Spring Concert with soprano and bass

Yesterday, I was wondering where all the fulfillment is that those parenting ads promise.  The kids bickered all afternoon, and all through dinner.  Time-outs were issued.  Threats made. Desserts rescinded.  Screen time nixed.  And yet the insults, the screaming, the crying, the pulling of the hair, the swatting of the bodies continued.  I had no other option but to take my book ("How to be Idle"), with tea and cookies in the conservatory while they duked it out.  And it wasn't even amusing squabbling either, not about evolution, god, or the afterlife, just bland stuff. Frankly, I don't even think I ever knew what it was about.

And it turned one's mind to foster care.  You know?  What about foster care?  Just a weekend.  I could pretend to be high, and then pull myself together real quick.  I know some good families taking foster kids right now. 

But it turned out to be Coyote's First Grade Musical night.  Why do they always plan these things for after he needs a haircut and right before he gets one?!  Not this time:  I subjected that kid to the fastest, crookest shave possible.  It was like a sheep sheering contest and when it was done I flung up my hands and looked for the score cards to show my standing.   He'll need a secondary trim this evening.  But at least we could see his eyes.  The hair in front of them was gone and I hadn't poked them out, even though he was sure I would and squirmed enough to make it likely.

And then we got in the car and they fought the whole way to school, where we met Huck, and I buried my head in his chest and begged him to take me far from here.  But instead we went in and sat on folding chairs which looked like they might spontaneously fulfill their mission while you were using them.

And suddenly: there was Coyote, gleaming in his white button down shirt, tucked in to gray pants, and goofing off like crazy with all his friends.  Coyote, as you might glean from his name, is a rabble rouser. Every time I see that kid at school, he's organizing some rebellion or sneak attack.  I was so proud and so smiley that my teeth and lips dried up and I got stuck open.  There!  YES!  That is the reward!  Watching your son push his teacher's buttons and create mayhem among the children.  THAT, my friends, is the pay off.  I was so glad to see he had friends.  It's been a long, hard struggled and he won.

And then they stood up there on the risers and sang Rhyme-in-Time plus a bunch of Raffi songs which the people behind us found hilarious and I was thinking "Um... haven't we all just spent the past six years singing these ad nauseum until we long for death to all our senses, in particular our hearing?"  But "O loke to ote ote ote opples and bononos" was knee-smacking funny in the row behind us.

And then... and then... I saw all those kids up there... in their Sunday best... smiling and singing their hearts out.  And I saw all these weddings, and births, and funerals, and graduations, and firsts and lasts, all the big big moments.  A lifetime of big moments for all 65 kids up there.  And I just fell apart.  I wept.  I am not one for the weeping.  But it was so intense and overwhelming and beautiful and perfect and sad and simply amazing.  I tried to hold it together.  I choked down my louder sobs.  But the rush of emotion was so intense, the tears just shoved their way out, rammed down the walls of my stubborn Dutch stoicism and poured down my cheeks.

And Oh! There was Coyote.  Happy incarnate.  And clean.  I could see his eyes.  His freckles.  His perfect soul reaching for the high notes.

Check out that bow!

And then it was over.  Some kid barfed, of course.  And we all went home.
And I felt as mercurial as the spring weather.  Sunshine now.  Storms again. And then a long long rain (or snow, whatever, it's supposed to be rain).

As I tucked him in to bed, he says, "Wasn't that a great concert, mom?"  "Oh yes."  "Didn't I do a great job, mom?"  "Oh yes."  "I really liked that."  "Me too."

DOA

Grim Reaper at Lincoln City

It's spring and in spring one's mind naturally turns towards death, as snowdrops turn their droopy heads toward the compost they sprung from.  I don't know why death is so dear to me lately.  Since high school, when our school's smartest and snarliest guy went all blase about someone's dear relative's death and drolled, "Death is just as much a part of life as life is,"  I've understood this concept.  And I have contemplated it in detail.  For what is life for, other than thinking about death?  I am no aimless wanderer, I know just where all of this living is headed.  I know where I am going and I think it behooves me to spend most of my journey contemplating exactly that.  I'm kidding.  Living, is just as much a part of death as death is.  So, now we've figured out the destination but I'm still not sure which road I'm taking to get there.  But I seem to be getting closer anyway.  Maybe death is more of an as-the-crow-flies thing instead of an as-they-slapped-down-the-roads issue.

I've thought a lot about death.  Not what comes after.  There's no point in thinking about that.  This doesn't keep my children from constantly arguing about it, however.  While other people's kids fight over the remote control, mine come to blows over the afterlife.  We had another round just this Tuesday, as a matter of fact. Blue: nothing.  Coyote: heaven.  Blue: nothing.  Coyote: god. 

Actually, I have thought about what comes after death, a pointless exercise or not.  I just can't help myself. 
And I've thought about how I'll die. Usually, what happens is, I get a runny nose.  And my differential goes like this: Lou Gehrig's?  Ebola? Alzheimers?  Cancer? pre-cancer?  I can usually talk myself down to "cold" but it might take an hour or two.  Maybe it will be an industrial accident and that's why I don't want to go to work.  Anyway, thinking about how I'll die is also kind of pointless.  Thinking itself seems kind of pointless, frankly.  But that never seems to stop me for doing it, and doing it too much.  Perhaps THAT's what makes people go cross-eyed.

But back to death,  I think lots of other pointless and ineffectual things about death.  Such as how come we seem so opposed?  Why do we keep making it legally impossible?  Between the FAA and dragged out death scenes that go on for years, and sometimes decades, it seems the one thing we Americans can't tolerate is death. 

And also, I think about why death exists at all.

Maiden, Mother, Crone

Of course, just like everyone else on this planet, I don't relish enduring the death of a loved one. Ick.  And I don't really like to imagine them enduring my death, if they really love me like they say they do.  And I tend to be superstitious about it.  I don't imagine that in most cases it is pleasant to endure, whatever part you're playing.  It's the suffering associated with it.  It's the missing.  And the finality. No one can make amends then.  No one can say that one last important thing.  And I fear and dread that aspect of it.  The going-on when it's over for a part of you.  So other than death totally sucking and being perhaps the worst part about life,  there are other things to think about it. 

I can think a lot of things about a lot of topics, as you can probably tell, but sometimes after thinking about something, reasoning it out, coming to logical conclusions (I did get a 4.0 in Logic) or not so logical, the truth of what I've thought-out will wash over me as an emotional/spiritual wave.  And I'll suddenly get it, like a religious experience: oh my god! That's true!  And I'll feel it all over, in all my buzzing little cells.

Death of a Ruddy Duck Pinata.

And that's death for me right now. I am so very thankful for death.  Death is perhaps one of the greatest miracles (after living, of course) that any of us will ever take part in.  Death is amazing.  Death has done me well.  A) It's made room for me here.  Imagine 14 billion people on this planet.  Nope.  I never would have been born.  And maybe my existence is great or not-so-great to you, but that's all pointless to contemplate.  I'm here now and I've managed to find a way to think that's pretty cool, and I think you should too.  B) Every thing I eat is dead.  Plants, mostly.  All dead. And they all grew from dead things.  I'm out in my garden for hours every day now and I'm up to my elbows in death.  Planting little seeds in it.  Cute, ookey-bookey, lil' seeds.  And killing quack grass, evil serpentine quack grass  C)  I am totally 100% post-consumer recycled product. I am ABC gum.  Everything in me has already been caught, devoured, and released.  And here I am. 


And I feel it.  I stretch out on my spring dirt.  I make full-body contact with it.  I lay in my garden rows, and I feel that dirt all along me.  And that glorious death.  A riot of death.  A hootenanny of death.  A bosom of death.  Ahhh... bury me alive... in all this death...but leave a little air hole for now.

Henry's Lube Job

I read that high power careers require at least two people, one to have the career and the other to get the groceries (or hire and manage the person who does) and clean the pool (or at least be home for the pool cleaner) and hook up the phone lines (or standby between 9 and 4 waiting for the schmuck who does) and to get the oil changed.  Despite lacking "high power", Huck doesn't have time to do this crap. And what else am I doing but standing around looking like a dirty hamper for time-sucking banality.

Blue celebrates Mardi Gras

Since the Honda dealership can never seem to find my name in their computer (I was once eventually found in "corporate accounts" BECAUSE that was the Only way they could put my name in correctly BECAUSE the computer program deosn't recognize spaces in last names BECAUSE computer programmers are a bunch of crap-heads names Johnson and Johnson who haven't left their mother's basement in 12 years and have no idea there are O'Murphys and Van Cracks BECAUSE we have yet to revolt and slaughter them all BECAUSE we are weak and we continue to let them make us feel small.)  and because I have to make an Appointment and because when I arrive no one knows I'm supposed to be there because, again, no one can find my name in the computer.

So this time, I decided to try the new place near our grocery store (I'd tell you the name, but experience tells me that would just result in a lot of comments from their marketers on my blog).  As I drove up, I almost noticed the flashing yellow lights in the warning center of my brain: Something Is Not Right Here.  And these signals came in the form of Natty Gan hats, tweed cutie pies which I myself own.  "Oh Geez," I said to Blue, "They make them wear demeaning costumes."  But when the grease monkey jogged to my car and handed me a menu, I realized that the hats were actually really HOT!  And I almost asked him if he could perform my lube job by turning around and dipping a la Hefner's bunnies (Listen, I just finished his bio and all this trivia is still floating around my cranium).  No bunny tails, however.

Bummer #1)  that wasn't the guy who serviced my car, he was just the hostesser
Bummer #2) I was informed that at this special establishment, I would be sitting in my car while they worked on it.  Meaning: no sharing a small enclosure with strangers as we take turns attempting to cajole the broken soda fountain to give up the goods.  Meaning: no jogging through wind and cold to a holding tank that stinks of car farts and contains leering strangers.  The bummer is sitting in my car.

He handed me a newspaper and I was good to go.  Until 20 minutes later.  I  was still sitting in my car and I was still waiting my turn.  But Oh!  Turns out that was the good time.

I drive over the pit.  And here is this screen right next to me with four live-action boys-in-hats views.  I can see one bending over the hood and two below, all butt-shots that aren't entirely ready for their close-up, and I realize that this is the oil change of choice for paranoids and undiscriminating gay men.  Here I have the opportunity to monitor their every move and pretend I'm making sure they do it right or just stare at their jumper-clad hinies.  But I don't know what it is they do anyway and I can't see any meaningful details in the grainy butt-cams.  What I do get, however is an earful of eavesdropped "office" politics.  Let's just say the acrostic for TEAM here was, roughly, "Bite Me."

The other problem is that I can feel them working on the car. Beneath me.  Beneath my butt.  And this probably never occured to the man who dreamed up this plan, but the whole operation had a very gynecological exam feel to it and I actually squirmed and tightened.

Well, you say, at least you brought a good book to read.  Fabulous, actually.  Peter Sagal's hilarious and smart "The Book of Vice."  Unfortunately (and here is where this business idea finally makes sense) I was interrupted every 30 seconds with "courtesy offers" and up-sales. I'd stupidly rolled right in to this trap.  I was literally a captive audience and this grease-monkey-cum-wiper-shark kept interrupting the chapter on consumption to encourage new this and new that and flushing 8 different fluids and changing 12 types of filters.

As all trapped animals, I became snarly and started baring my teeth.  And when I said no to another intervention, he says, "Oh, you had that done at your periodical, mandatory 120k money flush?" (I'm paraphrasing).

I don't do those. Because this is how it goes: I bring the car in, even though it works fine.  I am inconvenienced all over town and several hours later, they give it back and it's still just fine but my bank account has a $600 gushing gash in it.  And then three months later, I'm at an oil hange and they suggest I need all my fluids rearranged again.  And I say, "That's impossible! I just had the 80k!"  And they say, "Oh, but we don't do that at the 80k."  "Then what the Hell do you do at the 80k for $600?"  I hiss.  So now, if it's dirty it gets changed and if it's not, we drive on by.

After a while, every time this capped kid opens his mouth, I just yell "NO."  Nancy Reagan would be so proud.  And once I got the rhythm down, I just yelled "NO" through my window every 30 seconds.

By the time we left, my butt was numb.  I'd been sitting in my car for over an hour.  Worse than Seattle rush hour.  I'm kidding, at least I moved 10 feet.  But for all that time, we could have been in Ritzville by now.

Deflections on the Good Life

We hustled some hot muffins over to the octogenarian-ette neighbor because she's been laid up with an infected knee.  She's about the sweetest and fanciest thing ever.  She claims to be a city girl, although she moved out here to her husband's mega-acre farm when she was 17.  She drove in to town every day to be a "big city" nurse and still claims to be clueless about farming.  One admires the chutzpah to claim a life totally separate from your husband's.  We adore her.

Seated in her living room, she relishes the company and launches in to a thrilling recap of her Bible Study Fellowship class.  She fishes out her Bible and reads the week's verse, pontificating and expounding upon Isaiah's wisdom and ... how to put that...psychic?... abilities.  I listen.  I let her enthusiasm billow over me.  I try to find points of agreement and stick with those.  I tell her I'm so happy she's getting so much out of that.  "Would you like to come some time?"  She invites.  There's a rabid faith in her eyes, a foaming pit bull who won't take "no" for an answer.  A blood hound.  Can she hear my panicked rabbit heart spasming? Can she smell the fear I am most certainly excreting from my freaked-out glands? How did we get here?  How did I get to this spot where I have to tell this old sweetie pie to shove it?  But rest assured dear readers, I have tools!  I have giant deflectors.

I have become a master of deflection, a journeyman of dodginess.  Here are the tools of my trade:

1a) I say, "I am very involved in my church and don't think I can fit another thing in!"  I love saying I go to church.  In this part of Washington state, it accords you privileges and dignity.  People trust you.  Like you.  People think the best of you and you are free to go.

b) the second part of this tool comes when she asks, "What church do you go to?"
"We are Unitarian Universalists."  I rely on her not knowing what that is, but assuming it's like Lutheran or Episcopal... close enough.  It's camoflage: is that a shrub over there?  or some chick army crawling under Jesus-barbed wire?  Although I tell her the name several times, she clearly can't place exactly what it is.  I like that.

2)  As she rhapsodizes about her church, which in next to ours, and looks like a giant ark with mood lighting and remote controlled curtains, I take my opportunity to further deflect.  I say, "My father is a Pastor."
"OH MY!  What denomination?"
"Non-denominational Protestant generally, but now he's a Mennonite Pastor."
I try to feel no shame using my father's job as cover.  I've done it before.  It once landed me an apartment when I sorely needed one.  When I use this tool, I feel like a feminist stripper:  being a woman is such a crappy, bottom position in this society that I might as well fill my panties with money and make the most of it.
My father's job, unlike most father's jobs, has been my cross to bear... and not because of him.  I recently chatted with someone who was talking about a pastor and his family as if they were all part of a package deal, a hero and his unpaid side-kicks.  My visceral response vacillated between needing an air-sickness-baggie and dieing to bash heads together.  People deny it when pressed, but it's true, the pastor's family is a special brood of gawk-worthy freaks who are just part of his circus act.  I know he tried to shield us from this fate and I could probably fill a very tedious, self-involved book-length blog post about all this but I'll stop right here.  The point is that although I no longer consider myself the Pastor's Daughter, it did impact my formative years as much as if my parents had tattooed my entire body to look like a tiger and made me jump through flaming hoops.  So, if I can occasionally pull something out of that that works to my benefit, I have no... or rather, few.... qualms about doing so.

3)  Deflection device three I didn't use here, but have accessed plenty.  Another one of those: I-paid-the-price,-I'm-leaving-with-my-merchandise situations.  This one goes, "I went to Bible College."  Never mind that I engaged in so much youthful carousing and follies and pool my second semester at the U.S.'s smallest accredited college in the smallest town in central Alaska that when I told them I wasn't returning for a second year, they assured me that I hadn't been invited to anyway.

I feel a little unctuous and smarmy using these tools, like an over-priced, un-showered plumber.

As we left, she says at the door, "I am just so glad to know that I have such good, nice, Christian neighbors!" And Blue looks at me, "Uh...MOM!?"  I smile huge, say SHSHSH, and kick Blue's foot, the universal mother-sign for: shutupshutupshutup.  I turn to M and gush, "It was so good to see you.  We'll come to visit again soon!"

As we walk down her driveway, Blue says, "But MOM!  We're not Christians!"

Maybe I am a Christian after all!

"I know."
"But why didn't you correct her?"
"Because that is a very long conversation and I have to get dinner going.  I didn't mean to be dishonest.  I just didn't want to talk about it."  And what am I supposed to say when she packages it all up that way?  Oh, Sorry neighbor lady, but we're not Christian, we're not nice, and we're not good.  But we are your neighbors, so good luck with that!
"You weren't dishonest," Blue assures, "You told her, like, three times that we're Unitarians."
"Yeah, but I was relying on the fact that she wouldn't know what that was."

There is hilarity and irony in this set of deflectors I have and I am sure there are many South Carolina mall-walkers who would be thrilled to gloat right now.  I spent my teen years approaching strangers every Wednesday night, "witnessing"...  sometimes to serious screamers whose feelings I now get.  I "witnessed" on buses, airplanes, street corners, Lane Bryant.  So I now understand the proselytizer's "thinking" and I sometimes feel it's my penance to put up with it all.  I can't imagine how irritating and annoying I must have been, perky teen pushing "answers".

My Unitarian friends seemed split on how to deal with those of religious persuasions that won't just let us go to hell.  For myself, I can feel the love of the Jesus-Converter; convinced I'm going to hell for eternity, what else can they do if they care at all?  I don't mind if Mormon's induct me into their books or whatever.  And I love to hear that people are praying for me... depends on what they're praying.

But other Unitarians are angered by the affront to their integrity and autonomy and tell all comers to shove-it.  Some felt the noblest path was stating you are not a Christian and then allowing people to see you are good anyway.  Be true to yourself!  And yet, I felt that in this scenario, being true to myself was going home and making dinner.

Some Unitarians, including me, felt that avoiding the topic was a fine way to go, especially in the eastern side of the state and especially when dealing with 80-some year old widows who aren't known for changing their world views.  We do this because we have other things to do with our time and energy, like making dinner.  We don't want to get involved in these discussions willy-nilly as they are exhausting and frequently fruitless.  And because many seem to then filter everything you do through the "Not-good, not-nice, not-Christian" filter. So we quietly deflect and move on with our lives, being good, nice, and dodgy Unitarian neighbors.