Happily Ever After

Once upon a time a darling young accountant named Jen met a wild party animal named Mike through some mutual friends at a dinner party. Jen was in the final phases of chemo for a condition called CLL, and while she'd always been a social butterfly, she was more focused on getting better than she was falling in love.

But that's the way love is. It smacks you upside the head and turns you silly in the course of a single game of flip cup, and the next thing you know you've made an appointment to spend a Saturday morning looking like this while going to get fake eyelashes.
I spent Jen's wedding weekend enjoying dainty tea parties, jubilant rehearsal dinners, chronic smiles and a serious case of flailing white girl arm during an open bar reception. And even though I would have preferred not to sob into a bouquet of flowers as Jen made her way down the aisle, I was thrilled to see one of the people I love the most in the world find her number one.

photo by Clay "The Man" Jackson

Jen and Mike turned lovestruck into something beautiful and timeless. Congratulations to both of you and I wish you all the joy and happiness you deserve.

Let's talk about the weather. And fatherloss.

My dad is in Iraq and has been for about the last four years. This is my real dad, not to be confused with my dad Steve.

Pretty much everyone I know knows Steve as my dad, but there is this other guy named Greg who is also my dad. Well, my dad insomuch as annual phone calls and once-per-decade reunions make him a "dad." I sort of think of him as this distant uncle it's great to see whenever possible, but as I've become an adult who can barely fit in time to text her closest friends, I get that some relationships are better when there's no obligation behind them.

I don't think most of my friends have ever met my real dad. Heather met him when she went on a weekend visit with me when we were 11, and Liz met him in 2003 at my cousin's wedding. I remember giving him a hug and then Liz saying, "Who is that guy?" And I was like, "My dad, duh. You mean, I've known you for 13 years and you've never met or seen a picture of my dad? Really?"

There aren't too many pictures of my dad. I have one of him when he became a Marine and there are a few of him from when he and my mom were together. The most recent ones I have of him are from my Grandpa's funeral more than a decade ago. Recently, though, he emailed a few photos of the weather in Iraq, and while the sand storm is mind blowing, I really can't wrap my head around how gray his mustache has gotten in the last 6 years.

My dad is the one who can't put his arms flat against his sides, which is a trait Mack shares. And now I'm going to barf up some Freud.

My dad is going through a divorce, leaving the woman who put a lot of strain on his relationship with us. He definitely deserves most of the blame, since the man I remember does what he wants without much regard for other people, but this woman is psychologically stunted and acted like a bigger baby than any of us kids.

Since he's losing her as his family, he has been trying to reconnect with Leiah and I in the last year or so. Leiah is obviously more guarded about letting him in, understandably. She was just a baby when my mom and Greg split up, so she didn't get a chance to really remember him being in her life. I, on the other hand, formed my earliest memories while we were still a family unit.

I remember him playing Bear with Shannon and I, him tucking me in at night, him making breakfast on Saturday mornings, him working on the car while I cleaned his tools, him flashing his belt as a warning that if we didn't chill out he was going to whip us, him throwing a glass of iced tea at my mom's head, him drop kicking our new puppy for having an accident and him explaining to me what divorce was and why my mom was getting one. I remember the good and the bad, so while of course I would have preferred to have my parents together, I'm glad I took a whole picture of him with me when they split up. Leiah was only able to take that image of a hero dad, the one that little girls are promised but few really ever get.

I'm not sure what our relationship will look like in the coming years. I'm not sure that he'll ever meet my husband or my in-laws or my closest friends, or if he even wants to. I really have no expectations, but even if we're just talking about the weather, it's good to know he's alive.

Mansion, Sweet Mansion

I've been meaning to post this for, oh, I don't know, 14 days and 3 hours, but when I remembered to take pictures it was too dark or the hurricane of life had left a mark that only real live visitors are allowed to see. But this morning, while everyone else enjoyed a Memorial Day holiday, I decided to cut the crap and finally, FINALLY write about our new apartment.

Which is about a third of what we paid for our shack in Venice and about 300 times nicer and bigger. I mean, I have two! closets, one of them that has a special little nook that I've claimed as my "office." Where I do important "work." Like check account balances and email recipes to my mom.
At first I suggested Mack use it as an office, but he was all, "I'll feel too claustrophobic, cramped and alienated." Apparently those feelings turn into "jealous" when you see just how good of an idea it really was. Mack has been relegated to a corner in the "study," but in reality, he sort of gets the entire study as long as no one is spending the night. He's got his piano in there, thanks to Mike, and all of his guitars and his computer.
Speaking of Mack, where is he at 12pm on a weekday? In our bedroom of course. Because he sleeps so late and I wake up so early (10 am), we NEVER make our bed, even though our bedding is cute and our room looks way better made up. Just trust me on that.
Probably my favorite room in the whole house is our living room. It has a built in bookcase that makes the weird junk I've accumulated and really like having around feel like it belongs. It also has a non-working fireplace that is perfect for that candelabra I got at the Salvation Army as a Halloween decoration last year.

The kitchen is the worst of the rooms, but it has a washer and dryer which is a luxury we've lived without for two years. When we very first saw the place, this was the room we walked into, dripping wet and having not slept for two days. We hadn't officially leased the place, but I was so tired of being in limbo and hauling a moving truck full of our junk around, I probably would have moved into a cardboard box at that point. That this place had miniature appliances and zero counter space is something I decided to look at as charming. And thanks to my parents and Ikea, we got a much needed kitchen cart which drastically improved our cooking quality of life.
We're a couple doors down from a delicious coffee shop, two blocks from my favorite boutique and one of my favorite restaurants, three blocks from an enormous park, and a 10-minute walk to the public library. The only thing we don't have is the beach, but since we are now eligible for stop by visits from people we love, we're coping alright.

3 to the 1

For my 31st birthday (a little aside: when I was 11 I really thought I'd have my shit waaayyyy more together at 31 than I actually do), we had a little vegetarian cookout with family and friends. It wasn't the craziest birthday I've ever had or the most memorable, but it was definitely one of the most special so far.

It's been a while since I've had my people around on my birthday, and to have so many of them, some I hadn't seen in years, crammed into our tiny kitchen and singing happy birthday, well, it just makes me teary to think about it. I think some people call this feeling gratitude, but since I'm made of spikes and nails and iron, I'm going to call it awesomeness.

My friend Nash was there with a gigantic fisheye lens and he caught the moment I was aglow with feeling that awesomeness. If 31 was this good, I can't wait to see what you people make 40 feel like.

Criss Cross Country

Three years ago, we loaded up the truck and we moved to Beverly... Well, the West Side of Los Angeles anyway.
Last week, we loaded up the truck and headed back to be with ya'll hillbillies again.In case you ever wanted to know what driving 2,169 miles non-stop across the country with a freak husband who refuses to stop even though you're both hallucinating shadow people running across the road looks like, I give you this little film, made possible by iPhone and boredom and sleeplessness. Sorry in advance for the bugs (and to the bugs) on the windshield.

* Song is "I feel it all" by Feist.

Cancun: It's like America and Mexico had a baby.

After spending 6 days in Cuba, being to Cancun was like being half asleep. I didn't realize how exhausted we were from being a part of the buzz that is Havana until we were in a place that's basically peace and quiet. Which is to say, a much needed vacation at the end of our vacation.

The first thing we did, after eating chilaquiles and drinking beer, was take a 4-hour nap. Then we went to Wal-mart and bought sunscreen and bottled water and snacks. You can't quite understand the joy of seeing Lays potato chips after a week of pondering chicken flavored Cornitos.

Our hotel was in the city part of Cancun as opposed to the beachy, resort part, and I am so glad we stayed in the city. We got to see actual Mexican people and see actual Mexican schools. And we got to give our pesos to actual Mexican businesses. That being said, we couldn't resist being tempted into the Carribean blue water, so we took a ferry to Isla Mujeres to go snorkeling one day.

We were planning to go to a place touted as a "national park" called Garrafon, but that turned out to be a $59 per person amusement park with water at its center. So we walked up the street a bit, stopped in at a cafe for lunch, and discovered a hotel called Garrafon de Castilla where you could pay $5 for the day to snorkel, lounge on the beach and enjoy enormous pina coladas. The actual hotel reminded me of a Corona bottle, and the reef was everything we were looking for.
Having done the beach thing, we decided we should explore some of Mexico's Mayan ruins. There are several close to Cancun, but we settled on Tulum for two reasons: it was the closest one and it was right on the bluff looking over the ocean. We took a bus for about 60 pesos each ($5), and three hours later we were dropped off at a street that reeked of tourist trap. We followed the other white people to a little marketplace and quickly noticed some brightly cloaked men swinging around a pole over our heads. Yes, men swinging around a pole over our heads.
Apparently these are Totonac Indian flyers, aka the original pole dancers, and they preserve an ancient form of worship by putting on a show for tourists and then passing around a hat. They are so in touch with their divinity that they actually say to you, "Is that all? It is for all of us and we are not on salary." (In our defense, we only saw the landing, so we didn't feel we owed a full show's worth of money.)

The ruins were incredible, as ruins tend to be. I love me some ruins. It's so interesting to look at them and see how people used to live, what they were afraid of, how they tried to impress one another. I'm always left thinking we really haven't come that far, especially with regard to our feats of human greatness. I mean, when was the last time anyone put in the time and effort required to build a city out of stone.
While at Tulum I had one of those "Is this really my life?" moments. We walked down the steps along the bluff and were able to swim out into the ocean and look up at the ruins. The water cooled us off just the right amount, and everything was so incredibly beautiful I could hardly believe I was in the center of it. Also, I was able to change into and out of my bathing suit without a towel without flashing any of my private parts, which is fairly mindblowing.
We couldn't take a bus back to Cancun because they'd stopped running, but luckily that gave us the opportunity to be introduced to Colectivos. Colectivos are like church van taxis that cost 35 pesos per person ($3), and they pick people up and drop them off along the side of the road. You pay your money, take one of the 12-14 seats, sit back in the cool air conditioning, and watch a movie starring Bruce Willis. I wish we had Colectivos in the U.S. because I would so take those to Riverbend for concerts or Louisville to see my mom and dad. The Colectivo that picked us up in Tulum ended its route in Playa del Carmen, so before we hopped on another Colectivo to Cancun, we walked around the streets of PdC and ate dinner on the sidewalk of a cute little restaurant right by the beach.

After two days in Cancun, our wanderlust was pretty well satiated (and the swine flu masks were making more frequent appearances), so we hung out around the hotel and checked email. We found out Mack would be going to school at UK for sure, which meant there was a whole new adventure waiting for us when we got home. I bought a return ticket to LA instead of Louisville, and then we decided to catch a real live bull fight.

I regretted not seeing a bull fight in Spain when we traveled there, and even though we're vegetarians, I decided we should see one in Mexico. We took a taxi to the Plaza del Toros, but apparently we were a couple weeks too late. The season had already ended. A guy who we assumed helped train the matadors gave us a little behind the scenes tour, which was probably more fun than the bull fight would have been anyway. When he brought out the training bull, I think I screamed and I know I started to run away.
Cancun was a blast, and I'm glad we got this little bonus vacation. Even if it did mean I'd spend a day of traveling in a face mask and still come down with a fever and respiratory sickness while Mack stayed healthy as a horse.

That time I "broke the law" and went to Cuba

It was 2 p.m. on a Wednesday and I was about to go to Lexington to watch Ben for a few days when, in an attempt to delay our goodbye, Shannon said, "Come to Cuba..."

An impromptu airfare search led to an impromptu text message which led to an impromptu ticket purchase which led to an impromptu vacation with Shannon in Cuba. It was an incredible experience, one that started with being pulled over within minutes of getting off the plane, featured a dramatic foot pursuit, and culminated in a day at the beach.
I didn't really know that much about Cuba. I knew that it's under embargo from the U.S. because of Fidel Castro, that it's known for its rum and cigars and that toilet paper, as well as aspirin and sunscreen, is scarce. Beyond that, I was an idiot, especially when it came to Spanish.

The first thing I noticed about the country was definitely its politics. There were Viva la Revolucion billboards everywhere along the highway. Here we have billboards for Love's Truck Stop; there it's pro-Fidel propaganda everywhere you look. It reminds me of Iran in that way, but without the mask of religion. And since religion isn't the driving force, there is sex and art and music and drinking and a hussling so intense it makes you appreciate the cardboard messaging tactics that our beggars use. It wasn't until the end of our trip that I finally learned how to say, "Leave me alone," a phrase that could've saved us a lot of headache when Shannon wasn't around to be our guide.

That being said, when we were with Shannon, I loved Habana. I loved the antique cars that give their passengers an air of class (because of the embargo, Cuba hasn't been able to import many new cars and have kept models from the '50s and '60s on the roads). I loved the swanky hotels with outdated upholstery that's stained with decades-old activity. I loved the mojitos and the national beers (there are two, Bucanero and Cristal).
I loved the crumbling facades on the outskirts of the pristine and antique Habana Vieja and I loved wandering from plaza to plaza and remembering what it was like that time we visited Madrid.
I loved visiting the Necropolis de Cristobal Colon and walking up and down the streets of the dead. I loved stepping into the very U.S.-influenced El Capitolio and gawking at the tense nipple that the enormous bronze female sculpture was sporting, wishing aloud the Ashcroft was there to squirm underneath it. I loved sitting on the steps and having a "romantico" photo taken of the three of us with a 100-year-old pinhole camera.
I loved spending a day on the beach even though the high winds threatened us with Portugese Man O' War jellyfish. I loved touring the Castillo del Morro and realizing how ridiculous a weapon the cannon was. I loved chatting with the man in the watchtower and looking through his gigantic binculars at the Bacardi building and the lovers on the Malecon. I loved watching the sun set from a patio on the sea and will never forget the fishermen pulling up fish after fish from their intertube boats long after the water turned black from darkness.

And, even though it was shattered by theft, I loved the night I spent drinking rum on the Malecon with new friends and my older sister and listening to musicians parading up and down the sea wall. My camera was snatched by a sea crocodile and his accomplice, forcing me to dig into my memory for those precious moments I had during the trip and giving me a great story to tell about CSI: Havana starring Norlin Garcia and Mack Thomas. It sucked to lose my mementos, but even that eruption of tears and the consequential 7 hours at the police station couldn't undo the joy I felt watching Shannon eat $1 cheese pizza at El Rapido.
** If you're a government/legal/prosecution monger type, this is all fictional and a lie.

How in the...

Lately I feel like I can barely make a list of all the crap I've done before I'm off to do more crap that will then need to be logged into the blog so that in 3 years I can remember just what the hell I've been doing with my life.

In the past couple weeks I threw a 50th birthday party for my mom, went to Cuba with Shannon, got my camera stolen while sipping rum on the Malecon, went to Mexico with Mack, swam in the ocean while looking up at Mayan ruins, found out Mack would be officially going to med school at UK, bought an impromptu ticket to Los Angeles to move across country yet again, contracted a 24-hour flu with symptoms that made me regret giving my mom shit for worrying about the swine flu, and completely missed the Derby.

The word I'm using to describe it all is "swirly." "Feverish" also works.

More to come, especially now that my temperature is holding steady at 98.6 and Laila is going back to school for the week. Whew.

Passportage

I got a passport 8 years ago to go with Shannon to Cuba. She was going for school and I was going as a journalist. Because that was the sneaky way I had to work it.

Well, that trip didn't work out, but the passport came and opened up the world to me. I've since been to Spain, England, Holland, Morocco, Jamaica and Iran.

In three and a half hours I will finally be using my passport to go with Shannon to Cuba. Mack is meeting me there for a 10-day getaway that will probably change my life (most trips do). And my passport feels good that its destiny is fulfilled.

And I thought I was bad.

Leiah moved into a new place a few weeks ago, so last week I spent a few days at her house watching Ben and helping her get settled. We went through clothes, found a roomful of wedding and baby stuff that could be donated or given away, and then had to tackle her keepsakes.

I have a soft spot for keepsakes. A soft spot that's about two trunks tall by two trunks wide plus an under the bed box full of photos. Mack loves my soft spot.

While I'm good at being practical about things like how many pieces of Gladware you really need, I'm terrible at purging keepsakes. Every time I open my own collection to eliminate things, it's like I get to go back in time, see who I was then, laugh at how ridiculous she was, and then come back to who I am today feeling very grateful and more like I have accomplished something with my life. Something like not being 17 anymore.

Helping Leiah was tough. She has the funniest notes that she passed during class and a love letter from a boy who was so sweet and so helpless in his feelings for her. She has fake wedding programs that she and her friend made for their future alter-ego selves. She has baby photos of a boy I love so much I'll probably keep his baby picture framed and on my windowsill even when he's 75. Those things made it hard to say no.

But there were other things.

When we were kids we had this awful wool blanket that was kept on the couch for us to cover up with if we got cold. This thing was brown and as scratchy as a beard, and it became known as Itchy Scratchy to us girls. Leiah decided she was going to love this blanket and claimed it as her own. Fast forward 22 years when she pulls Itchy Scratchy out of a bag, tattered and torn, aging worse than a smoking woman.

When I asked Leiah why she ever liked that obnoxious blanket she looked at me and said, "Because Amber. It's what I do. I liked Itchy Scratchy and I liked LJ. I don't know why."

We also came across her old orthodontics. When I say orthodontics, I don't mean retainers. I kept my retainers for a few years after I stopped wearing them, but mainly because I knew how much my parents had paid for those things and I felt awful pitching them. I guess Leiah had similar issues because we not only found her retainer but also her rusty headgear and her braces. Yes, her actual braces.


I'm I ever glad my packrattiness was tempered by a tiny apartment and a cross country move.

Twinkle twinkle little star, how I wonder how you turned my niece into Ozzy Osbourne.

This is an angel at Christmas, just 4 short months ago.

And this is how age makes us rotten.

I almost killed my nephew.

pancake breakfast at Denny's. a side trip to the mall. running through Dick's and hiding in the tents. watching the kids play in the playground. chasing each other and playing I'm gonna get your butt. laughter. joy. the casual stay by me in the parking lot warning. a repeat of the same warning. the turn to open his door. the realization that he's off and running. the looming SUV cruising out of its spot. the carnal shriek that squeals his name in such a way he whips around terrified and runs back. the welling up of tears. the hyperventilating of both of us in the back seat. his cries for mommy. my cries for how sad and scared he is. my mind wanders to horribly dark places called what if and I beg it to stop. the thought keeps creeping in and I try to kill it with gratitude. my singsong voice of happiness trying to undo the trauma. his silence the whole way home. the apology so heartfelt a piece of me died when I heard it. the sorry exchange, him for almost getting smashed by the car, mine for screaming at him and scaring him to his core. the delicate recount offered to his mother when we pick her up from work. her reply that sometimes trauma is a good thing. and that you can never take your eyes off of them, not even for a second.

I think this is what they call a life lesson, for both of us.

I think Jesus is the Easter Bunny. And Santa Claus.

What do you get when your parents buy a minivan, your older sister comes home from England, your baby sister gets a lizard, your little sister needs to sleep and (almost) everyone's birthday happens in the spring?

An Easter weekend at Mountain Laurel Lake.

My parents booked a cabin on this bigger-than-a-pond-but-not-quite-a-lake patch of water a while ago, hoping that everyone would be able to come together and spend some QT together. Little did they know that more of us than they expected would be living under their roof, ODing on QT daily.

About 22 seconds after we arrived, Charles started fishing off the deck. And he didn't stop fishing until Sunday afternoon when the car was all loaded up and we were about to drive off. To his credit, he caught the first fish and the last fish of the weekend and increased his manliness by 86%.



Since we ladies don't like worms and cigars, we spent our time doing more ladylike things like playing cards and cooking delicious black bean burgers (Kristin's recipe) and birthday cake. My mom brought an egg dying kit so the mommies of us put on their patience hats and helped toddlers enjoy brightly colored vinegar with epic stain potential.

On the first night, we realized there was no way the babies were going to be able to sleep in the same room. Mainly because Renee kept popping up in her bed and saying, "Hi-lo" to Ben and Leiah while they were trying to sleep. So my mom and dad, you know, the people who PAID for and ARRANGED the trip, relocated from a bedroom to the loft. Betsy and I were also in the loft. On the pullout bed. Next to the prison toilet.

The prison toilet was actually a highlight of the weekend because it was the reason I laughed so hard I drooled. See, they'd put a toilet upstairs, but it was only hidden by a little screen panel so everyone could see and hear everything you might do in a bathroom. Like in prison. My mom was absolutely hilarious acting out a late night trip to the prison toilet, and I was doubled over in laughter and pain from laughter.

Another highlight was Boggle. Which is basically a game that I can add to my list of games no one can beat me at. During one round I actually came up with agile AND genius, and if you want to know how impressive that is, go get Boggle and take it on your family's Easter weekend trip.

I also recommend taking babies on your trip. Babies are freaking hilarious. Renee took her first boat ride with Dude and loved it so much that every time he'd circle in to drop her off, she'd look at me and her dad on the dock and say to Dude, "Let's go, let's go."
And Ben wasn't about to be out-funnied by Renee. After he'd made the goodnight hug-kiss rounds once, Dude asked him for an extra kiss. Well, that baby was exhausted and just couldn't summon the energy to walk over to Dude to deliver. Instead he stood on the other side of the room and blew a kiss AND a hug. And now we have a new family tradition.

During the day we took lots of walks around the lake. Well, we walked and Renee screamed and demanded someone carry her after she crossed the first bridge.


Renee was obsessed with throwing rocks in the water all weekend, an obsession I take the blame for since I showed her how to throw rocks in a puddle. We also took the babies "swimming" in the hot tub, dried off in front of the fireplace and drank beers.

On Easter the babies looked for their Easter baskets and then were sent on a hunt for eggs. Ben was faster than Renee, so Leiah kept having to sneak eggs out of his basket and drop them on the side of the road for Renee to find.

The entire weekend culminated in a pile of us on a hillside, watching the babies blow/lick bubbles, laughing at their new found addiction to jelly beans, and settling into gratitude for having so many people to love and laugh with.