Rain King

I love gray, rainy days in the winter in California. As I sat watching the weather on the news this morning, I realized that we are already halfway through January, February is always a short month, and once March goes by we will be in Spring. I run the risk of being ostracized by those of you hungry for the sun and warmth for what I am about to say...I am not ready for the spring yet. (Gasp!) We have had nowhere near the amount of rain we usually have by this point, and a rainy California winter is what I am hungry for. I love having the fire going, something warm to eat cooking on the stove, a cup of tea, and a good book. I also love putting on my headphones and immersing myself in music that is suited for a gray, wet day, such as the Counting Crows (poor Adam Duritz just can't sing a happy summer song and make you believe that he feels it.) By the middle of March, when the sun starts to tease us with warm temperatures and then retreats for our final cold snap, I will probably be longing for short sleeves and flip flops. But, for now, I am reveling in the falling rain.

Short Story

Tonight I can't think of anything to write. I have been having a lot of negative feelings about people around me, things I'm doing, and just life in general, and I don't think that it is very conducive to my writing. And so, in lieu of trying to write something and just ending up with blather, I am going to post a piece of writing from about a year ago. It is just a short (short) story that I wrote for my creative writing class.

Consequences of an Afternoon

“My taste in music is what would be politely called eccentric, but really the word strange is more accurate,” Ethan said to Sarah’s back as her index finger ran the length of his shelves of CDs. She spun around quickly, brown hair whipping behind her; she hadn’t realized that he had entered the room.

“No, no, you aren’t strange, I mean, your music isn’t strange,” she stumbled, trying to overcome the feeling that she had been caught doing something wrong. She had entered this room through an open door while trying to escape the chatter of other classmates enjoying the gathering. “Your choice in music is really varied, just like mine.” She watched as Ethan sat on a well-worn brown sofa directly across from the shelves she had been perusing. Looking around, she saw that the room was lined with windows, with shelves on every wall from the windowsills down filled with books and CDs, as well some expensive looking pieces of stereo equipment. The sofa was the only piece of furniture in the room. “Is all this music yours?”

“Yeah, the books too. I guess this is kind of like my own library – my parents just leave me to myself in here.” Ethan’s piercing blue eyes stared at Sarah from under his shaggy dark hair. “I’m glad you came. I didn’t know if you would, since you don’t really know anyone but me.”

“I almost didn’t – my Dad wouldn’t have let me, but then he left, so I did too.” Sarah closed her mouth quickly; she always said more than she meant to around Ethan. ‘Thanks for inviting me’ would have been just fine. At least she had stopped herself before telling him that she didn’t care about not knowing anyone but him at the party -that he was the only one she wanted to know anyway.

“Well, I’m glad you did,” he repeated, his eyes shifting away from her face to where his hands were fumbling with the zipper on his sweatshirt. He stretched one arm across the back of the couch to stop the nervous fiddling. “Parents can really be a pain can’t they?” he commented, rolling his eyes.

“Yeah, right, a pain,” she mumbled in agreement, looking out a window into the gray afternoon. “Anyway, it’s nice to see your house,” Sarah said after a minute, shaking her head to break her gaze and train of thought and turning to where Ethan sat. “I was wondering what it looked like after hearing so much about your family.”

“It’s a pretty standard house, I think,” Ethan responded, looking around the room. “You know, we do talk about my family a lot,” he directed his gaze back at Sarah, “but you really haven’t told me anything about yours.”

“Not much to tell. I’ve got a dad, a mom, and a couple younger brothers.” She moved to sit by him on the couch, the sagging cushions pulling her into Ethan’s side. She would have struggled against gravity and the timeworn groove of the sofa, but Ethan didn’t seem to mind the closeness of her body, so she stayed where she was, staring straight ahead and avoiding eye contact. “Should you get back out there to the party?” she asked, hoping to change the subject but not actually wanting him to go.

“Nah, they’re fine – they are so wrapped up in the video games I don’t think they even noticed I left. It wasn’t even really my idea to have everyone over before the football game tonight. My mom suggested it in front of Chad, and he jumped on the idea so quick I couldn’t tell him and the others no. I’ve kind of been around less lately since I started eating lunch with you, and mostly they’ve just quit trying to hang out with me.” Sarah didn’t think Ethan sounded sad about this. A glance to the side told her that his eyes had shifted straight ahead as well.

“I meant to thank you for sitting with me - it’s been nice having someone to eat with,” she said softly, “I sat alone for the first few days after I moved here, and I always felt like people were staring at me. I like talking to you.” She closed her mouth abruptly again.

“I like it too,” he said. They sat silent for a moment, listening to the laughter and talking against the background of the video game in the other room. Sarah laid her head on Ethan’s shoulder without thinking, but realized it was too personal and started to sit up. “No, stay there,” he said quietly. She relaxed her neck and her head rested on his shoulder once again. She was surprised at how natural it felt, how right. She looked up at him and felt an irrepressible desire to press her lips to the underside of his chin. She did so, wondering how he would react. His hand went to her hair, stroking it a few times. Her heart fluttered, and her cheeks grew warm as he took her hand and laid his head on hers. They sat that way for a while in silence, until a voice from the other room called out for Ethan.

“Dude, we’ve got to go get ready for the game tonight.”

Sarah didn’t know who was talking, but she and Ethan stood up, and he slowly dropped her hand, looking into her eyes for a moment before turning and leaving the room. She stayed where she was, willing her face to return to its normal color as she listened to the scuffs of tennis shoes against linoleum and complaints that it had started raining. She heard goodbyes and then a door closed, and a minute later Ethan was back. Suddenly, panic hit her. “What time is it?” she asked quickly.

“About four.”

“I need to go home,” she said briskly, “I didn’t know how late it was.” She moved around Ethan and out of the room, making her way to the front door.

“I’ll take you,” his voice was right behind her. Sarah kept moving toward the door.

“No, you can’t. It’s ok, I can walk. That’s how I got here,” she explained in a rush. She opened the door and stepped onto the red brick of the front steps.

“But it’s raining now, and you don’t even have a jacket. Just let me take you.” She heard the jingle of car keys being pulled from their hook and the door shutting behind them, footsteps following her down the walk.

“No, you don’t know where I live, you can’t…” she trailed off as she turned to look at him standing in the rain staring at her with concern on his face. He took her hand and looked her in the eye.

“I don’t care where you live,” he said intently. “Please, let me take you home.”

“Alright,” Sarah sighed resignedly. “Let’s just go.”

In the car, Ethan drove with one hand on the wheel, the fingers of his other hand interlaced with Sarah’s over the gearshift. It was quiet except for the occasional direction she gave him. She tried to keep her eyes trained on the road ahead, but couldn’t fight her urge to give surreptitious glances in Ethan’s direction to gauge his reaction as they entered the neighborhoods near her home. To her surprise, she read nothing there but joy, something that was mirrored in her own heart at the pressure of his hand on hers. She knew she should be worried about what was coming, but all she could feel was happiness.

The car slowed as it bumped through the muddy lane where she lived, jostling Sarah out of her euphoria.

“You can let me out here. I’ll walk down to my house,” she said, looking at Ethan as he turned his face to her.

“And let you get all muddy?” he kept driving. Sarah groaned as they approached a dingy yellow house, gasping slightly at the sight of a beat up blue pickup out front.

“That’s it – that’s my house. My dad is already home. I’ve got to go,” she said hurriedly, removing her hand from Ethan’s and trying to unbuckle her seat belt quickly. She heard the car shut off, and her eyes flew to Ethan’s face.

“I thought maybe I could come in and see where you live,” Ethan sounded hopeful. “I’m not quite ready to let you go yet.”

“No!” Sarah shouted, adding hastily in a quieter voice, “You can’t come in now. I’m going to be in trouble, and I’ve got to go.” She opened the car door with shaking hands.

“Maybe I could come in and talk to your dad – maybe if he met me, he wouldn’t mind letting you hang out.”

Sarah turned back to face Ethan, putting one trembling hand on the side of his face.

“No, you really can’t meet my dad. I need you to go as soon as I get out of the car – don’t listen to anything you might hear and please don’t call me tonight.” Ethan’s face fell as he misinterpreted her words. “Look, Ethan, thank you so much for inviting me today – it may have been the best afternoon I’ve ever had. I am going to be in a lot trouble when I go inside, but it was worth it. I will see you at school. Save me a seat at lunch?” She knew she must sound crazy, but his confused expression turned into a smile as she quickly brought his hand to her lips, kissed it and got out of the car.

Sarah hurried up the dirt walk to her front door, not looking back as she heard Ethan’s car start. The front door opened before she could reach the knob, and she stared down at her father’s muddy steel toe work boots. She could still hear the car idling behind her, and she silently pleaded for him to go.

“Where have you been?” her father drawled. “Who said you could leave the house?” He grabbed her by the arm and yanked her in the door, kicking her leg out from beneath her so that she hit the floor. Sarah heard the car pull away just before her dad shut the front door, and she sighed quietly knowing that Ethan was out of sight and the range of sound. “Did you say something?” her father’s words slurred drunkenly.

“No sir,” she said quietly, bracing herself for what was coming. It’s all worth it, she thought to herself as she felt the force of steel meeting her ribs. She was already looking forward to lunch at school the next day.

Old Friends

"Life is partly what we make it, and partly what it is made by the friends we choose." Tennessee Williams

Today I am feeling especially grateful for old friends. One of my bestest from high school, Gretchen, is in the area this weekend visiting her parents, and so we got to go to lunch today and then to tool around the book store. It was wonderful. It is amazing to have friends who, no matter how much time between visits or how different your lives are, you can get together with and just fall back into a familiar pattern as though no time has passed. It never feels awkward or stilted, just normal and fun. It is one advantage to living in the same area you grew up in - everyone's parents still live here, so even if my friends move away, they always come back to visit. I love them so much, and love seeing them.

Gretchen graduated a year before me, and has lived in the L.A. area ever since. She does wardrobe for the show 24, but doesn't think a thing of it. She has worked on many shows and met many stars, but she never talks about it unless I ask, and even when she does talk about it, she is so not taken in by the glamour of Hollywood. They are just people she sees at work, some of them are jerks, and some of them are not.

When I lived in Utah, Jon sent an email out to a bunch of old friends from high school a bit before my birthday, asking anyone who could to come out and surprise me for my birthday as I had been kind of lonely. Gretchen answered the call, and the day before my birthday she knocked on my door. How many people pay to fly out to surprise you just because your husband asks them to? Gretchen is one of a kind, to be sure, and I am so grateful to have her as a friend.

The Girls

So I have a new theory that your level of productivity can be measured by what time you put on a bra in the morning. Typically, the longer you go without a bra, the less productive you are, because let's face it, how much can you possibly do with your girl's just hanging out and swinging around? Putting a bra on keeps them in place and (mostly) out of the way. A few days ago, I didn't shower until about 1 in the afternoon. While this in and of itself is not that strange for me, the fact that in all that time I also never stopped to put on a bra is. Generally after about an hour without one, when I am up and moving around, they make themselves known and pretty much demand to be supported. But maybe even they need a day off once in a while. They do, after all, work pretty hard.

(oh, and for those of you keeping track, I didn't write on this blog yesterday, but I did write on another one, so I am still keeping with writing every day.)

Clutter

I find myself day dreaming of organization. Baskets and tubs and shelves for everything, room for all the stuff we have accumulated. A home with enough rooms for our children to only share with one other sibling, where they will have room for their things. A home where nothing is all over the floor simply because there is no where else to put it. I long for a garage where I can keep extra drawers with the off-season clothing, so that on those freak warm days in the spring that only last a week, my kids aren't dying in their jeans and sweaters because their t-shirts are in storage.

I would love to have a laundry room where the dirty clothes go each night rather than filling up a basket in a bedroom to overflowing. Cupboards and drawers in the bathroom for all of my hair products and beauty things, where everything can live and is within arms reach while I am in the shower. A closet with enough space to hold my clothes and shoes, so that nothing is piled on top of each other and what I want is easy to find.

My life is hard enough without the piles of clothes and books and bags on the floor at the foot of my bed, waiting to trip me in the dark hours of the morning. Without the minefield of toys in the kids' room when I precariously pick my way through to wake them in the morning. All of the clutter and the mess only makes me more stressed, adding to my frustration and putting me that much closer to the breaking point. And yet, all I can do is dream, because for right now, all of the stuff, like me, has nowhere else to go.

Apply Within

Sitting at yet another dinner with only my children for company, I could finally see why women whose husbands work at night or work out of town cook their children a separate meal. I didn't quite understand before why they would do nights on end of chicken nuggets or cereal (besides the reason of simply not wanting to cook another meal, which believe me, I understand.) But tonight, after I had put in all the effort for spaghetti sauce, which was wonderful by the way, I sat at the table wishing that I could leave my children there to eat on their own without feeling like a bad mother. I love my kids, I do. And at least some of the time, some of them actually appreciate the fact that I have cooked. But spending another evening meal listening to them talk on and on (I am trying not to use the word "incessantly" as it seems very negative to use on your kids) with their only intended audience being yours truly, made me want to run away crying.

I miss having my husband home to really appreciate the effort I make for dinner, and to listen to everything the kids have to say so that I can zone out once in a while (which I do anyway, but it ends up with them saying "Mommy, mommy, mommy" until I respond.) Let alone missing some actual adult conversation at the dinner table. I am glad that my kids are now fed and happy, but all I wanted to do was take my plate into the living room and read while I ate.

Maybe what I need is a nighttime husband - just someone to come in and fill in from before dinnertime to the time the kids go down. He could offer to help make dinner, help the kids with their homework while I focus on cooking, then talk with me while we eat as well as listening to the kids talk. After dinner he could complement me on the meal, then help clean up, get the kids showered and dressed for bed, and then help tuck them in. Then he could leave - it would be a 3 hour window, 4 max. Know anyone who wants the position? It's only pay is a yummy, home cooked meal and some conversation with a pretty cute lady...

My daughter the racist

Here I am, sitting at the computer, thinking that there is nothing to do, when I remember that Sundays do count in the "write something every day" goal, and therefor there is, in fact, something to do. I am finding that the problem I am running into is what to write about. My life is not so exciting that there are just endless entertaining anecdotes to choose from...although now that I think of it, Hailey said something today that caught my attention.

The kids were starting a movie, and there was a preview on it for The Princess and the Frog, which we had the pleasure of seeing on Christmas Eve. As I pass the living room and start down the hallway on my way to the bathroom, I hear Hailey say "I thought she looked better when she was the frog because she wasn't black." Whoa whoa whoa...I turned around and came back down the hallway and started with "That isn't nice Hailey," then stood there at a loss for what else to say. I finally asked her why she liked Tiana better when she wasn't black, to which she responded that she looked more like a princess that way. WHAT??? Ok, at what point did my daughter become a racist? And where did it come from? I talked to her, explaining that black women can be princesses too, and that black people are our equals. Apparently she doesn't really think black people are pretty. OH MY GOSH.

I have no idea where this way of thinking has come from in my daughter. We don't even really talk about race as an issue in our home, because all people are equal in our minds. (Ok, wait, that may not be completely true - we don't talk about black people - we do occasionally make fun of Mexicans because my mother-in-law is one - but I am thinking that needs to stop before something bad comes of it.) But perhaps that is where we have gone wrong - maybe that has allowed her to form other thoughts and ideas based on what she is hearing somewhere else (although she says she hasn't heard anything about black people anywhere else.) I don't know. Jon says she inherited the genetics from my grandfather, a terminal racist from Missouri. This from the man whose grandmother told us once "Did you know that colored people are just like us?" with a tone of surprise in her voice. (Just for the record, Hailey wasn't around either of these people when they were ever talking about other races.) If it is genetic, we are in trouble.

So how do I impress upon my child that all people are equal, without making it seem like such a big deal that she ends up talking about it on the playground, which will inevitably make us all sound like racists?