at this point.)
Today's view from the balcony is: sometimes kids just plain suck.
So, Tuesday night, Ashes asked me, once again, whether there was anything I could do to get her into Honors English at school. This has been something of a cause for her, and I think it's a good one. Even so, I tried to explain to her that I had already tried twice, and that the reason that she probably wasn't being considered is because she had a C her second quarter and a D for her mid-term (although that was, admittedly, because she took the test late, because she had the flu).
But I do want to encourage her, and since it is a course that she has a lot of interest in, I promised her I'd try, and Wednesday morning, I wrote to her teacher. Who wrote back. And her response was: "Okay."
So, they've rearranged her schedule for next year, and now she's in honors English, and I feel pretty damn good about the whole thing. Go, me!
I called up Josie to let her know, and then I said, "But watch. She'll say thank you, and then, yell at me about something else I didn't do."
Last night, when I arrived home, the kids started getting on my ass about supper, so I turned to Corb and he suggested that we go to eat. I immediately knew what the response was going to be: Ashes would be all for it, and Theo, who hates going out to eat, was going to give me a rash of shit.
Sure enough, that's what happened, but since I had given in to Theo last time we had suggested going out, I decided to hold firm this time.
That is, until we started out to the car.
There, stretched out on the front steps, was a pretty, deeply tanned, long-legged twenty-something, casually smoking a cigarette. It was a new neighbor of ours, and she had not gone unnoticed by my son. In fact, as we passed her, Ashes tapped Theo on the shoulder and said, loudly, "Look, it's your girlfriend."
The minute they got into the car, they started hitting each other. "Stop that!" I said.
Ashes laughed at me. "You think that's going to make me stop?" said Ashes.
"She said that girl's my girlfriend," fumed Theo.
"Because you like her," said Ashes.
"I know!" said Theo.
"Which is ridiculous, because she's twice your age," said Corb. "What is she going to do, say, 'Oh my God! He's feel the same way about me that I do, and we can run away together!'"
"Well, anyway," I said, thinking about how I'd feel if someone did that to me. "It was really embarrassing to Theo. Ashes, please stop staying things like that Theo."
Ashes snorted. "Like that's going to stop me."
"What?"
"I'll say whatever I want," she said.
"Then there's no way we're going out to dinner," I said.
"Whatever," she said, and turned her iPod back on.
"My family is so retarded," said Theo.
So, that was it. Corb and I looked at each other, and decided to forget about going out to dinner, and just go to the supermarket, instead.
As we passed the restaurant, Ashes said, "Why aren't you stopping?"
"We're not going out any more," I said.
"That's so gay," she said dismissively.
We pulled into the parking lot of the supermarket. "We have to go in with you?" she asked.
"Yep."
"That is SO gay!" she said.
Well, okay. Whatever. Corb and I walked around the supermarket, with the kids tailing behind like puppies. The two of us bought whatever the hell we felt like for dinner. And, when we returned home, Corb went out to sit on the balcony for a bit. I joined him, a few minutes later.
"It's their attitude that was driving me crazy," said Corb.
"I know!" I said. "It's so frustrating. Maybe we should just cancel our two week vacation. Or just leave them at home with Josie. That'd serve them right."
I sit there, thinking gloomy thoughts, looking out onto the pond.
About five minutes later, Ashes opened the screen door, and sat next to me on the balcony. I pretended to ignore her.
"Daddy," she said, after a minute. "I'm sorry."
"You were awfully rotten in the car," I said gruffly.
"I know. That's just the way I am," she said, sounding as sweet as can be.
"Well..." And I have to admit, my heart started to soften. Or maybe it just grew a few sizes larger.
Properly chastised, we actually had a pretty good dinner. And then, afterwards, Ashes and I went out for a walk around the pond, just the two of us.
Okay. well, maybe kids don't suck that much...well, not ALL the time.
It's amazing the emotions that your children can inspire in you. The highs, the lows, the needless fears. I wish it was more of a level surface, but for some reason, being a parent tends to be a roller coaster, more than anything else. Sometimes I feel that all I can do is to clutch the front of my seat and try to hang on for dear life. Even so, there are moments...good moments. And they do help you forget all the really stressful times.
Unless, that is, you write them down, so you can use them for blackmail in the future.
And that dear friends, is the purpose of today's balcony view.
Our apartment complex, despite all the complaining I've done in the past about the management (and in particular, about the dreaded Drill Sergeant), does have one truly redeeming feature: the apartments are all grouped around a peaceful pond, which affords a really nice view. I always had in my mind, when we first moved in here, visions of sitting outside at night, stretching my legs out after a long day at work.
Only problem is, it never really happened.
Honestly, I very rarely venture out onto the balcony. Part of the reason is that Mr. Benjamin, our next door neighbor, has his balcony about a foot away from ours. He's a nice enough guy and all that, but I always saw my balcony visits to be somewhat solitary affairs. Maybe Corb. Maybe the kids. No next door neighbors, certainly.
Th other reason is even sillier. Ever since the fall from Josie's storage area about five years ago, where I broke two ribs, I've had something of a fear of heights going on. Nothing that obvious...I don't scream and close my eyes when I cross over bridges or anything. However, we live on the third floor, and our balcony is somewhat rickety looking, and the combination has been a huge deterrent. For the most part, my time on the balcony has been limited to five minutes at a time. Well, except for the time that Corb locked us out of the apartment, and I had to climb up the fire escape and wait outside in the dark for about a half an hour, until the apartment complex came around with a duplicate key.
This past week, however, Corb has been on a balcony revitalization kick. He's always the idea guy like that...I could very easily just live in a room full of kitschy orange seventies furniture, and be as happy as a clam. He likes changing things, revising things. Which is fine by me...I just go along for the ride.
So, he's added a floor rug, and huge pots, where he's planted morning glories. And blinking summer lights, strung all around the railings. Last night when I arrived home from New York, I realized that he had purchased new chairs, far more comfortable than the plastic ones we had.
And I thought to myself, "Ah, what the hell? Time to get over your fears and give the balcony a chance."
So, here I am, typing away, and watching the wild Canadian geese that make their home in the pond, nibbling away on the grass beneath the balcony. Their babies are almost full grown now, and are in the final flush of that awkward adolescence period.
I've told myself that I'm going to try, this summer, to spin a few tales from the balcony. Just about...anything. I want to post more stories to Live Journal, and maybe this will help me achieve that goal. In any event, we'll see how it goes.
"I like sitting out here," said Corb, as we watched the sun set this evening, just a few minutes ago. "It's like a room of the apartment we've never used."
Cut to prevent spoiler warning
( Read more... )
So, I read this, and I think to myself...why don't I want my life to be anything like that?
Pump my kids full of neuroenhancers to give them an edge over other kids? That's for helicoptor parents who are obsessed with being better than everyone else and have to send their kids to the best schools and brag about how their kids performed better than anyone else in the class. Why in earth would I really want to inflict something like that upon my children? My children will live their lives and make their way in this world. I have no desire to force them into a mindset where they have to look at things constantly as an endless rat race where you have to do all you can to get ahead. Why? What for? What's the point? What do you win at the end?
Spend my life endlessly working? Wringing my hands all day, worrying about whether I'm being efficient enough? Whether I've worked enough hours? Why? What the hell kind of life is that? I'm much happier putting in a full week of work, but then having time for things I truly enjoy, truly derive meaning and satisfaction from: my family, reading, theater, occasionally going on adventures, traveling, and writing insane posts about things like giant hemorrhoids the size of a baby's fist and Bristol Palin dressing up as a superhero to fight for abstinence.
Don't get me wrong. I think I'm more than productive. I do good at work, I get involved with theater, I'm happy with my writing output. I just think that one should spend a healthy amount of one's life focusing on more frivolous pursuits. Laugh a little. Have a good meal. Maybe a few drinks, every now and then. Socialize. Tell tall tales.
That's what makes for a life well lived. It's not just about direction, because ultimately, that direction is meaningless and ever-shifting. Sometimes it's what you do between direction that's far, far more gratifying.
"I have to stay home and take care of my husband," said my friend Sarah on the phone yesterday morning, as I called in on my way to work.
"What's wrong with him?" I asked. "Sleeping sickness? Loss of limb? Swine flu?"
"Even worse," she said. "Hemorrhoids."
"Get out!" I cried out delightedly, the ten-year-old boy inside me rearing his wicked little head.
"Yeah," she said. "He has this huge hemorrhoid. It's bigger than a baby's fist! You should see it."
I thought about that for a minute. "Um, no. I'd rather not," I replied.
"He's had it all week-end, and it just keeps getting bigger and bigger. So, I'm taking him to the doctor this morning."
Around noon, Sarah came in to work for about an hour. Curious, I scuttled out of my cubicle and moved over to her desk. "So how did things go?"
"Oh, it was awful!" she whispered, her eyes growing wide. "They had to lance the hemorrhoid and drain it, and it was disgusting to watch. There was all this clotted blood spewing out of it! And even worse..." She closed her eyes and winced. "After they were done, the doctor told me that after I got him home, I was going to have to drain it for him."
"Drain it?" I asked.
"By squeezing down on the hemorrhoid...like a teabag!" I recoiled from her desk, shaken to my very core.
"Corb," I said that night, as we were buying dinner dinner at the Stop and Grab. "I love you very much, but I don't know if I'd ever be able to squeeze your giant hemorrhoids like a teabag."
Corb raised an eyebrow, amused. "Oh really?"
"No, sorry," I said. "I thought that story about Bobby Brown digging poop out of Whitney's bum was gross and unreasonable, and surely a sign of true love. But as much as I truly love you, I just couldn't dig poop out of your bum. And I truly, truly, couldn't squeeze your hemorrhoids, no matter how much you needed me to. We'd have to hire a maid."
Corb thought about that for a moment. "Fair enough."
As we were packing the groceries into the car, I turned to him. "I wonder though," I said. "I mean, if you love someone, I guess you could do anything. It would be nauseating, but I guess...well, maybe you wouldn't have to hire a maid."
"What I want to know is, how is he going to the bathroom? Using toilet paper? That must be agony."
"She says he's been constipated for three days. Maybe it's nature's way of compensating," I said. And then, I paused for a moment. "Could you?"
Corb opened up his car and looked at me. "Could I what?"
"You know...pop mine? If I really needed you to?"
"No," said Corb, shaking his head. "But I'd be happy to hand you a pair of plyers."
Photo by Corbett.
As a result of all the work I put in on The Late Night Show during the winter months, something had to give, and what gave was my commitment to directing the annual spring play that my friends at the Eldredge Singers put on, which this year is 42nd Street . I was sad about the whole matter, because it's a great group of people and I always feel good about the show we spend six months laboring over.
Fortunately, when the big guy closes a door, he opens a window somewhere...although sometimes, that window's located in the outhouse! Not in this case, though, as I was asked to call the show they're doing. Calling, for those who don't know, means that I sit on my ass in a lighting booth and bark out instructions to folks who really know what they're doing and when to do it, and don't need me to nagging them to get it done. Plus, I get to hear all the conversations in the headset, which keeps me endlessly amused.
My favorite conversations involve Tony, the musical director for the show. Tony, who's been a best friend for years, loves the moment at the start of the show where he enters dramatically from stage right, dressed in his tuxedo, and receives a spotlight and thundrous applause. To deflate his ego, the headset conversations usually go like this:
ME: "Is the penguin waddling around backstage?"
JAY: "Yep. Should I bring him on?"
ME: "Yes."
JAY: "He wants to know if the orchestra is tuned."
ME: "They are."
JAY: "He wants to know if the house lights are down."
ME: (Deep sigh) "What does he want, a formal invitation? The penguin needs to fly!"
My involvement is basically limited to about a week until the show goes up, and then the first week-end of performances. I have to travel to New Jersey that second week-end. It does mean a bit of scrambling in the family situation...Corb picks up a lot of the slack, thank God.
Not a bad gig, really. I get to see the show come into being and hang around with a lot of people I like for a few days. Plus, having not directed, I don't have to yell at anyone! This I can totally live with...I feel like the favorite uncle who comes to hang around for a few days. The one that hands you five dollar bills and pats your back every now and then.
Last night was opening night, and, as usual, things all managed to work out, despite the insanity of the past week. Sets to be completed, lighting cues to be sorted through, drops and curtains to be raised and lowered...it all came together, thankfully. Which left one thing to do...celebrate.
To make sure that Corb and me get some "us" time, I have deliberately been avoiding going out after rehearsal too much. However, last night was opening night, after all, so I made it a point to be there.
Glad I did, too. I met up with my friend Kim, a marvelous writer who reviewed the play last night, and brought with her a friend that I haven't seen in years, Bev, who I used to work on community theater with almost two decades ago (when I was but a child). It was great to catch up and talk over old times, tell old theater stories, update each other on who's doing what. Although we live in the same town, we now travel in different theater circles, and that makes all the difference.
I love catching up with old friends, and conversations like this:
TED: Is so-and-so still a pain the ass?
BEV: What do you think?
TED: Is so-and-so off the wagon, again?
BEV: What do you think?
Gossip, laughter, singing. And, of course, beer. I sat next to my pal, Sue, and we talked about our trip to New York a few months ago, to Myra, one of the chorus ladies.
MYRA: You go to New York City together, just the two of you?
ME: That's right! I leave Corb home, all alone. It's great! I get to be a heterosexual for the week-end.
MYRA: (Amused) Oh really?
ME: Look, I played a heterosexual for thirty years of my life...you can't expect me to give it up cold turkey, just like that!
At the end of the night, as things were winding down, I was talking to the director of this show, Greg, who's a terrific nice guy and has worked hard to make the show perfect.
Earlier that evening, he said to me that "his job was now done" (although oddly enough, the backstage staff received a slew of notes this morning).
However, as I was talking to him, I started to realize that he was starting to feel the way that I get at this point in the production: the happiness of seeing it come to life, and the sadness of knowing that the show had taken on a life of its own.
"You know the end of 42nd Street, in the movie?" Greg remarked. "The show is a big hit, and everyone's planning the parties they're going to go to, and busy congratulating each other? And there's the director, watching everyone walk away, feeling a bit on the sidelines? That's sort of how I feel, right now."
Yeah, I know that feeling. Directors need their time in the spotlight, too. Then again, there's always the final cast party, and if I know this group, there will be very nice parting gifts, for a job well done.
That helps to kills the pain.
I woke up at 9:30 and read in bed for half an hour.
Then I walked down to the lobby to get Theo and myself some breakfast.
After dropping Theo off at Josie's, I drove home to feed the cats, clean the apartment, pay a few bills, and write three pages of "Pictures of You."
Returned back to the hotel at six and went out to dinner with Corb. Nachos and buffalo wings. I know, not the healthiest, but it was yummy.
Now relaxing in the hotel room. It's a good life!
What I'm Reading: The Second Civil War by Ronald Brownstein
What I'm Writing: Pictures of You, Chapter 16
Although I have to admit, I think I have been moving in a more moderate direction for about six months now. I've been noticing that I spend less time listening to Sirius Left, and more time listening to the far more moderate POTUS political station.
Maybe I'll have to rethink my "nocompromises" name, although honestly, that had nothing to do with politics and everything to do with how I approached my personal life. Still, even in the personal, my life...as with most lives...has been one long string of compromises. And I don't think that's a bad thing, at all.
But what in the world would I call myself, if not nocompromises? I'll have to think about that one for a while...
It started the afternoon after my return home from New York City.
All of a sudden, in the wink of a barfly, my nose started leaking all sorts of stuff. I found myself avoiding everyone at work like the plague, afraid that people would view the unsightly snot faucet that my classic Greek schnoz had become.
Later that night, not only was my nose leaking, but I had a sandpapery sore throat. And, I started to feel all cramped and achy, too. Like I was eighty-years old, or something.
The next morning, for some reason, I woke up in my bed, at around four o'clock. It was about an hour earlier than I needed to awaken. I was all alone, since Corb was away in Virginia this week, studying how to become a better Hotel Manager.
If you ask me, 4:00 in the morning is the worst time of day to wake up. That's when all your worst fears and insecurities take roost. And here's what my inner voice started to say to me:
Swine flu...you've got swine flu...
"No, that's ridiculous!" the more rational part of my brain tried to argue, feebly. "Why in the hell would I have swine flu?"
Think about it... continued that irrational part of my brain, which, by the way, sounds a bit like Jacob Marley scaring the shit out of old Scrooge. You were in New York. Surrounded by people! You spent hours on a train, spent time at Penn Station. You slept in a hotel next to a porn store. You even spent some time at a bus station! You spent hours and hours surrounded by the great unwashed. Swine flu...you've got swine flu!"
You know, the irrational part of your brain is most effective at four in the morning. Frankly, the other guys crammed inside there really weren't awake enough to argue. So there I lay, clinging desperately to my designer bedsheets, eyes staring up morosely at the darkened ceiling, my body shaking, convinced that I had contracted the deadly dreaded swine flu, and only had a few days to live.
"Is this how my life was to play out?" I wondered. Never knowing if my book would be published? Never getting to see my children grow up and get married? Well, okay, yes. Yes, I've already seen one child grow up and get married. Stop arguing with me!
Should I go to work that day? If I truly had swine flu, I could contaminate and kill the whole office. Should I even get near my kids? Should they go to school? Swine flu's most dangerous to young men. Had I doomed Theo to a chaste, unloved life?
Should I alert the media? Should I put into action my "as I lay dying" plan, where I would call everyone to my bedside, one by one, and recite to them in exacting detail every single bad thing that they had ever done to me, so that by the time each person left me that person was left a broken shell of a human being, and there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth?
Would I get the time to carry out my plan? It would take a lot of phone calls. And, travel time. Could people work it into their schedule? How much time did I have, exactly?
I tell you, that hour of my life was a miserable one, a time spent wallowing in fear and loathing. Now that I think about it, it was almost exactly the way I felt the night that I lost my virginity to a trampy chorus girl after a performance of You're a Good man, Charlie Brown.
And even worse, all during this time, and for the next two days, one song was playing through my head, continuously. That stupid Kara DioGuardi song from the American Idol finals. Over and over again. Every step you climb another mountain... How about if I don't want to climb another mountain with every step? What the hell am I, a Von Trapp? Somebody, kill me. Please!
Be that as it may, I am happy to report that, this morning, my throat started to feel a little bit less like sandpaper.
And, the snot factory has shut down, for the most part. I don't feel as achy as I had, either.
And from this, I can only draw one firm conclusion.
I am a swine flu SURVIVOR.
"Grrrr!"
I could hear Corb growling from the bathroom, and knew he was mad at me for something. "What did I do now?" I asked, from my seat on the computer.
"Did you use my towel when you shaved your beard last night?" he yelled out.
Well, I hadn't really thought about which towel I was using. "Ummm...maybe?" I called back. "Why?"
"Why? Because it's gross! So now I just came out of the shower and I've got beard clippings all over...grrrr!"
I tried to ignore him, because I knew it was a losing battle.
"Dammit! I think I'm going to have to jump into the shower again!"
"Just use another towel," I called out.
"I will...after I hop in the shower!"
After a thirty minute sprinkle, he was at it again. "Let's see how you like it!" he called out. "I think I'll shit in your towel and let it dry all night. All caked in crap. Let's see how much you like that!"
Sigh. So dramatic...still, I suppose he has a point. Really, I never do think about the towel I use for my beard clippings. The only reason I put a towel over the sink is because he complains about the clippings in the sink, if I don't. I tell you, beauty is not an easy thing to achieve.
And it's not as though he doesn't have his quirks. Try finding use dental picks by the couch. See how much fun that is to pick up. Or, his stinky used socks, which he leaves everywhere. We all have our crosses to bear.
A few minutes later, as he was flipping through his favorite Cranberries songs on his iPhone, I called out, "I love you."
He paused a moment. "I love you, too."
I nodded and headed to the bathroom. Once there, I uncapped the mouthwash and started to pour a splosh out.
Corb watched me from where he was sitting, like a cat observing a bird. "And don't forget to rinse out the cap when you're done," he said.
Grrrr....
In which music, glorious music, which hath the power to soothe the savage beast, only manages to muster in Ted's wicked little soul yet another pathetic round of Catholic guilt.
( Read more... )
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nocompromises- Confessions of a Three Dollar Father-Knows-Best
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