Claim Jumper

Who am I to look down my nose at the plastic island?
They say it’s as big as Texas. Maybe that was the reference that caused my disdain.

Scarcity - money, time, water, food.

Scarcity of space.

I want to try to walk on the plastic island. I wonder if it would hold my weight?
Is it one layer thick of yogurt cups and soda collars and tennis ball containers? Or is it ready to sustain the weight of a 137 pound woman?
I don’t have the proper equipment to really take a good look at it from the underneath;
So I’ll have to just go for it.

You know when someone is trying to rescue another from the thin ice that has formed on a lake or pond? How they sprawl out; they splay their arms and legs wide to distribute their weight evenly?  That’s how I would approach the plastic island.
That approach could be interpreted as respect. Which is funny because just a while ago I hated that damned island. And now I respect it.
I’ve got no money to buy any land. I don’t think anyone has officially claimed all that space on the plastic island.

No one has officially laid claim to me either.
I think this is the beginning of a mutually respectful relationship.

Remodel

If you’ve got a child that won’t go to sleep at night, you may want to reconsider the choices you’ve made in woodwork and drywall textures. 

There are monsters lurking in there:  hideously deformed faces, anguished and weeping, eye sockets empty but seemingly turned upwards - begging for mercy; long-legged beasts with knobby knees, their gangly fingers dangling beside their striated thighs; cigarette smoking dandies with grotesque thoughts on their minds, their perfect teeth clenching quellazaires with ghoulish malevolence; a perfectly normal looking man - at first - until you notice the one bulging eye looking directly at you; an abnormally fat bear with the face of an eagle, its left claw not a claw at all but the bucket of a backhoe, endlessly scooping, scooping, scooping.

Could you sleep with all this going on?

Back and Forth

I used to think babies came out of women’s belly buttons.  I guess the fact that my mother confirmed this misconception didn’t help my quest for truth at all.  So amazed was I that a baby could make it out of that tiny hole.  “It stretches,” my mother explained.

I also used to think that if you got married, you automatically had a baby.  So I wanted my mom to get married again because I wanted a little brother or sister.  I guess the fact that my dad was an unpredictable and raging alcoholic didn’t pose any obstacles, at least for me.

I used to think that all dogs were boys and all cats were girls.  I guess it would make sense that I thought they got married to one another and the girl cats had babies out of their belly buttons, except I couldn’t seem to find a belly button on any of the neighborhood cats.  I didn’t have a cat to examine because my asshole dad didn’t like cats.  He didn’t really like pets at all.  That’s not a good enough reason to call my dad an asshole; I had others.

For a couple of months when I was eight years old, I thought that my eyes were crossing every time I closed them and that they were going to stay that way.  This posed considerable challenges when it was time to close my eyes and go to sleep.  It was painful to close my eyes; I was sure they went instantly crossed.

For a long time I used to want to be a figure skater.  I loved Dorothy Hamill and even got my hair cut like hers.  My sister called it a “wedge” cut.  Dorothy had dark hair and big, straight, white teeth just like me.  I liked her clothes when she skated.  I liked the sparkles.  I liked the way the shoes looked on her feet.  Watching her skate back and forth on the rink was so calming to me.  I was always looking for something to calm me down.  Still am.

Back and Forth.

I got an idea a couple days into my battle with nighttime eye crossing:  I would close my eyes and imagine I was ice skating.  I would watch myself skate back and forth and move my eyes under the lids - back and forth.  Watching would ensure that my eyes weren’t crossing.  I watched myself skate until I fell asleep out of pure exhaustion. 

I used to think I could chop someone’s head off using the paper cutter at school.  That if I could just get someone’s neck under there, I could “pretend” to drop the blade and it would cut straight through; clean.  Such a genius plan, but I could never get my dad to come to my open houses.

Little Battles Children Fight

Summer

Open my eyes; look at the clock.
It's 5:54am; go back to sleep.
Fail; go to the bathroom.
Go back to bed; go back to sleep.
Success.
Dream about a mechanical spider that started out to be a regular spider, but changes as I chase it around the room to kill it.  Try to flush half its body down the toilet.  Why do I think I can flush a robotic spider down the toilet?  Doesn't make sense.  Toilet overflows.  Where's the other half of its body?  Go back into the bedroom.  There it is.  Now it looks like a hermit crab without a shell.  I look away.  I look back.  It is now a mechanical, robot spider again.  But only half of one.  Fear gives way to anger.  Spider starts flexing its big hermit crab-like claws.  I find an acceptable place to pick it up.  I run to the bathroom with it.  It spits a sticky mucousy substance on my fingers that instantly starts to burn my flesh.
I wake up suddenly.
Look at the clock.
5:59am.
Go back to sleep.  Damn spider is still there.
Wake up.  Look at the clock.
8:04am.  Stare at ceiling for seven minutes.
Rub my eyes.  Pull the covers back.
I'm still in my clothes; even my fleece jacket.  Why?
Does it matter?
Take off my clothes and put on another set of clothes.
Head to the bathroom; brush my teeth and pee.
Where are my children?
Oh yeah - they spent the night at their friends' house.
Make it to the couch; my pride and joy; my $2,000 couch.
Grab my laptop; go on Facebook.
Jovie likes my status; so does Dan.
Decide to marathon LOTR trilogy - again.
Update my status with this information.
Get bored with this blog.
I'll finish it later.  Lots of time.
It's summer.

Salt

If I hadn't met you...
My kitchen would be clean
The laundry would be done
I'd have washed the windows and
Cleaned the floor...
Swept after I cleaned, of course.

The dead cat's cat box would be in a landfill
By now.
I'd vacuum more often,
Dust.
If I hadn't met you.

But if not, I'd be alone in this world,
just getting my work done.
No new stories to tell or
feelings to feel.
Quietly listening to what others had lived,
Without you or me.
If I hadn't met you.