That's a bargain, b*tch

Playlist

"I am stunting and flossing and saving money and I’m hella happy. That’s a bargain, bitch, I’mma take your grandpa's style. I’mma take your grandpa's style, no for real, ask your grandpa. Can I have his hand-me-downs?"

- Macklemore, Thrift Shop

Thrift Shop - Macklemore
(Quoted above) A true homage to the emergence of hipster culture into the mainstream, and to the economic downturn. Everybody loves a bargain. Thanks, Macklemore, for bringing art back into the realm of the every day. You are truly the Degas of our time.

As Long As You Love Me - Justin Bieber
The reality here is that love does not make up for poverty or hunger. Let's be real, Justin. Also, you are 12. But clearly this is not your first rodeo, as your song Baby debuted at #5 on the Billboard "Hot 100." Justin, this song, which you wrote when you were actually 12 (maybe?), includes the lyrics "I'll buy you anything. I'll buy you any ring." Don't be stupid Justin, you're 12 and shouldn't be buying rings for anyone. You are too young for marriage. 

Give Me Everything Tonight - Pitbull
Pitbull sings: "Grab somebody sexy, tell 'em hey, give me everything tonight." Can you imagine doing that? In a club or something? Walking over to somebody you think is cute, grabbing them, and saying to them "Give me everything tonight." Can you imagine that working? What would that even mean? Though I guess we're in a similar realm here as Nelly when he says "It's getting hot in herre, so take off all your clothes" to which his lady friend replies "I am getting so hot, I'm gonna take my clothes off." Really? She's totally down. She even re-states his mandate as if it's her idea. It's interesting.

Ignition- R Kelly
Another winner. Mr. Kelly sings, "Sippin on coke and rum, I'm like so what I'm drunk. It's the freakin' weekend baby, I'm about to have me some fun." Yes, R Kelly. whatever, you're drunk, go have fun. It's the weekend!

Tik Tok - Ke$ha
And it's hard to know where to begin with Ke$ha. The truth is that it becomes more unbearable to me every day that I do not have a dollar sign in my name. Furthermore, Ke$ha's use of one of my favorite words - crunk, and her reference to "boys tryin' to touch her junk" make her untouchable (!) in my book. Not that I endorse boys trying to touch anyone's junk willy nilly, I just enjoy a good reference to one's "junk" every once in a while.

Sexy Bitch - Akon & David Guetta
Getting back to basics, the song that really brought me to my current love of mainstream hip-hop. It's really phenomenal; the premise is that this woman he knows is really hot, and he's trying to describe her without being "disrespectful". He's unsuccessful, though I can't imagine that he's really trying that hard. As he explains, "she's nothing you can compare to your neighborhood whore". Classic, Akon. But also, you can do better.

Two Reasons - Trey Songz
The morning after I posted this I woke up at, I kid you not, 6:30 AM thinking, oh no! I forgot about Two Reasons! I proceeded to sing the winning (and practically the only) line in my head on repeat - "I only came here for two reasons, I can't lie. I only came for the bitches and the drinks." Interestingly, having only heard it on the radio, I thought the lyric was "I only came for the ladies and the drinks" which I feel a little better about. Either way, it's worth a mention, and given that my attempts to incorporate the song into my everyday life have been largely unsuccessful*, here it is.

++++++

I work as a nanny and mostly, I love it. Nothing's perfect, but spending lots of time with kids and getting to sleep in is a pretty good deal. I also have the great good fortune to have at my disposal my family's 2000 Toyota Sienna or, as it's become known, the Family Van. No swearing or disrobing in the Family Van. Just kidding, that's pretty much all that happens in there. From time to time the Family Van and my work come together in a magical car ride I like to call "Wait, are those your kids because you look a little young but your hair is disheveled enough that you could be their mom." And one time some kids honked at me as I drove along in the Family Van- clearly some type of Electra-complex situation. The other day, driving my kids back from school, one of them said, "I bet that people looking at you driving think that you're a mom." I started laughing hysterically and said "I bet you're right." I was laughing, I think, because it was either that or the tears. The kids were laughing, I think, at the idea that anybody could mistake me for a mom. Laughable.

I do like to keep things fresh though. I mingle with the youth from time to time, and I try to keep the Family Van's radio tuned into Movin' 99.7 (All the hits!). In the interim I try to keep a sense of humor about the way I spend most of my time, i.e. as a mom/minivan driver. I do things like the Family Van paper-cut above, and wearing my recently inherited maroon velour workout suit from my grandfather. I wore it out once as a joke, but the fun wore off pretty quickly and I felt trapped. Lesson learned.

*Once I sent a group message to a few of my good friends (I have recently discovered group messaging, much to the dismay of my loved ones), one of whom (Nick) is a tattoo artist, containing the following: "Will you support me if I get a tattoo on my lower back that says 'I only came here for the ladies and the drinks.' Also, Nick, will you do a tattoo for me?" The message was largely ignored (appropriately), except for one response, from Nick; he wrote "Yes. And yes." Another time, I went on a first date and when my gentleman friend started a sentence "I used to come here..." I finished it "for the ladies and the drinks?" He said, "Well, I came with my mom, so I guess I came here with a lady." He didn't get the reference.

Worlds Collide with an "Oof"

I drove up north about an hour to see him in the hospital with my cousin and uncle. He looked pretty bad- alarmingly so. I hadn't seen him so sick, and it was a shock. He was all drugged up and feeling rotten and skinny and small in the big bed. It's hard to know what to say, because "how are you feeling" is salt in the wound and it's hard to think about anything else. We didn't hang out long, because attention spans are significantly shortened by pain and morphine, and on our way out of the room, he said "Donald Trump is on the phone." I smiled and nodded, not knowing what to make of it, not wanting to think about it too much because I don't know that I'd want what I'd make of it if I did. My cousin said, "No, look at the TV. It says Donald Trump is on the phone scrolling across the bottom." And I realized that he was making a joke. I laughed, said "I love you" and "Bye."

++++++

Things aren't ever simple. I've had this conversation with a number of people in a variety of contexts, but I think that this is one of the things that makes life and living so phenomenally beautiful. And even when they are simple they don't exist in a vacuum, and they are hopelessly intertwined with something essentially messy or confusing or inconvenient, so they're not really simple anymore. I've been feeling lately that worlds are colliding, but it doesn't look or feel like the big bang (as I imagine it), or like the parts of "Fantasia" that are all dark and color smashing into each other with dramatic music and cymbals* and fear and exploding light. It's more like fumbling or rolling or floating around in the dark, bobbing along without direction and then bumping into something soft and warm with enough force and surprise that out comes an inadvertent grunt, an "Oof." What was that? And then things move along, mostly like before, but there's some shame or embarrassment about the collision, and nothing and no-one is quite sure what just happened, of if it will happen again.

++++++

My grandpa died the other day, in what can only be considered a whirlwind of insanity and calm and coming together and missing each other and talking and turning inward and reflection and confusion and grounding and feeling lost and really, who knows? We went out to dinner to celebrate him the day after, because it's what he wanted, and he didn't want anything else. We went around the table, a long one with family flown in from the east coast and the up north a ways and down south a long ways, and told stories about him. There was no need to innumerate the conflicts and breaks in communication or love or the anger and hurt that we all knew existed, and will live on in ways we can't control. We all knew that was there, but it wasn't time to air that. We were remembering our grandfather and our father, and with no pretense of covering up the dark or repainting the past, we shared.

They were all great stories, from all different parts of his life as well as ours. One of the ones that stood out was a story told by my uncle from when he was about 9, his brother a few years younger, and my mom about 2. It was on a camping trip, my uncle explained, that lasted the whole summer. The family went out in the family car and camped all over the country. One evening in Yellowstone National Park, a dinner of sandwiches and such was laid out for the five of them to eat on the tailgate of the truck. Maybe left out too long, or maybe not, the dinner attracted a bear who began to help him or herself to the meal. My grandpa, furious at the intrusion, grabbed a pot and went to town, whacking the bear away from the meal. These were days when we knew less about preservation, conservation, and bear safety. Apparently. Those of us who'd never heard the story before were slack-jawed; three tiny kids and his wife feet away and he's going head-to-head with a bear? He drove the bear away apparently. My other uncle added, "I remember it a little differently. I remember him getting in the front of the car and shoving the bear in the face with a broom while a neighboring camper shouted 'Wait! I'm going to get my camera!'" They noticed a yellow spot of paint on the bear's head (anyone else see where this is going?) and asked a park ranger on their way out of the park, how the bear's head came to be so marked. The parks had a system, explained the ranger, of marking and relocating bears that had attacked humans. They captured the bear in question, marked its head with a spot of yellow paint, and moved it far away from where humans might encounter it. Oh gosh. Defending life and dinner from a savage bear, a known enemy to humans? My grandpa was a damn superhero.


*Gosh, I'm the worst. I started out with this saying "symbols." Thank goodness I caught it, right? Like the time at camp when I thought I used the word "signet" when playing Contact with campers and staff on a hike. It was my mistake, because one of the kids guessed the other kind of signet, the kind that is a symbol (as on a ring or a necklace) and I had to give it up because even though he guessed a different word, it was kind of the same word. As I explained that I was thinking of the baby swan signet, my fellow counselor called me out and informed us all that the signet that I was thinking of was in fact spelled cygnet, like the constellation Cygnus, and that I was a dumb-face. He didn't say that, but we all knew it.

My tipi door doesn't have a key.

The first shift after a serious conversation with my boss about wages and employment, I'm opening the shop with a co-worker. I arrive and realize that I don't have my key. My heart stops. Well, I thought, my co-worker will have her key. Guess who wrote down the schedule wrong and thought she was coming in at 2? You guessed it, because I target a highbrow and overly-educated audience, my co-worker. And being the luckiest person on the planet, my father was at Peet's getting me coffee (I already said it, I'm the luckiest). So I coerced him into taking me back home and then back to work, keys in hand (not without nearly sliding down the stairs and ending it all much sooner than anticipated), all the while lamenting to myself  "My tipi door didn't have a key.What the heck!" And then I recall the dirt and the grit under my fingernails, and the sleepless (sleep-light) nights when there would come a shuffling, quiet and then louder, and then an "Aaaallleeexxx?" and I'd think WHY ME? There are THREE of us in here! and then the moment of recognition that I'm a little bit elated that it's me, and so I'd slip my feet into my shoes and pray for no slugs. And then I remembered that time, on our last day at camp, when one of my tipi-mates (one of the three) crept up to the door of our tipi from the outside and moaned "Aaaallleeexxx?" and a shock of adrenaline and dread zapped through me even though the kids were gone and it was 2:30 PM. And then I realized, and laughed out loud. But the store has keys, so I had to get them. And more luckily still, they were exactly where I'd thought they would be.

++++++

My first temper tantrum since I don't know how long, and it feels so familiar, and so like an ugly but well-used work-shirt unearthed from underneath dust and notes written in on graph paper that say "you're cute". But mostly so stupid. That's the takeaway here. Work life, love life, home life, school life, thug life- all in a snarled mess that, surprisingly enough, wasn't resolved one bit by throwing my shoes at the wall. The body's natural tension-reliever of bursting into angry and self-pitying tears though was a relief, if not a solution. Curling up and snuggling down was a relief too, treating myself (and all those other things that aren't towing the line) with benevolent disapproval and reflecting on the alarming realization that my day inevitably ends much better if I've spent some time sweating. Who knew? (I'll tell you- everyone. Everyone knew.)

++++++

My first visit with Isaac, Sam, Eleanore, and Lisa in a year went by in a haze of Star Wars talk, frozen yogurt with so many toppings, hugs given in passing or not at all because it was all just too much, and stories. What a gift. Cider, the cat even came through to make an appearance, and Sam said,

That's Cider.
I thought so. Did you know the first thing you ever told me was that Cider is a hunter?

No response. Kids have the good sense and the lack of hindsight to have no use for nostalgia of their own lives. Who needs it? There's so much to come. Isaac is all full of light saber talk:

I'm going to build a light saber.
Great! I think if anyone could do it, you could.
The only thing I've got to figure out is the power source. I might just use electricity instead of crystals...
Sure.
...because the way that real light sabers are made is very complex. I might just have to forfeit the laws of science.
Forfeit the laws of science? Well, honestly, people do it every day. So it sounds like you're well on your way.

And I'm glowing.

Good/Bad Things I do(on't do)

I am frequently struck with the intensity of the sense of morality, or good versus bad, in young children. Spending lots of time with a certain three-year-old this past spring, photos of people and animals we passed on the street often were classified as "BAD!" or rather, "MALO!". When I asked why, I typically got another hearty "MALO!" and we went on our way. This typically takes me by surprise I suppose because using words like "good" and "bad" doesn't hold much utility for me any more. It always feels a little like a hand-full of cold water in the face, just a surprise. What could it mean, really? I guess the world doesn't seems to lay out so simply for me anymore.

In conversation with my friend Dahlia a while back, she was really into characterizing people as "weird" or "crazy". As in, "You're weird!" or "My mom's crazy!" and at one point asking me, "Are your friends weird?". The question itself took me by surprise and I responded, "Well...yes, I guess they are all weird, but I think that's why I like them." And I couldn't substantiate this in any kind of legitimate way, but I bet you'd be hard pressed to think of even one person who isn't weird, or stupid, or crazy in some way. What are we without our quirks? And whether we classify them as good and positive, or bad and negative, don't they make us so fabulously interesting? A good friend of mine recently said to me, "It's so weird that you're so into Harry Potter. I just wouldn't expect that of you." Neat, right? Maybe he thought I was cool, and Harry Potter is lame (or possibly the opposite...) and his brain was working overtime trying to fit the two together. Either way, I think that I and Harry Potter are pretty great, and doesn't that make for interesting conversation?

I understand that it's a part of the developmental process, wanting to understand and label things as good or bad, learning about boundaries and rules and eventually how to make them for yourself and evaluate the ones set for you by others. It's just interesting. And when I think about it, even though I don't frequently make use of the words themselves, the idea of good and bad run pretty deep in the ways I look at and move in the world.

good:
make art
hum all the time
laugh
love people
hang with animals
hang with kids
be myself
dance in spontaneous situations
think a lot
feel things really strongly
see beauty
trust myself
love Harry Potter
travel
use words to communicate
use art to communicate
do really cool stuff


bad:
run away from things that make me happy
hum all the time
fear physical activity
judge myself
judge other people
hide in bed
think a lot
characterize things as "good" or "bad"
judge other people for the above
spell correctly (guess how many times it took me to get the word "legitimate" right? I'll never tell.)
look at other people and wonder why I'm not like them
carry on habits of a 13 year old
feel guilty
worry
don't trust myself
feel things really strongly
stop myself

Don't worry though. While I figure it out, I'm keeping busy.

Blowing smoke-rings of belly-steam

Things get confusing when I'm scampering all over the country, specially when the aforementioned scampering follows a more global-type of scampering. It gets even more complicated (or perhaps, less) when my post-summer vocabulary has been, as it always is, whittled down to about 1/3 it's original size and the vast majority of my feelings, observations, questions, hypotheses come out as "Rad!", "Shut up!", "Classic!" and the like.

I left camp, after 3 months of living on a little island where dirt under the nails was the norm and the introductory packet, which I haven't read for 3 years, tells you don't bother to bring a hair dryer. I headed south, through a city in which I spent a year and left feeling drained and confused. Though in this visit, I left with an understanding that I'd found a family during that year when I felt sick and tired for the majority of the time, a re-writing and a re-wiring of the stories I'd told myself about that time up north. As I traveled south this time, I felt encircled by a group of really special people who think that I'm really special, and it felt really good.

I drove to Corvallis with a great new friend and had some good family time with she and hers, ate fresh-caught tuna, played with kittens, bakes scones, and went on my way reluctantly.

I drove to Arcata, and had the best time. I stayed longer than I'd intended (thank goodness), mostly because my understanding of days, dates, and times is shaky at best since 3 months of staring at deer and exclaiming "Wait, what day is it?!". Great food, great days of extended sleeping, great family time, sister bonding that usually goes in fits and bursts and in the company of a whole host of other people, events and exhaltations.
"This is my sister!"
"Oh, wow! It's great to meet you."
"You too!" Me beaming. Hug Sarah. Things couldn't be any better, I swear.
And for a few days I forgot that I really miss my island with the deer and the dirt, and loved the fog and the layering in clothes that weren't entirely fleece-based. And I loved the heat when we caught up to it (outside of Arcata, of course), and the river and drinking beer (one is plenty after the summer I've had) and reading (endless pleasure after the summer I've had), and making new friends even as I'm relishing in those ones I've forgotten how to be without.

I left (implied: later than planned, even if still on the day), and felt like this for a million reasons when asked how I felt about going home:

Ummmmm...

And there are different parts of this "um"- the home part, and the returning part. They're different questions- am I returning home? How is it returning?

Back in the Bay, I've got not much to say except that I'm here, and my brain's come loose.
Why then, Alex, would you choose to share this with your vast and exhaustively literate audience?
Great question reader. You tell me. No? Well. Moving on.

I'll leave you with that. That's to say, with nothing more than a mind gurgling with things that are hard to articulate and give off a scent that's alternately intoxicating and revolting. Life, right? Classic.

Via del Burro and Ice-cream City

Comfort born of intimate knowledge and best best friendship pervaded my stay in Rome. What a gift, to begin my further travels with my great friend Loren, and her sister Gracie too! We talked about traveling, living, love, home, being women and girls, eating, spaghetti carbonara, gelato, landmarks, walking, blisters, thinking, tiny penguins and dancing cats, being late and getting lost, cooking, growing and growing gardens, where we'll live, how we'll live, how activism lives in our lives, how that's different for everybody because, guess what? Everybody's different. I know, shocker.

Maybe I'm laying the gratitude for friends on a little thick here, so let's be real for a minute (as if I'm every anything else): my life these days is absolutely marked, shaped, formed, and transformed by the support of those closest to me. As much as traveling has shaped me, it wouldn't mean anything if I extracted from that travel the ways in which the love and presence of my loved ones has buoyed me at the same time. And the fact that I've had the opportunity to see so many of those so close to me during my travels, well it makes the celebration of those friends that much more inevitable. So there's that. And honestly, I'm plagued just as much (more? Probably not...) as anyone else with doubts about friends, friendship, being liked and loved, being likable and lovable. Maybe it's just that these relationships and connections seem like the most noteworthy things in my life right now. As much as I struggle with the presumptuousness of writing my thoughts and feelings and publishing them, these friends and friendships seem to me worthy of sharing (to be clear, sharing on this blog, i.e. with my mom). Just laying it all out on the line here; dropping some knowledge. Like I do.

I bought a stuffed goat (not taxidermied, worry not!) for Per in lieu of leaving behind a friend of George to keep him company. I toyed with the idea of leaving George, but I can't quite bring myself to do that. So a goat it is. A goat named Marco; he's Italian. Marco slept with Loren, George, and me once he joined our little caravan, and he and Loren in particular became fast friends. Let me share with you a memory that I will pull out whenever a melancholy mood threatens violent takeover:

I went to the bathroom getting ready for bed while Loren laid in bed, preparing mentally I suppose, for the same.

Loren: What's that?

Marco the Goat (Loren): Maaaaa.

Loren: I know, she's taking forever.

MtG: Maaaaaa.

Loren: Don't worry, she'll come back. She's just in the bathroom.

MtG: Maaaaaaa.

Loren: I know, I totally agree.

MtG: Maaaaa.

Loren: Hahahaha. Don't worry. I won't tell her.

I can't imagine a life without friends like this- ones that converse with toy goats and imaginary ghost people and take everything you say and sing it in a throaty Tom-Waits-meets-the-Rolling-Stones kind of way. This kind of creativity and silliness is my life-force, or maybe the butter in life that makes it worth eating, and occasionally overeating, but never eaten with regret when all is said and done. What would we do without these friends? What would we do without butter? Vegans stutter- I know, I know, you do do without butter. I wish I could. But I can't. Or won't, if we're being real.

We cooked dinner the night Gracie came to visit, and it turned out magnificently under the benevolent kitchen-dictatorship of Loren.

Gracie: If you keep taking pictures of me, it's going to look like I'm on some kind of weird cooking show where I do random things that don't add up to anything!

Loren: Now, add the flour and eggs together. Do you think the cake will be OK without baking powder and baking soda? Yeah, probably. Right?

Alex: Uh...

Loren: Yeah Gracie, just mix them all up together, equal amounts, and then whip the eggs.

Alex: I'm trying to help, but I'm just in the way. Should I just get out of the kitchen?
Loren: NO! I need you to help me spice the veggies. You're not in the way.

Alex: OK.

Gracie: Is this good?
Loren: No, keep stirring.

Alex: FOREVER.

The cake was very dense, and everything was delicious, and don't worry, we finished the entire can of whipped-cream by the time we left Rome. What would I do without friends like these? I honestly have no idea. Certainly not eat gelato twice a day. Which we did.

Off Again

And so the journey continues. From Zurich to Rome.

From Rome, with only a few tears, to Istanbul.

Istanbul, not bad, right? Guess what? Turkish, it's a great language. It's related to Finnish, and guess what else? HUNGARIAN! The world tends to line things up in surprising ways.

More later- trying to spend less time on the computer, and more time in the city, though even with the lure of the computer ignored, I've been spending a lot of time lying in the sun with this; it's like a drug. The family thinks I'm sleeping in but really, I'm reading. What's becoming of me? I remember this with Harry Potter. Curled up in a sleeping bag on the floor of my parents' room, as was my habit in those days, with a headlamp and the Book. Being in middle school, I remember my mom sitting up eventually and telling me to go to sleep. With a plaintive look in my eye, I would say "But mom, I'm almost finished, and Harry's battling Voldemort!" She, with a look of pity and understanding and resignation, would say, "Alright." 

And in the morning, I would be exhausted, but exhilarated. Basically the best.