Ktraveldan Network

The Lust of Aggression: Pious Injunctions of Pacifists Like Us

2011-08-04T21:35:00.000-05:00

This was originally posted on my philosophy blog, and with a notable sense of aggression I said, what the hell, with a post this nice, I'll post it twice. Warning! It's wordy :-)

“How long do we have to wait before the rest of men turn pacifist? Impossible to say, and yet perhaps our hope that these two factors-men’s cultural disposition and a well-founded dread of the form that future wars will take- may serve to put an end to war in the future, is not chimerical. But by what ways or byways this will come about, we cannot guess.” ~ Freud

As a collective, human beings demonstrate an indisputable predisposition towards aggression, which as an instinctual behavior is not readily brought into submission. A primal expression that serves as an integral component of mans determination to survive, instinctual aggression may be deemed culturally unacceptable, although it is often necessary, as Freud observes when he states “ for it is war that brings vast empires into being, within whose frontiers all warfare is proscribed by a strong central power.” While distinctly cultural or theological mandates to assume a pacifist stance to ensure peace are admirable, these unattainable, chimerical goals have not proven realistic throughout history. Although Sigmund Freud declines to guess the means by which men may be ultimately prompted to assume a pacifist philosophy with the intent to ameliorate aggression and thereby decrease instances of war and warlike behavior, it is evident that instinctual predispositions towards aggression are innate.

Whereas Freud promoted “a strengthening of the intellect which tends to master our instinctive life,” Plato, for example, encouraged focus not only upon intellectual reasoning but also on the existence of the soul. This differentiation between body and soul, with all of its theological implications, remains a central theme in modern culture. Plato argued that we are in continual conflict within ourselves, as reason wars with appetite while spirit wars with the flesh, our appetites appropriately described not only as arising from hunger but sexual desire as well. As Plato compelled us to subject appetite to reason in a quest to uphold the sanctity of the human spirit and thereby appease a higher power, Freud states “thus the instinct of self preservation is certainly of an erotic nature, but to gain its end this very instinct necessitates aggressive action.”

While a predetermined “aggressive instinct” may be considered undesirable by some, it is this same instinct that can be credited to a certain extent with the propagation of the species and the continuation of life, a desire which in and of itself is sanctified by the same higher power Plato’s dualism hoped to appease. Freud aptly recognized that aggression shares polarity with desire by contrast, providing incentive for action in relation to a desired object as he states “in the same way the love instinct, when directed to a specific object, calls for an admixture of the acquisitive instinct if it is to enter into effective possession of that object.” Without an instinctual sense of aggression, love would be the ultimate pacifist spectator sport, with hate the inevitable outcome of frustrated desire. This would be a precursor to inevitable “crimes of passion,” as the sublimation of the desire nature has the capacity to incite war.

Just as erotic desire often precipitates an instinctual aggressive response, a theological desire may be fulfilled in a similarly aggressive manner. Freud observes “the simulation of destructive impulses by appeals to idealism and the erotic instinct naturally facilitate their release,” and it is such release in response to religious idealism that prompts holy wars. In this context, the One True God of the perpetrators is deemed to be “on our side,” with the natural procession of such thought being war in the name of self-righteous anger. Whether considering the atrocities of the Spanish Inquisition or the indignation of those who declared jihad on the “infidels” of the United States on September 11th, 2001, it was instinctual aggression that provided a catalyst for action, as the assassins “drew their strength from the destructive instincts submerged in the subconscious.” Although the greater percentage of people in a traditional Judeo Christian society may readily deny the aggressive instinct that would compel them to pronounce angrily that God was in fact on their side while simultaneously citing biblical mandates that effectively identify them as pacifists who “love thy neighbor as themselves,” Freud astutely observes that such pious injunctions are “hard to carry out.” With the untapped power of the collective unconscious subject to desire for war, one can imagine that little impetuous has been necessary throughout history to compel violent action, especially when considering those who have done so in the name of their gods.

Instinctual aggression, however, is far more encompassing than that which manifests outwardly in the guise of passion, war, or the anger of gods who entreat the masses to kill others on their behalf. Far more insidious is the instinctual aggression of an intellectual nature, where violence is executed in the realm of ideas. While war may manifest as casualties on the physical plane that are readily observable, it is the death of the mind, emotions, and spirit that often betrays the greatest instances of man’s inhumanity to man.

Propensity for war in the intellectual realm is wholly indicative of a distinct lack of pacifistic rational thought, wherein presumed cultural superiority assumes an inevitable moral superiority that is often a harbinger of further abuse. This intellectualism of war enables those who employ such strategies to assert an often wildly destructive bias promoted by those who assume a stance of cultural or moral superiority, the outcome of which is the oppression of those not deemed worthy of higher thought or consideration, as occurred during Kristallnacht or the Holocaust to follow, to name but one example.

When contemplating the indisputable biological model that supports the existence of mans aggressive instinct, Freud wisely observes “that there is no likelihood of our being able to suppress humanity’s aggressive tendencies.” While this perspective may initially be considered a fatalistic caveat that negates even the potential for pacifistic behavior, Freud counters by stating “in any case, as you too have observed, complete suppression of man’s aggressive tendencies is not an issue; what we may try is to divert it into a channel other than that of warfare.”

In both recognizing and respecting inherent aggressive tendencies, Freud challenges us to employ reason as a means of harnessing the formidable energy that aggressive instinct provides. Although an utopian political ideology embraces a world where threat of war gives way to reason, the diversion of indisputable aggressive energy into such channels as the study of law, science, and medicine allows us to “rest on the assurance that whatever makes for cultural development is working also against war.”

A Rejection Observed

2011-03-11T10:51:00.000-06:00

He sat silent in a deceptively sunny class, a quiet unassuming blond with a marked lack of self esteem or notable presence.

Darryl Bauer was assigned to the seat directly behind me in what was our grade school homeroom class, and although I didn't consider him a personal friend, I wasn't oblivious to the fact that few had chosen to befriend him at all. I was nice, if casually disinterested, pleasant, if even in a noncommittal way. As kids, maintaining your coveted place in the social hierarchy was as imperative as breathing, and as a popular kid myself, I was admittedly not quite willing to validate Darryl by being overly attentive to him myself.

But I did pay attention to what had happened to him that day.

There are kids like Darryl in many classrooms in life, overlooked, underestimated, on the periphery of acceptance during a time in their development when being noticed and accepted is of paramount importance. They're the kids who don't get picked for the team, or for whom a ride on the bus is an excruciating lesson in loneliness, aside from the attention they might receive as result of a random insult or an outright assault. What would they do, what would it take, to be accepted?

For Darryl, it was the supposedly magical interest he received from Angela Cincinelli the Cheerleader that promised to put him on the map.

From an objective perspective, which was of course the luxury of those not tormented by demons wrestled by the nondescript Darryl's of this world, the sudden attraction was suspicious, at best. What could the popular and effervescent Angela, in spite of inherent homeliness both of face and spirit, ever see in the likes of Darryl? When a girl like Angela feigns interest in a guy like Darryl, one would be wise to pause for thought. Could she be sincere? Did she really like him? Or was there an underlying joke underway here, a game that only a select few were aware was being played? Say it with me everybody: yes.

As it turned out, Angela's interest in Darryl was intended simply to enable her to advance her ego in the most cruel and vicious manner. The Latin root of "cru" in the word "cruelty" is "blood", and the literal meaning of the word then is "to spill blood." And although there was no actual blood shed by this quiet unassuming person as a result of Angela's actions that afternoon, I'm fairly confident that he nurtures a wound, no matter how faint or painfully forgotten, to this day.

Angela, in spite of being decidedly unintelligent as well as unattractive, was a master of PR. By affiliating herself with other, more attractive and popular girls, she imagined that she had become desirable by proxy. She could do a cartwheel, she could make the squad, she could ridicule kids like Darryl without flinching! Fascinated, like a cobra before a mongoose, we often thoughtlessly elevate the aggressive Angela's of this world to a position of envy or admiration, regardless of whether or not there is anything about them that is genuinely unique or valuable to warrant the attention we provide.

Angela was going to have her 15 minutes of fame, and if it was to be found at the top of a cheerleaders pyramid or upon Darryl's broken emotional back, it didn't matter. In spite of her bland face covered with freckles, the large unbecoming mole on her overweight thighs, or the transient disarray of her shockingly red hair, she was notable for being rude, recognized for being brassy, and acknowledged because she accepted no less.

Angela was going to promote herself regardless of the expense to another, no matter what the cost.

It was warm outside, and summerish. With the end of the school year approaching rapidly, it was all we could do to contain ourselves and focus on the matter at hand, which was getting through just one more day . Restless and prone to intermittent bouts of chaos anyway, Angela's antics that memorable afternoon served to create a frenzy of laughter and unprecedented glee for everyone who witnessed it.

And Darryl, of course, was the unwitting source of entertainment.

Flattered by her attentions, and completely oblivious to the fact that he was undoubtedly a topic of heady conversations and unkind plans, Darryl mistakenly made his unrequited crush public by bringing Angela a gift that day. A small, delicate, and thoughtfully given ring.

Believing her to be sincere in her fawning expression of interest in him, he had painstakingly wrapped the small gift box, the paper lumpy, the tape askew. One can sadly envision him carefully folding the paper the night before, deep in thought as he wondered excitedly about his good fortune, the quiet overlooked kid now the center of attention in a world populated by cheerleaders and jocks! What would she say, what would she think, when she received his romantic and thoughtful gift?!

As it turned out, it most definitely wasn't "thank you."

I became aware of the interchange when Angela, obnoxious and insensitive as ever, boldly announced her gift to the entire room as she opened it. Apparently Darryl had slipped it to her quietly while passing her desk on his way to his own, and his attempt to remain discreet was not to be respected.

"Oh look, " Angela all but screeched, the teacher having momentarily left the class, "Darryl gave me a ring! Why would I want this?!"

The class, looking around in wonderment, thrilled to watch the show, erupted in raucous laughter.

"Hey Darryl, " Angela now called out in a sarcastic sing song voice from across the great divide, "did you want me to be your girlfriend?!"

Darryl, now mortified at his desk and red faced in humiliation, stared intently at the floor. He did not move, he did not cry. His hands folded before him, he fixed his gaze and bore the laughter in silence.

"Oh my God," Angela announced scathingly, "like I would want to be your girlfriend!"

The laughter was now more of a roar, and I suddenly opted to forfeit my stance as a popular kid myself to defend the hapless Darryl. Turning around sideways in my seat, I said in plain view "just ignore her, Darryl," the unspoken rule that seventh grade students only call each other by their last names being broken to communicate my genuine concern. "Who cares what she thinks!"

Turning to glare at Angela, I called out with all of the emotionalism of a 12 year old hero "who do you think you are, Angela? Would you want someone to do that to you?!"

The laughter subsided momentarily, the focus on Darryl's humiliation being redirected now to an anticipated fight between myself and Angela. As I poised myself to take the bullet, Darryl looked up at me for a moment with a fleeting glance of appreciation. My heart was pounding, and I recall having felt almost disassociative in my awareness that I had now become a moving target myself for having chosen to become involved. The decision to defend Darryl was an impulsive one, and although not carefully considered I knew it was the right thing to do. Remaining sideways in my chair, my eyes locked with Angela's while I momentarily patted Darryl's forearm in a sympathetic fashion.

I was most certainly not going to be on the cheerleading squad now, and not simply because I couldn't do a cartwheel.

Resenting my having interrupted her show, Angela regarded me angrily as she redirected the focus of the hunt back to her prey by marching across the classroom and flinging Darryl's ring out the window onto the lawn below. The fact that the school janitor was in the process of mowing the lawn on which the ring was now lost made her gesture all the more outrageous, and the laughter in response to this was deafening.

Looking around the room that afternoon at what were sure to be future perpetrators of various crimes and misdemeanors, I regarded the scene with dismay, although I'm sure my thoughts were not quite that philosophical at the time. What I do recall feeling was an overwhelming empathy and sadness for Darryl, a relative stranger that I had known for many years.

When the teacher returned to the uproar minutes later, and the situation was disclosed, Darryl's shoulders slumped further and his head lowered even more when the teacher himself laughed as he called out the window to the janitor to stop the lawnmower. Sending several boys outside to search for the ring, which was later found to have belonged to Darryl's grandmother, his humiliation was finally complete.

I have sometimes wondered what ever became of a kid like Darryl or a girl like Angela, and I would be dishonest if I said that I hadn't hoped fate had corrected this injustice by allowing her to grow up unsuccessful and alone while Darryl had lived happily ever after. It only seems fair, when you consider the magnitude of what was done that day.

It had been a cruel and unnecessary rejection, and it was most definitely observed.

And Justice for All: Victims of a Broken Promise

2011-02-20T21:32:00.000-06:00

“How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others? The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just and unjust. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that “an unjust law is no law at all.” ~Martin Luther King Jr.

It must be terribly exhausting to try and defend yourself continually when confronted with the prejudices and misconceptions of others. Racism prompts a natural procession of despair and hopelessness, and everyone who participates, whether from the front or the back of the bus, is guilty of perpetuating it. For countless generations, our nation has been socially irresponsible in promoting racist ideology that has greatly impacted our culture. This was particularly true in the past, when the lack of humanity inherent in racist views necessitated the non violent direct action of the Civil Rights movement followed by the slow, arduous process involved in repositioning an entire class of people to their rightful place of equality within a society that so often rejected them.

We are all created equal, but we do not treat each other as such. How many countless opportunities to meet and embrace those who are different do people discount within the confines of their prejudice?

Unfortunately, it is difficult at times to remain wholly free from the insidious perceptions of prejudicial thought for recipients at both ends of the color spectrum. As Dr. King states in his Letter from Birmingham Jail, his daughter experienced “ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky,” when confronted with petty, illogical racism, while black nationalists descended into a self imposed abyss of “bitterness and hatred,” and white moderates “remained silent behind the anesthetizing security of stained glass windows.” It was the stance of the latter, safely ensconced within the safety of their churches, that may have enabled the suffering of those oppressed to continue unabated far longer as a direct result of their inaction, prompting Dr. King to ask poignantly “what kind of people worship here? Who is their God?”

Prejudice, defined as an irrational attitude of hostility that causes injury, damage, or disregard for the rights of others, is both spiritually as well as morally corrupt. Prejudicial thought disallows for the acknowledgment of our common ancestry as children of God, with legally mandated segregation promoting a “separateness” that is contrary to the law of God. As Dr. King so eloquently stated “all segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality, giving the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority,” a stance which was rightfully presumed to be unjust in the eyes of God and therefore necessitated abolishment. “There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the depths of despair,” Dr. King lamented. In seeking to eliminate such despair, participating in non violent direct action is therefore both a legally and morally responsible act, intended to bring injustice to light and consequently serve as a catalyst for positive change.

Historically, engaging in non violent direct action has proven a profound and effective means of encouraging individuals to “see the moral light and give up their unjust posture.” In having recognized that not all opinions are created equal, Socrates, for example, stated “the unexamined life is not worth living,” and championed the concept of philosophical enquiry via application of what is now defined as the Socratic Method. As a proponent of dialectic practice that compelled others to either further substantiate or reject their previously held beliefs as a result of posing relentless questions regarding such topics as virtue, knowledge, morality, and justice, Socrates was considered a “gadfly,” or nuisance, in Athenian society. Because virtually any thought or idea that effectively challenges the status quo may be perceived as anarchistic to those who cling to it, Socrates persistent questioning of traditional thought angered many who deemed him a harbinger of chaos, and an ultimate threat to complacent society. Following his imprisonment, Socrates steadfastly refused admonishments on behalf of his supporters and friends to escape his decidedly unjust fate as a political scapegoat, reasoning that it was not morally acceptable to do so. If he chose to escape and thereby evade the Athenian justice system, he believed he would in effect be guilty of “inflicting evil” on society by failing to obey their laws. As a pioneer of non violent direct action, Socrates, like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., remained a modicum of the virtue and justice he so diligently supported.

The tremendous communicative power inherent in non violent direct action lies in its ability to “create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks to so dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored.” In presenting himself as the quintessential living sacrifice, Dr. King embodied what Paul preached in Romans 12:1. “Therefore I urge you brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God-this is your spiritual act of worship.” As an integral part of this spiritual act of worship, Dr. King embarked upon a “process of self-purification”, wherein he repeatedly asked himself “are you able to accept blows without retaliating? Are you able to endure the ordeal of jail?”It was this Garden of Gethsemane~like willingness to reflect upon the challenges that lie ahead, and his willingness to seek justice on behalf of the multitudes as mandated by his godly heritage, that enabled Dr. King to become not only a voice within his generation, but one of the most respected men of this century. By invoking non violent direct action, his words became the source of strength upon which the power of his conviction was carried, lending credence to a message far greater than any jail cell could contain.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. successfully brought to the light of human consciousness that fact that we are genuinely equal, and without the fear and strife that we allow to separate us, we are one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

At least that's the way it should be.

Candy's Bitches

2011-02-18T09:10:00.006-06:00

And now, from the Profound Thought files comes this article regarding forming our own opinions while avoiding the psychological manipulation of relational aggression, and the lessons learned therein.

Relational aggression, incidentally, can be defined as any behavior that aims to manipulate the web of third party relationships in order to hurt a particular individual. Spreading rumors, gossip, lies, telling secrets, eye-rolling, and exclusionary tactics all aim to promote cruelty through the social networks. Janie and Susie don't like Mary, and if you are nice to her, then we won't be nice to you!

Only the weakest members of a social network, and those most in need of validation, succumb to these manipulations (or initiate them for that matter) while the strong do survive although they may find themselves eating lunch alone when they refuse to play the game.

That having been said, below is the situation where I was first directly introduced to relational aggression tactics, and how I chose to handle the situation...

Long ago and far away in a land I would like to forget, I worked in a highly political retail environment, where the social hierarchy was as clearly defined as that which may be observed amongst competitive chimps.

There were two subdivisions in this hierarchy, comprised of one clique led by an inbred, cross eyed Italian with a lisp named Candy, the second group being comprised as those I would identify simply as Other.

Being a fairly independent type myself, I gamely crossed between clique genres on a regular basis, not wholly committed to either one or the other elitist waring factions.

Recently divorced, confident, and busy, I more often than not stood bemused during my assigned mundane tasks at the Timex watch tower (not to be confused with the Jehovah's Witnesses Watchtower) labeling those items that took a licking and kept on ticking while simultaneously watching human nature unfold around me.

Never one to be unsociable, I accepted invitations from Candy's Popular Clique to sometimes go out after work or get together on the weekend, but I was always subtly aware that they were trying to sell me something, or make me be something, that I didn't particularly care to be. I always strove to keep my options open, and walked away with a smile if it got too incredibly cloying or catty, which it often did.

On the Other team, a Hispanic girl named Laura could do no right in the eyes of Candy and her cohorts. She was shunned as a veritable Untouchable, ignored with an intense concentrated effort while regarded as inferior to obviously superior cross eyed Italians with lisps. Because it is my nature to defend the underdog, I began to seek Laura out for conversation on a regular basis, much to the chagrin of Candy.

While interacting with Laura, who seemed disproportionately ecstatic to have someone interact with her in her ongoing social isolation, I was annoyed to notice that I was being intensely scrutinized by Candy's mafia. I was apparently now considered a traitor of sorts for refusing to join them in maintaining their hostile ostracism of Laura. Et tu, Brute! Back away from the Hispanic outcast!

I think not.

One of the lesser minions in this clique, a bootlicker named Marianne, approached me haughtily one morning to let my having formerly defaulted from the clique, with all of its dire consequences, be made known to me.

Like I gave a flying fuck.

"Uh, listen," Marianne pronounced arrogantly, the shock of my having disrupted the hierarchy and befriended an outcast rocking her to the core of her bootlicking soul, "Candy and I have noticed that you are like, talking, to Laura."

"Mmmhmm," I replied flatly. "I am. She's nice."

"Well, " she said slowly, drawing in a melodramatic breath and placing her servants hands on her considerable hips, "we don't like her."

"Hmmm," I observed coldly, "that's interesting. I like her."

"We don't want her hanging out with us!" she said sharply, searching my face for any indication that I grasped the fullness of her implication. If you hang out with her, than you can't hang out with us!

Oh, cry me a river.

"Listen Marianne," I said evenly, leaning towards her while making direct eye contact, "I like Laura. She has done absolutely nothing to make me dislike her. I form my own opinions, whether you and Candy agree with me or not."

Glaring, she turned on her heel and sauntered away, in an apparent rush to meet with Candy in the breakroom, where the magnitude of my insolence would undoubtedly be discussed over Diet Pepsi and potato chips.

Oh, the nerve!

I despised the mentality of these superficial, vicious people, and could not help but come to the conclusion that their need to emotionally abuse and isolate others was driven by nothing less than a deep seated collective insecurity. From my perspective, the opinions of bullies, gossips, and followers such as these meant absolutely nothing to me, and I went about organizing my Timex watches in a state of cliqueless oblivion following the exchange outlined above.

Days later, I arrived to work and casually approached Laura to say good morning. To my surprise, she observed me coolly, regarding me with the same studied indifference with which she had been treated by Candy. Looking at her quizzically, I was amazed at the strategic maneuver employed by a ridiculously vengeful Candy, who then called out to Laura to come join them in the break room, citing donuts and the unspoken gossip and ostracism factor they were to enjoy that day. Eyeing me with a momentary flash of desperation, Laura shrugged her shoulders and walked away with her newfound friends, turning her back on my kindness in her fear.

Fascinating.

Laura was in, I was out, and in spite of my loyalty and dissent in the face of injustice, I was subject to the greatest injustice of all when Laura herself turned on me.

This of course serves to illustrate that when courage prompts us to exercise the power of independent thought, we are often called upon to stand alone, as well as forgo the donuts and gossip as enjoyed by the group.

Shiny Treasures

2011-02-17T10:10:00.001-06:00

I break for homeless people. I feel a kinship with them, and want always to reaffirm any small hope they may harbor in their broken hearts that people do care.

This has been an ongoing theme for me my entire life. I am perpetually drawn to the loners, the disenfranchised, the person slumped over on a park bench. What's wrong? Can I help you?

As a child, I was possessed of the utmost sensitivity, even attributing feelings to inanimate objects. If you didn't play with that toy, it would feel left out, and of course you can't neglect to spend time with the teddy bear. How would he feel? Everyone, and everything, had to be tenderly included and considered in my world.

Although I didn't encourage my son to project deep emotionalism on inanimate objects, I did try to teach him compassion. Years ago, while on an outing in downtown Chicago, we came across a man panhandling in a wheelchair. I told Daniel that he should give the man the change he had in his children's pockets, as an exercise of awareness and generosity. At first he pouted, but when I assured him that God would see to it that his money would ultimately be returned to him for his having recognized the need to help someone, he agreed to give the man his coveted pocket change.

On the Metra train on the way home, Daniel was enthralled to find three shiny quarters on the floor beneath his seat, which was a full twenty five cents more than he had just given, and a lesson was definitely learned that day.

I had a second opportunity to demonstrate the concepts of equality and giving to my son while we were in New York one Christmas. Walking up and down Broadway one rainy evening, the streets lit with a dishonest neon brightness that failed to illuminate all but the most shallow of eyes, we came across a homeless man sitting on the ground in a doorway. He looked young, younger than most who live their lives on the street, and he lowered his gaze as we approached him.

Taking Daniel by his hand, we walked up to the man, and I knelt down on one knee, encouraging my son with a glance to do the same. "You don't have to look down when we walk past," I said softly. "We're no different than you are." I handed him some money, wished him well, and walked away. Daniel was very quiet. I wanted him to know it's wrong to look down on others, and I think he understood.

This preoccupation with the homeless culminated in the early 1990's with my having implemented a ministry of sorts to help the homeless in Union Park. With a friend of mine from church, we photocopied fliers, shopped for canned goods, bought a turkey, rallied others to donate clothing, and set up folding tables in the field house for Thanksgiving dinner. I brought in a microphone and speaker system, and basically sang, talked, and counseled my way through a three hour service, whilst simultaneously trying to ensure the bunson burners were still operating and all the food was cooked and served. It was a lot of work. I went back again at Christmas time, and then again for several more holiday seasons thereafter. From our first group of 7 men and women, we were later serving closer to 40.

Being part of a large group such of this was cathartic for me. I always wanted to be a part of a large family, and have spent time driving through neighborhoods I could never afford to live in, looking at beautiful houses and wondering what it would be like to be a part of a home, a family, such as that.

Basically, I have more in common with the homeless, and I know it.

I was in downtown Chicago recently, and saw a homeless man sleeping on a park bench. I knew he was homeless because of his sun darkened skin, his inappropriately warm coat, and his defeated posture. I paused and thought of how ironic this was, a bereft person set against the framework of the lake, the boats of the wealthy during the summer season sure to pass him by.

I stopped on the sidewalk and opened my backpack, filled with gum wrappers, scribbled ideas, and half finished books, to search for money. Any money. In the bottom, I found them. Quarters.

There were others on the benches around this man, happy well dressed couples chatting aimlessly while someone lay broken and ignored in the midst of them. I thought momentarily of how strange I would look walking past them to greet the man on the bench.

I watched him for a long moment, in the shadow of the Drake Hotel as limo's sped by, and thought about how I sometimes feel that I am racing towards nothing, too.

I walked gingerly across the well manicured lawn, the precious quarters in my loosely clenched fist. I had $2.25, a ransom for a paupers king, representative of all the worldly goods I had to offer. It wasn't much, I reasoned, but maybe it would give him a cup of coffee and some hope.

He was sleeping, perhaps whiling away his loneliness, killing time. Maybe he was exhausted by grief as well, weary of the effort it took to continually look away from cold stares of indifference.

I tapped gently on his shoulder. "Sir?"

His eyes opened suddenly, fearfully. They were a deep azure blue, like the sky on a warm sunny day. I was surprised at their beauty.

Nervous, he tried to rise up from his prone position. "Yes, mam?"

"I just wanted to give you these quarters," I said warmly, smiling as I placed the coins in his anxiously upturned palm. "It's not much, but I thought it might help you."

His mouth dropped open in childlike excitement. "Oh thank you!" he said wondrously, regarding the splendor in his hand.

I patted his shoulder and told him to take care of himself before I walked away. When I turned to look at him over my shoulder, I could see him holding his hand full of quarters up in the sunlight, turning them over like so many shiny treasures.

An Ethical Dilemma on a Sleepless Night

2011-02-15T05:23:00.002-06:00

De ja vu: The Sequel

I lost a friend in the recent past, as much to gossip and miscommunication as to any specific incident that would have mandated a separation.

There were countless opportunities to fill in the blank spaces in our interactions that would have helped to diffuse a rapidly deteriorating situation, and I sincerely feel that I did my personal best to keep that from happening, even up to and including driving to her house one evening when she didn't answer the phone so I could speak to her in person if that's what the situation called for.

The friendship, however unstable at times, was important to me, and I made an effort to communicate that to her with sincerity. Another person, however, had gossiped about me viciously to this friend, attributing me with comments and attitudes that I had not expressed. The agenda of the other girl, a shallow competitive type, was to discredit me with the full intention of destroying our relationship. Unfortunately, this other girl did ultimately succeeded in ruining the friendship between us, and although I consider it sad in a sense, I sincerely believe it is my former friends loss that things ended the way they did. I know I was a good friend, and in no way do I consider the outcome of this situation to be a realistic commentary on my value as a person.

Still, because I did at one point care, I talked on the phone with her one last time, with many hesitant pauses and unspoken words. To my surprise, for some reason she opted to tell me a detailed story during this call about the health issues of a co-worker. Having been seen at a local hospital for a problem that was highly personal, this was an emotionally charged story, full of embarrassing details that had prompted the person to literally beg that the nature of her diagnosis not be discussed with anyone. In fact, if I had ever chosen to repeat this story and cite my source, it would have created an interpersonal disaster for all concerned.

Because of the magnitude of the disclosure, I was confused as to why she had confided this information to me at all, and could only assume that it was a final effort to attribute me a position of trustworthiness in her life. She was forming one final bond with me in relaying this trust, and she knew me well enough to know that I would not betray her regardless of the final outcome of our relationship.

And that's where the ethical dilemma comes in.

From the time of that phone call, I have felt further hurt and betrayed by this person, and without cause or reason. Like many other people in my life, I tried to help and support her both academically and in her personal life, spending time with her socially and interacting with her and her family in a meaningful way. When she was ridiculed by others, I rallied to her side and defended her vehemently. When she would cry that she "couldn't do it," I insisted that she could, and that I would help her every step of the way. When she panicked before tests, I sat at her house until 3:00am and helped her study, oblivious to my own need to sleep. I was, in essence, incredibly loyal, and tried to always follow through on what I said I would do, and to be there when she needed me. I wanted, basically, to be the kind of friend that I would like to have had. But in choosing to believe the gossip of others, she basically communicated to me that I was not important to her, and that I was therefore not viewed as trustworthy in her eyes after all.

So, I thought sadly, why should I remain trustworthy by keeping her secret?

I have wrestled at times with whether or not to divulge what she had told me to the person it concerned. I rationalized that I would like to know if others were discussing my personal life in detail, and that it would therefore be somehow noble of me to "help" this other girl by buying her a clue concerning her having been betrayed like I was.

It sounds all well and good, but there is one small problem with this. Helping the third party is not my true motive, my motives are not pure because I am hurt and angry, and any action I might take in that direction would therefore be wrong. In trying to hurt the person who had hurt and used me, the third party involved would be little more than a unwitting victim or catalyst for a vengnance that in all fairness didn't concern her, and there could never be a positive outcome to my disclosure under those circumstances.

Might my former friend have repercussions to contend with if I did this? Yes. Would she be extremely uncomfortable trying to deflect the gossip and distrust that would undoubtedly descend on her? Undoubtedly. Would I be happy to see her in such a situation? Maybe...but just for a moment.

Ethically, the bottom line is, whenever we take matters into our own hands with the intent to "even the score," create deliberate strife and division, or advance ourselves at the expense of another, no good can come of it. It's ill-gotten gain, and it will turn to gravel in your mouth. Seeking to hurt others, even if in some instances it might seem justified as a result of how they treated you, is an unhealthy course of action to take.

No one ever gets away with anything, not really. The truth always comes out in the end.

And with that thought in mind, I'm not going to disclose what I know to try and hurt this person who hurt me. My friendship was a gift, and all that I tried to do for her will come back to me someday, if even from someone else. I'm going to do what I believe is the right thing, even though doing the right thing is not always the easiest thing. I can be trusted to keep a confidence. Hopefully she will look back someday and realize that I had been a much better friend than she had given me credit for.

It's the least I can do for someone I had genuinely cared about, and I never told anyone what she told me as much for her sake as the woman who deserves to have her privacy respected, in spite of not having been treated with anything near the consideration I have extended to all concerned.

I have been, and will continue to be, a trustworthy friend.

A Blogger Sorority Book Signing Event

2011-02-14T10:00:00.000-06:00

I've heard of 60 second delay, or even 60 minute delay, but this is ridiculous. Has it been a week already? Time to hit the blog.

I attended a book signing at Borders in Oak Brook, which is just across the international date line, in an adjacent time zone and to the left, in the hopes of meeting authors Jen Lancaster and Wendy McClure. As usual, I got lost no less than three times on my journey, and ended up calling my ex-husband to ask for directions while parked beside a darkened unkempt trailer that undoubtedly housed three serial killers with a case of Pabst Blue Ribbon, so you know I was determined to get there somehow. Speeding to and fro on off ramps that quickly led to various Upramps to Nowhere, I finally found it. Borders, Taiwan.

Anxious to encourage Jen and Wendy by buying their books and just being there as a show of support, I was also hopeful about requesting strategic moves that would see me published myself by next Tuesday. Breathless and knocking over various patrons on my way to the coveted seating area, I was relieved to find an actual seat where I could observe the proceedings and interject comments without restraint (unless, as has happened before, bookstore employees were deployed to restrain me.) I'm here! I have a question! Pick me!

"So Wendy," I said coolly as I took the floor, an author waiting to happen myself, "tell me. Who are the Damn Hell Ass Kings, anyway?"

That's great, Kim. You are a powerhouse of intellectualism and wonder, especially today. Next?!

I was nervous, and I'm not quite sure why. Being in close proximity to others who are as successful as I am not tend to have that effect on me. Consequently, virtually every inane comment or inappropriately phrased question I posed to the authors inevitably created the uncomfortable physiological sensation of my ears being on fire while lockjaw simultaneously overwhelmed the lower portion of my face. My questions then were formulated more as inarticulate blatherings than those normally considered viable during actual communication.

I like books. Books are good. Will you sign my nice books? Special Ed speaks. Again.

When the books were signed and my cross examination was over (my ears now in flames and my tongue sorely cleft to the roof of my mouth), it was time for my personal favorite part of the show at any book signing I attend. Armed with my Kodak Not So Fucking Easyshare Camera, I am always determined to get a picture of whatever I was doing on any given night, if for no other reason than to appease my parol officer. This night was no different. Time for a photo op! I thus went forward to stand towering behind the authors seats, posing and ready to smile.

Now, I can usually be counted on to wait my turn and play nice, but I found myself suddenly in a little bit of a social quandary in this situation. The official Borders photographer was poised and ready to take my photo, I was poised and ready to take my photo, the authors were poised and ready to take the photo and escape having me hovering over them, and yet a petite woman with the most girlishly feminine voice I ever heard would simply not stop talking long enough for us to take the photo.

She was very friendly, but I was getting edgy, leaning on the authors chairs as I was and trying to look petite myself.

Within 3 minutes, I went from poised to annoyed (patience isn't necessarily a virtue, you know) while I regarded her with increasing disdain in the midst of her lengthy soliloquy. Dressed in what I would describe as an Aspiring Writer's Uniform of sorts, complete with a blazer and strategically placed broach, I listened to this woman go on and on and on while I loomed plus size and awkward behind the book signing table for 10 incredibly-long-goddamn minutes waiting for my photo op. Hey! It's my turn now! I think Wendy may have even thought I was loitering behind her in a deliberate effort to look down her top, which would have been fair, really, seeing as the buttons on my blouse were not quite willing to accommodate their own contents either, a fact which I tried to disguise behind my large and colorful scarf.

Pay no attention to the bra behind the curtain, everyone, and just smile for the camera puh-leeze. Obviously, I got my picture, although the sun was coming up over the Oak Brook horizon before it finally happened.

When a picture's that nice, you take it twice.

When the remainder of the people left, I was intent on detaining the authors for additional questioning. Tell me about your world (and please don't mind my lockjaw.) Where is Printers Row? What's goes on at a book auction? What's an average advance? What planet am I on? Both Wendy and Jen were extremely funny, informative, and surprisingly open about their individual experiences in having a book published, citing what it's like, for example, to read their own reviews or wait for an opportunity to appear on Oprah (Jen Lancaster's planned strategy being to jog past Oprah's studio and lob books at passers by.) It was a revealing backstage view of what goes on behind the literary scenes, and was well worth the drive to hear it.
I found Jen Lancaster to have a very witty and sardonic sense of humor, even off the cuff and on spontaneous short notice, and was left to wonder about the fashionable life I never had as I admired her harlequin sweater and fantastic black sequined shoes. Wendy, quietly down to earth and funny, was just as clever in person as she is in print, and didn't even seem to mind when I caught her off guard by presenting her with an obscure photo from her blog featuring an interview she did with FOX news two years ago.

This is a picture of Wendy McClure that I have had on my refrigerator for two years, and not only is it funny, but it reminds me not to take myself too seriously, either.

They were both patient and friendly, and talked to me and the remaining Border employee far longer than they were required too, really. And just when I had finally become really comfortable (my ears now merely simmering), having pulled up a chair and assuming that we were going to hang out until at least Sunday, I was politely reminded that I hadn't yet paid for the one book I had absentmindedly stuffed inside my purse and it was now time to go.

Refraining from imposing further by asking them with all of the eagerness of a socially inappropriate stalker dork if they wanted to go out for a drink, I eventually left with a great deal more to consider than I had known about when I first got there. Both of these women are extremely talented and accomplished, and I am grateful to have had the opportunity to have met them.

Authors to the front of me, stalkers in the back, here I am, stuck and unpublished with myself. Having met Jen Lancaster and Wendy McClure, though, I may be one step closer to my literary goals as a result of their advice and knowledge.

Either that, or maybe I'll do a jog by book toss in front of Oprah's studios, too.

Aristotle on Demand! (It's Better than Comcast!)

2010-12-18T23:59:00.000-06:00

An analysis of Nicomachean Ethics occurs here, so get ready to philosophize.

I'm talking about happiness, love, friendship, marriage, it's all here!

You can change the channel if you want to, but I love this stuff :-)

What does Aristotle say about happiness?

First and foremost, Aristotle said that, ideally, everyone's goal is happiness. What that means may vary from person to person, but it's important to note that what we may assume may create happiness (such as acquiring money) is not a true source of happiness at all. Money, in this example, is a means of acquiring what we need in a physiological sense (shelter, warmth, basic provisions) that will ultimately enhance our quality of life, but these things are not the source of happiness itself. For the purpose of argument, money can be considered a means to attain those things or qualities which will contribute to our sense of comfort and happiness, but it is not the endpoint at which we would hope to find ourselves truly happy as a direct result of having money.

Now, striving for honor or recognition, for example, as a means of attaining happiness is somewhat more noble (in my opinion) than longing for money, but because being considered honorable is contingent upon other peoples opinions of us, it is capricious and potentially fleeting at best, too. Gallup polls, top ten lists, awards shows, and People magazine give evidence of this every day. If being honored by others (by the public or in the media specifically, but more importantly by your friends or family) is dependent on what others think of you, you will only be as happy as your latest review.

For me, happiness encompasses the experience of love. The most comprehensive, perfect definition of love I have ever read is found in the book of Corinthians, V. 1, chapter 13, and reads as such:

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails.

And if you find love, genuine happiness, in spite of any circumstances you may find yourself in, will never fail you either.

What are the three kinds of friendship?

The three kinds of friendship are described by Aristotle as those motivated by either utility, pleasure, or "friends without qualification," who are defined as those who are virtuous and good towards each other without expectation.

If someone is friends with a person primarily for gain, and they are essentially using the other person, the friendship is easily dissolved as soon as the other party is no longer considered useful. If someone is friends with another primarily for fun and pleasure (which Aristotle says happens most often in youth) the friendship again is more easily dissolved because no one or nothing can be expected to be a never ending source of pleasure or entertainment indefinitely. And when hard times come, these "friends" are suddenly nowhere to be found.

In the final example of friendship, experienced between what Aristotle describes as "good and virtuous people," there is a sense of utility that is an extension of caring and generosity, pleasure is experienced as a result of happiness in spending time together, and because the motive is simply to be a good and loyal friend, the relationship tends to be more permanent because it is not contingent upon what you can "get" from the other person, or what they can "do" for you.

So good friends, in a climate of moral excellence between those who trust and help each other as well as being able to relax and laugh together, are good for their own sake.

And thousands of years after Aristotle pointed this out, it's still difficult to count most acquaintances as really good friends.

How do these concepts relate to ideas concerning love and marriage?

Marriage can be a friendship of utility, as long as utility is not the prime motive. The word utility, to me, has a negative connotation, and although there's an expectation within marriage of providing mutually beneficial utilitarian services (housekeeping, work, shared financial support, raising children), to marry specifically for what another can do for you is, I think, ethically wrong (although it happens all of the time.)

Marriage is more appropriately a friendship of pleasure, and those who feel that they have married their "best friend" have a much better prognosis for long term success in their relationship. You can coexist without the (assumed) monetary focus of the utilitarian marriage, but you cannot coexist in an unhappy relationship with someone whom you don't love or enjoy being with.

Ideally, marriage should be between those who share a friendship of virtue, with mutual respect and happiness a counterpart of two people who genuinely care about and respect one another
in addition to the aforementioned qualities of utility and pleasure. They're all interrelated, and each kind of friendship provides a component of a healthy and successful relationship.

A marriage of virtue is less common, I think, because people do tend to focus on others as a means of financial support or convenience, as in a marriage of utility, or as unrealistic sources of perpetual ease and eternal love, as in the marriage of pleasure. A virtuous marriage, on the other hand, recognizes the value of the other for who they are rather than what they can provide or perform, and as such has little expectation but to love and appreciate the other person no matter what their finances or how they look when they get up in the morning. It is love for the sake of the other instead of love for the benefit of the self, and that's what makes it virtuous.

And I'm rambling now, so on to the next topic :-)

Can selfish people ever really be happy? Are people who love themselves more happy and generous than those who don't love themselves?

I think that selfish people, with their inevitable focus on wealth, status, and self promotion, are by nature competitive and jealous and therefore cannot genuinely love themselves or others in a true sense. Their lack of concern for other people, as evidenced by striving to satisfy their own needs and desires above all else (and often in direct disregard to the needs of others) supports these observations. I have never met a selfish person who was really happy or who loved (or even liked) themselves. They're always busy looking for some additional conquest to justify their very existence.

A truly happy person, though, who does love themselves, is able to be generous towards others by merit of the wealth of love and kindness in their hearts. Being self content and having a strong sense of their own personal value, they are able to see the good (if not outright divinity) in others, which easily translates into wanting to help people and give back some of richness of spirit that they have within. Rather than striving to compete with others or forcibly take what they hope will somehow make them happy, the generous, kind, virtuous person already has what they need in their hearts, they are instead able to give without expectation, understanding that all the good things that come back to them in return are a gift, too.

And that's what happiness is. A gift

Parade of Lunches

2010-12-12T00:06:00.002-06:00

I have been on an endless round of lunch and dinner excursions lately.

Rotating friends and restaurants on the average of three times a week, I am a woman possessed with both the munchies as well as a rapidly reducing bank account. I have gone to the Marriott and Mateo's, to Pepe's and Portillo's. I have met people for Christmas parties at companies I don't even work for, reveling in the chocolate fountains and sparkly lights, and have accepted invitations to sit in cozy kitchens where I have been served coffee with eggnog and homemade tiramisu.

Being popular has its advantages, you know. But there is as yet one little problem when considering all of these recent indulgences.

I am getting as chubbified as Kirstie Alley isn't anymore. Uh oh.

These countless casual foodfests, although fun, have seriously compromised my ability to wear a pair of jeans that aren't being secured by a rope or pair of suspenders for lack of ability to button them. And if being a perpetual Jethro Clampet isn't bad enough, even Jared in his Before pictures is making me look Big by comparison.

What hath thou wrought?! It's not time to make the donuts, Kim, and you definitely shouldn't like Sara Lee! The party is over, or at least it should be unless you want to ultimately be removed from the house by paramedics after someone bulldozes the south wall of your living room in an effort to excavate you from yonder couch!

Oh, this is bad. This is not good. And no matter how much jewelry you adorn yourself with, or how blithe your wit and joi de vivre, when you phat baby, you phat.

This insidious foray into the realm of corpulent splendor happened silently, and without warning. Pass the butter, it whispered. Yes, I'll have some more, it sighed. A sirens call of cookies and croissants, a subtle insistence to have just one more outing on one more day with one more friend to one more restaurant, and now look. Captain Ahab is hunting me down as this Christmas seasons Moby Dick.

And of course, like a bridesmaid frantic to fit into an atrocious dress that is two sizes two small within a very short period of time, I have an urgent need to Get Thin Quick too. The fear of being harpooned is just one concern, the other being the teeny tiny Asian style student desks provided in a college setting within which I will not be able to fit my derriere unless I leave some of it behind. Because right now, my behind would be able to accommodate a family of four for an impromptu ride, the sheer magnitude of my nether regions now reminiscent of the most pronounced camels hump. Baby got back, so get on, everyone.

Oh God.

I don't relish the idea of having to bring a can of Crisco to school to provide me the slippery torque needed to be able to ease in and out of my desk without assistance from a crane or two muscular Hans, nor do I want to be forced to pronounce with false bravado that I prefer to sit on the floor because I am a down to earth type of girl that simply doesn't like to sit in desks like the phonies around her.

No!

The weight has got to come off, but I'm fairly confident that it won't be as fun and entertaining as when I put it on. Bring in the sour cream, guys! I just want to slather it all over my already grandiose person before I have dessert.

I have learned from this experience, though. Chubby is as chubby doesn't. If chubby wants to eat and yet not move, chubby expands. If chubby, conversely, decides to live on air and salad while running on a treadmill three times a week instead of riding a float in a Parade of Lunches, chubby deflates.

I'm off the float now, and back on my feet while I can still see them. No more parades. The party really is over! Now put the ice cream down and get to work already, before Herman Melville tells Ahab where you're hiding.

Diets Of The Poor And Anonymous

2010-12-10T01:01:00.000-06:00

Unfortunately, in spite of my current perimeters, I cannot afford to hire a personal trainer, PBS chef, or Jenny Craig Peppy Helper to induce a much needed weight loss miracle. I am on my own in this, and it is definitely a long, wide road to reduced radial measurements, trust me. And pass me a damn cookie already.

In my weight loss experimentations, I have adapted versions of the Diets of the Rich and Famous to suit my status of chubby poor unknown person, as well as having created some diet plans of my own when all else was lost.

Except my weight, that is.

The South Side Diet

I cannot afford the luxurious high livin' of those who practice The South Beach Diet, and have modified this diet to better reflect my lifestyle. On The South Side Diet, I simply drive to this racially diverse Chicago neighborhood late at night, and allow myself to be chased with box cutters and lead pipes, thereby enabling me to lose weight. Terror produces adrenaline, and running for your life is good for aerobic conditioning.

Note: Carrying a defense weapon on The South Side Diet is cheating. To enhance your terror and therefore your speed, no self defense mechanisms are allowed.

The Atkins Butter Churn Express

No time or money for well prepared steaks and vegetables low in complex carbohydrates? Enjoy easily accessible "free items" on the Atkins Butter Churn Express by ingesting sticks of butter and balls of processed cheese food, and you'll most certainly become thin just weeks before your massive coronary. Guaranteed.

Note: Margarine is even less expensive than genuine butter, and may be substituted with melted plastic products in a pinch.

The Poverty Diet

Do you crave M & M's? Krispy Kreme's? Pure granulated cane sugar by the pound? Simply ensure that you have no money whatsoever, not even a dollar, and you will be unable to support your habit. Deprive yourself of dollars for a enough days, and you will eventually become thin. Not even the vending machines will support your habit without a dollar to your name.

Note: Begging friends or coworkers for loose change or crawling underneath the vending machine hoping to get rich quick is cheating.

The Break Up Diet

Begin dating someone whom you genuinely like and who makes you happy. Do something mysterious to provoke them to unceremoniously relieve you of your Girlfriend Duties when you least expect it while in a heavily populated public place. This will make you lapse into a state of perplexed shock, the outcome of which will cause you to stop eating, therefore inducing weight loss.

Note: This is only for the courageous and determined dieter, and should not be tried by most, at home or otherwise.

The Bright Fluorescent Light Diet

Observe your scantily clothed body in any well lit dressing room in a public place. The trauma you experience as a result of this will create a sudden craving to be thin. If a store employee opens the door unexpectedly and shrieks at the sight of you, you may increase your weight loss significantly as well.

Note: Facing the mirror in a baggy sweatsuit with chocolate smudged on your face is cheating. You must be as close to nekkid as possible to reap the full shock value of your fluorescent viewing.

The Fuck It I'm Joining The NFL Diet

Just think! If you were a linebacker for the Chicago Bears, you wouldn't need to lose weight. Your robust zaftig self would suffice, and you would be welcomed into the open arms and bludgeoning shoulders of the opposing team players without judgment. You could, basically, say "fuck it!" once and for all.

Note: The sports application will not work if you are aspiring to be a jockey or or featured skater for Disney on Ice.

The Inverted Dimensions Diet

Instead of striving to become narrower, you should instead make it your goal to become taller. If you were 7'5 as opposed to 5'7, for example, you could easily carry the weight you are accustomed to, with additional inches available for the occasional pizza party or clandestine eclair.

Note: High heel shoes do not count.

The Son Of The Inverted Dimensions Diet

To make your body appear smaller, simply make your cranium appear bigger. This can be accomplished by banging your head repeatedly on the machines at the gym until it swells to monstrous proportions, thereby making your body appear smaller by contrast.

Note: This may cause headaches, but wearing a helmet is definitely counter effective and is most certainly cheating.

I make no claims whatsoever as to the efficiency or value of these diets, and if you saw me now, you would definitely believe me.

Broadcasting to you live from a well stocked pantry,
Kim

The Big Date: A Review

2010-12-09T23:40:00.000-06:00

It was a friend of a friend related fix up, and as such was being marketed as a "probable guarantee." "You'll probably really like him, " I was told with what was later revealed to be mock enthusiasm, "guaranteed!"

Like most results of marketing scams or late night infomercials, though, the product ultimately did not meet expectations.

On recommendation of a friend who apparently doesn't have a firm grasp of my interests or preferences (or of reality for that matter), I consented for my phone number to be given to an obscure Tony for what I was assured would be no more than a preliminary phone call test drive. "It's up to you," I was told with sincerity. "If you don't think you'll like him, then just don't go!"

Assured that I could default on the Tony loan at will, I agreed to talk to him with the intention to eventually meet without having read any of the fine print. This wasn't just a blind date fix up, but the relational equivalent of Stevie Wonder consenting to dance with Ray Charles in the midst of land mines.

Talk a walk side Kim! Bring a white cane and a helpful dog and live a little!

When we talked on the phone for the first time, Tony having been given my number and a specific time frame in which to use it, I was disappointed by the tone of his voice. It wasn't insolent or sarcastic or anything, which I may have even considered a challenge of sorts, but rather Mickey Moustonian. It was high, soft, inclined to spiraling upwards at the end of sentences in what almost sounded like girlish excitement. "Do you like moVIES? Do you want to go oUT?" Now, call me shallow, call me superficial, but just don't call me up and sound like Mickey Mouse.

I have an almost fetishistic obsession with voices. Some people go for feet, others have a fondness for piercings, and I just want to be enthralled, mesmerized, amused, and soothed by a warm, melodious voice. Like Kelsey Grammar when he's not singing, or Bing Crosby without the bing. Well okay, maybe not like Kelsey Grammar or Bing Crosby at all, but better. Seductive and confident, able to imitate others and do impressions, and always filled with ready laughter. I have initially fallen for guys based on their ability to seduce me with their voice, and have been repelled by others for lack of the same. Tony was definitely in the latter category. If I wanted to listen to a voice like that, I would just stay home and watch the Cartoon Network.

Not wanting to be overly critical, I thought, well, maybe his physical self is a startling contrast to his Jiminy Glick vocalizations. Maybe, I thought hopefully, he's a 7 foot tall bodybuilder with an IQ of 245! This could still be okay! Wanting to put my hands over my ears and repeat "la la la," as we wrapped up the phone call, I agreed to meet him at Friday's, insisting on taking my own car in case he was later revealed to be either a serial killer or a mouseketeer, whichever came first.

Like most people going on a near sighted if not entirely blind date, I met with certain socially acceptable prerequisites such as taking my car to the car wash and ironing creases into the front of my jeans to accentuate the pointy toes of my glamorous and dangerously exciting boots. In addition, I wore a half bottle of Ralph Lauren Blue, a fake tan which made me Bronze, and really dramatic earrings. Add my contact lenses and some good lighting into the mix, and I was ready to rock and roll!

Okay Tony, I thought curiously as I drove, lets see what you came up with.

When I parked in the lot at Friday's, I knew I was looking for an Italian type driving a red car, but that was about it. When I got there, fashionably late by at least 20 minutes, I decided to get out and walk cautiously towards the entrance of the restaurant. There, in the parking lot, I noticed a man wearing jeans and a short jacket emblazoned with a Teamsters Union emblem, and my immediate response was "uh oh, " which quickly evolved into "oh no," as I got closer. Standing there in the cold night air, peering throughout the dimly lit parking lot like a captain at the mast of what was sure to be a sinking ship, I was disappointed in what I saw.

His clothes were frumpy and nondescript, and he appeared to have rolled out of bed after sleeping in them. Not good. His face was mildly handsome, and he was taller than average, but his demeanor was incredibly intense, and I almost felt nervous as I approached him. "Hi," I said "I'm Kim. Tony, right?" Looking me up and down without even attempting to disguise the fact that he was looking me up and down, he said "hi" in response with his cartoonish voice that was now a complete dichotomy from how he should sound. Gesturing towards the entrance as he said "shall wE," I couldn't help but think "it's going to be a very long night."

His next offense occurred at the door. He walked in ahead of me, holding the door open behind him as an afterthought! What? Listen, Cubby, apparently you've never been to a cotillion or invited to tea at high noon with the Queen of England, but in my world, the man always holds the door open for the woman! Commoner. Proudly flipping my hair as I walked imperiously behind him, I decided he was uncouth and I would order very expensive items as revenge for his having been rude to me, which at Friday's might be a cross between an appetizer, a large beverage, and some water. So there.

Seated in a booth that was mercifully fastened with a curious combination of objects on which I could focus my attention, I looked around at all the stuff while he simultaneously tried to look at my stuff. I suddenly regretted having worn this particular top, and I began tugging at it self consciously as he leered. Too bad he wasn't Denis Leary, though, or at least he could have at least made me laugh. Tony, being a benign and nondescript Disney character by contrast, was unfortunately not amusing in any way. I found myself virtually carrying him and the conversation throughout the entire date process, much to my exhausted dismay. He was not particularly smart or witty, and although he laughed at appropriate times in response to my inane remarks, I might as well have been a kid practicing my show in front of a mirror at home while talking into my imaginary hairbrush microphone rather than having a conversation with a grown mouseketeer.

Sensing my discontent, though I sincerely tried to hide it, he tried to regale me with flattery. I was pretty, I was a lot of fun, I was funNY! Okay. And you are......not? To be fair, I rationalized that he may simply be nervous, or shy, and I was still at least moderately open to giving him a chance to enthrall me with his wit and wisdom. Or to at least formulate sentences with words that were not monosyllabic. Hello, Tony? Are you in there? Is anybody home?!

He nodded his head while I talked, and said "hmmm" when he obviously didn't understand what I was saying, which was often. He was perfectly welcome to jump in at anytime, all he needed was to choose a topic! Thermodynamics? The DNA of chimps? How about the relevance of the Electoral College? Anything? No? I looked at him sitting empty and boring before me, and noted that there was no compensatory qualities that he could even offer in exchange for being dull. He was wearing a cheap watch with a cheap flexible band, no rings, no bracelets. I detected no cologne, his hairstyle was bland, his clothes unstylish. So much for going out with a trophy date! This guy wasn't even really cute!

All he wanted to talk about, in fact, was how much money he made and what his projected net worth was soon to be. He made union wages, he bought and sold real estate, he was a rich guy! So? Who do you think you're out with, Anna Nicole Smith before the Trimspa? If he really knew me (which he didn't) he would realize that was the least likely approach to impress me, as I simply didn't have the common sense to realize the value of a dollar. Or even thousands of them all together at once, for that matter. I had never had a lot of money, and I didn't particularly foresee myself as someone who ever would. And even if I was to become suddenly wealthy (or to even find myself mysteriously above the poverty level for a short period of time), I would most likely give all the money away to Streetwise vendors right before I lost the wallet that contained the rest, so money was definitely not an issue for me.

I think you meant to date the leggy blond in the next booth, Tony, because I really don't care. You're boring, sorry. Money cant' buy a good sense of humor or careful turn of phrase. Check, please! Give it to Cubby the Millionaire Mouseketeer.

I had sadly decided that the date was a bust, in spite of his interest in my bust, but he was determined to continue dating me till the bitter end. "Do you want to go to a movie now? Huh?! Do yOU?!" Suppressing the urge to tell Mickey I was really tired, I agreed to go so as to avoid hurting his feelings if nothing else. Because, after all, there was obviously not going to be anything else after this date.

"Sure, " I said without enthusiasm, "that would be fine."

Still insisting that I take my own car in spite of his enthusiastic offers to the contrary, I agreed to meet him at a nearby theater. When we got there, I was annoyed when he reached out and grasped my hand without asking while we wandered back and forth looking at the marquees. I was of course looking for a benign comedy to ensure that I wasn't subjected to gratuitous sex or full frontal nudity that might have enhanced his libido or encouraged him to formulate amorous plans without my consent, while he instead looked hopefully for something rated R+++ for just that exact reason.

Ew! And who said you could hold my hand, anyway?

In line at the ticket window, I looked around at all the happy couples silhouetted by the golden lights above us with quiet envy. They really wanted to be with who they were with, and here I was with Annette Funicello. When he began to gently squeeze and stroke my hand while he smiled at me with what I feared was longing of some kind, it was all I could do to keep from pulling away and asking a nearby couple if they would consider having me join them for a menage a trois.

Once inside, I politely declined his offers of popcorn and candy, imaging him to be such a materialistic person that he would somehow equate my accepting these gifts as bartered items for which I was supposed to give him something in exchange. Tony, there isn't enough candy in the world! This may be a blind date, but I have 20/20 vision, even in the dark of a theater, and it's not going to happen!

In the uncomfortably close seats, he was apparently incapable of keeping his considerable hands to himself. His right arm was around my shoulder, his hand somehow finding its way into my hair where it rested on the nape of my neck. I wanted to shake him off of me like a dog that had just ran through a sprinkler, and instead just found myself leaning away in quiet annoyance while he fondled my head and continued to lay little pats and strokes and squeezes on my one free hand, the other being preoccupied with clutching my purse like Estelle Getty from the Golden Girls.

God will you get off of me?! Touch my leg and you die.

I could hear him breathing, and I didn't like it. I wanted him to stop breathing altogether, after which I would not perform CPR like a good little nurse, no. I would let him expire, like a carton of milk, right there! I made a mental note to be sure and kick the ass of the well meaning friend who orchestrated this fiasco, and all while I remained determined to just say no to petting.

Sorry, Tony! The petting zoo is closed.

At the end of the movie, which seemed to last no less than 14 1/2 hours, I quickly excused myself so that I could go hide in the washroom and sit a spell in the lounge. I was gone, oh, maybe 15 minutes, and was ultimately forced to return to the lobby were Tony lay in wait as there was no window deemed large enough to accommodate my escape from the lounge area.

When I walked up to him, smiling pleasantly but not overly friendly, he almost made me laugh for the first time that evening when he leaned casually against the wall, one arm outstretched and supporting a ridiculous Lord of Flatbush pose against a movie poster, his other arm moving in swiftly for the kill when I least expected it. Pulling me up against him suddenly, he whispered huskily "I think you're very pretty, Kim," as he leaned in and tried to kiss me. I turned my head skillfully at just that moment, his kiss glancing off of my cheek as it thankfully missed it's intended target. We were in a theater lobby, not the Sybaris, and could you just back away slowly from the woman who is not your girlfriend, Frankie Avalon?

I all but ducked beneath his arm as I made my escape, thanking him blithely as I headed for the door.

Once outside, he was not to be refused again. Hadn't he just spent 40.00 dollars? Did I think I was going to get away with not kissing him? Had I gone mad? When I reached my car, he all but pushed me up against the door as he put his arms around my shoulders and pulled me towards him. "I'd really like to see you again," he whispered, forcing a deep kiss on my unwilling mouth, complete with an intrusive tongue and obviously bad manners. Putting my hands firmly against his shoulders, I pushed him back sharply, now obviously mad myself. Looking at me with apparent amusement, he asked me incredulously if something was wrong. "I don't really know you, " I said with exasperation. "Well," he replied with all the subtlety of the Boston Strangler "you could know me if you wanted to" as he tried to kiss me again.

What is wrong with men, anyway? Do they think that they have the right to force themselves on women without consent or invitation and just kiss you for sport? Wasn't that a form of Lip Abuse? And of course, when you're out with someone that you really want to kiss you, all they inevitably do is sit there smoking furiously while they look at their watch and talk fervently about some Hot Chick who Done Em Wrong. The denial of a kiss is yet another form of Lip Abuse, but this situation with Tony was undoubtedly worse, and I felt a sudden need to go home and gargle with Listerine.

"Tony," I said firmly, suddenly very relieved that I had followed my intuition and taken my own car, "I had a nice time, but I need to get home."

"Can I see you agAIN?"

"I'm really busy right now with the holidays."

"How about tomorROW?!"

"Hmmm. Well. Tomorrow's not good."

"How about next wEEK?

"I might be busy." Or dead. Or something.

I finally consented that he could call me, and of course he did so the very next day. At 8:30am.

Hello? Oh, hi. No, I wasn't sleeping Tony, I was hanging wallpaper. Yes, really. I painted the exterior of my house earlier, and I was just about to go out and milk the cows that live in my garage. No, it's fine, really. What? Six. I have six cows. And a lama. Mmmhmmm.

This guy is insane. Who calls anyone at 8:30 am to request a second date for which they had been politely rejected the night before? A lonely farmer? A Russian cosmonaut that had just gotten in from hurtling through space and hadn't seen a woman in 8.5 years? This guy Tony?!

Politely declining to see him yet again, citing the need to get outside and shear some sheep just before I wrapped Christmas presents, I actually allowed my cell phone to remain disconnected for three days this week after I had been disconnected for forgetting to pay the bill. I figured he might get discouraged if he heard a recording that I was temporarily out of service, and go stalk some other early morning type person. I would be happy to introduce him to my ex-husband. Mike hasn't slept past 4:00 am since 1986, as far as I knew. They would make a great couple.

All I knew was that Tony wasn't going to be a couple with me. I would just end up returning him to customer service after the holidays, so it really wouldn't be fair to accept any future dates. If a potential relationship didn't have the ability to make me want to wander around the house singing one of my favorites, The Turtles song Happy Together, I simply wasn't interested. No sale. No deal.

So much for probable guarantees. Bye, Cubby.

Simian John and Other Debacles

2010-12-09T23:28:00.000-06:00

An exploration of relationships is undertaken here. I am, of course, not qualified to lead the expedition, but seeing as I am the only eyewitness willing to report my findings, here they are...

I was invited to go to a friends house recently for a group venture involving "pizza, cocktails, and CSI," and I happily accepted. There's nothing quite so compatible with pizza and criminal hijinks than a cocktail, so of course I said I would go.

When I first walked in, a woman with dark hair was sitting alone in the kitchen. I noticed that she eyed me almost warily as she assessed my high heeled boots and decorative, oversized earrings. She was cool, although not unpleasant, and I tried to make small talk with her to try and diffuse the strange, defensive vibe I was picking up. I later realized that this vibe was being channeled as a result of the lack of confidence she felt at the hands her disrespectful boyfriend, Simian John.

He was personable enough on first impression. He was friendly, with ready laughter and an engaging ability to communicate that I was the only woman in the room, which I of course found flattering. Until, that is, I slowly realized that he and dark haired Susan were an official couple, and all bets were now suddenly off.

Well, for me, anyway.

His girlfriend vacillated between looking angry and depressed as this guy shamelessly complimented me, cornered me, and began actually trying to wait on me in her presence while virtually ignoring her. Can I get you a drink? I never saw you at any of the other parties I've been too. Are you seeing anyone?

I felt extremely uncomfortable. When we all moved to the living room, he deliberately sat beside me on the love seat after his girlfriend chose to sit on the couch, which was unnerving. When he manipulated this seating arrangement, she looked crestfallen.

Turning my body away from him (body language 101) in an effort to discourage him, I focused on talking with his girlfriend. Sad and upset, she was intent on watching him while trying to feign interest in talking to me. In an effort to shift his focus back to her, then, she suddenly picked up my friends baby daughter, valiantly playing with her while she counted fingers and toes. She hummed a lullaby and gave the baby extravagant kisses, and all with the intention of trying to demonstrate to him what a great catch she was. I noticed her glancing at him fervently from the corners of her anxious eyes while she self consciously played with the baby, and he of course showed no response whatsoever.

This woman is desperate, I thought sadly, and this man is simply not interested in her. Or at the very least, he was not loyal and was therefore intent on working the room and shopping around for a new model, which was obvious.

I felt sorry for her, as she finally released the squirming baby and made other efforts to gain his attention. John, will you help me change the ringtone on my cellphone? Can you hand me a napkin? Do you want another piece of pizza?

He was brusque in his response to her, and very dismissive. Who cares about that stupid cell phone! Can't you get it yourself? No, I don't want anything right now, I'm trying to talk here, Susan.

And then she would go to smoke, and maybe to cry, out on the back deck by herself.

I was unnaturally quiet. I wanted to take her aside and give her advice. Listen, I am not your problem here. I am not a threat. But you need to realize that if it wasn't me your boyfriend was flirting with, it would be Anywoman, Anywhere. He is taking you for granted and he completely disrespects you. Your real problem is in idenitifying the behavior, making the decision that you won't allow him to treat you like that, and then taking appropriate action.

I had excused myself to go to the washroom when she stepped out momentarily, wanting to avoid being alone with him and further exacerbating the problem. When I returned, Susan had taken the seat beside him on the love seat. Clinging to his arm, she had her knees drawn up in a self protective stance as she leaned against him heavily. John, in the meantime, looked annoyed, his body language (tense and awkward and trying to lean in the opposite direction) indicating that he was less than pleased with her attentions.

Oh, I thought with dismay, that is the entirely wrong thing to do. I wanted to warn her not to reward his bad behavior with affection, which would only serve to reinforce it. But she didn't know that I was an armchair psychologist available for private consultations.

When I sat in a seat now distant from him, he still continued to lavish attention on me while belittling his girlfriend in my presence. This was orchestrated to communicate to me that he was available, in a sense, in spite of the fact that he had a very dependent and needy woman trying to sit on his lap. I wasn't buying.

Frustrated and hurt by her boyfriends attitude, Susan finally strode away from the room in obvious anger, going into the bathroom and slamming the door. I decided then that I was going to go home, to alleviate one component of the problem. I was tired, anyway, although watching this dance was clinically interesting from my stance as a psych student at the end of the couch, a detached objective observer.

John mumbled "she can be such a bitch," as he watched her storm away. Shaking my head, I thought "I don't blame her."

When Susan finally returned to the room, she sat at the opposite end of couch, away from him, pouting and glowering. Good, I thought. Checkmate! Now she had his attention, at least momentarily. The relationship dynamics were going to be modified, right here before my ever watchful eyes!

John? Your move. Time to apologize and show her some much needed respect. But John wasn't going to play nice. I don't think he was smart enough to know how.

In an effort to level the playing field, Simian John then orchestrated a response that might be expected from a 15 year old. Pulling a small pebble from the tread on the bottom of his boot, he threw at her suddenly, hitting her in the face!

Warning! Incoming asteroid approaching!

My mouth dropped open in astonishment as this small object flew past my face on its way to its intended target. Reaching down to pick up what hit her, Susan was understandably insulted. I restrained the urge to roll my eyes, shake my head, and whistle as I ran for cover.

"You hit me in the face with a rock?" she shrieked, showing the first healthy sign of self respect I had seen all night. "What the hell do you think you're doing?!"

"It was just a pebble," he said with a scathing laugh. "I was going to throw a pretzel at you, but I thought the pebble would be better."

Shaking his head and laughing, he turned and looked to me for reassurance that hitting his girlfriend in the face was funny and acceptable. Unsmiling, I raised my eyebrows and all but turned my back in support of her position.

"You have no right to throw anything at me!" she yelled. "Nothing!"

Woo hoo! You go girl!

And off she went to the nether regions of the bathroom again, while Simian John astutely observed "man is she pissed! It wasn't even a rock!"

This guy was no rocket scientist. It doesn't have to have been a boulder, John. It was the gesture of hitting her face with a rock the way flying debris might hit the Earth's moon that was the real issue. Houston, we have a problem.

"You hit her in the face" I said incredulously, unable to remain silent under the circumstances. "Whether a pebble, a rock, or an asteroid, you deliberately hit her in the face!" I regarded him with disdain, and thought about how incredibly selfish it was that he was willing to humiliate her in front of a room full of people to advance himself. I'm not with her! I'm still available! Look, I don't even like her that much! Let me just hit her in the face with a rock from the bottom of my boot, and then you'll see that I am prepared to dismiss her on a moments notice!

You have got to be kidding me. I frowned at him, a virtual stranger who insisted on trying to involve me in his drama, with utter contempt.

Looking perplexed, Simian John now regarded me with confusion. Could this somehow be bad? Is it wrong for a man to hit his girlfriend in the face with small airborne objects? Not really, idiot, unless you mind if I help her find a skillet so she can hit you over your fucking head.

But that response, my friends, was implied by the look on my face (which had not been hit), rather than overtly stated. I was, after all, a guest in someone else's home, had only had one drink, and no one knew that I was really Dr. Joyce Brothers.

Deciding that I wasn't going to leave just yet, I was hoping to see Susan return and tell him that she had decided that their relationship was unhealthy, and that she no longer wanted to see him unless he changed his attitude drastically. Failing that, maybe she could try the decidedly more shocking but effective "go to hell!" as she stormed out the door, slamming it behind her with a flourish. Or maybe she would tell him to get out, instead! I waited to see how she would communicate to him that what he had done was unacceptable and that she would'nt tolerate it! Instead of putting him in his place, though, her next move completely surprised and disappointed me.

"John," she whined as she slipped back beside him on the couch, "I wouldn't have gotten so mad if it had been a pretzel that you threw at me. I'm sorry I yelled at you, honey. Will you forgive me?"

What?!!

Simian John, now smug and triumphant, then sends her to get him a drink when for all intents and purposes he should have been on his way to a 24 hour florist in an attempt to make amends.

Tsk tsk tsk.

What Susan needs, I decided following an extensive internal dialogue that far superseded any that was taking place in the room, was to find herself a healthy adult man, rather than trying to create a relationship of equals with an obviously damaged kid. But she had a vested interest in "keeping" her boyfriend, and was therefore far too eager to cling to the remnants of whatever love or respect he may have shown her at one time. And all with the hopes of maintaining her "relationship."

Her reaction reminds me of an article I read years ago involving a man who was jailed for domestic violence. Amongst many of the lovely behaviors he subjected his wife to, the most notable was his having conceded that he often chased her while she ran barefoot and crying, a blowtorch aimed at her feet. When she would scream and jump and run to escape him, he would tell her slyly "I'm just trying to help you improve your coordination." And the article states that she then thanked him for this behavior just before he was being led off to serve his prison sentence.

Such is the fate of those who allow themselves to be subjected to psychological abuse. The ego of the victim is eventually dissolved by the demeaning behavior of the abuser, and they can no longer retain a sense of self. I personally think that it's imperative to be aware of these types of abusive behaviors in others, and to try and protect your boundaries at all times. Patrol the borders, and man the tower! There is no trespassing beyond this point!

After the psychological debacle I witnessed between Susan and Simian John, I finally decided to go home quietly. I had seen enough codependent insanity for one night. I felt exasperated, drained, and annoyed, although my own self awareness had been raised for having made these observations.

To me, having been allowed the grace of objectivity, this was an easily resolved dilemma. Either have a heart to heart talk, apologize, and set up clear perimeters for mutually acceptable future behavior, or cut your losses and separate. Presto! End of drama. But then again, no one asked me.

After I left, I was grateful that I had at least managed to escape the premises without having been hit in the face with anything, which was a relief. If I ever visit with that couple again, though, I am bringing a skillet to defend myself.

Just in case.

Riley Said...

2010-12-08T23:50:00.000-06:00

This is an encore presentation, originally posted in late 2006, the content of which is highly relevant to me at this point in time as I tentatively plan to return to school to pursue my Masters of Science in Nursing Education. Curiously, a young twenty-something year old co-worker named Heidi just recently speculated as to why so many of the students she went to college with seemed so old, which reminded me of this post in spite of any short term memory loss I may suffer as a result of my having lapsed into antiquity. Old though I may be, however, there have been moments of wisdom, and although I have attained many more goals than those listed in this post at the time it was written, there are always more articles to submit and newspapers to speak to, as I can always find something to write about. Read on.

Earlier last week, while studying for a test at school that had me on the verge of a brain anuerism, I was happy to once again have been saved by the bell. I knew there was a good reason why I have 64 phone numbers saved in my cell. You just never know when you're going to need a call fix, which of course prompts me to do anything rather than study. *Brrring* Uh oh, time to close the books! (And I might as well get another snack too, while I'm at it.)

On this particular call, I was surprised and excited to discover that I was being interviewed for a local paper called The Fifth Avenue Journal after having accepted a request by the Dean of my college to participate on his Adult Student Advisory Board as one of the aforementioned Adults. "I'm looking for students to brainstorm with me on how we might enhance the learning experiences of older students," the Dean had informed me, "who are at least over 25." Well, fortunately for him, I just happened to have turned 26, so apparently I qualified to participate!

Anyway, back at the Fifth Avenue Journal, a reporter had been assigned to investigate this infiltration of mature students amongst their unsuspecting 20-something peers. It was a covert operation of sorts, with many of us tooling around campus in disguise while listening to Britney Spears, wearing pink clothes and meticulously hiding any forms of ID that disclosed the fact that some of us came into being in the 1960's.

What was it like, the reporter queried, to walk in beneath fluorescent lighting as a confirmed relic wearing bell bottoms you owned the first time they were in style back in 1977?

Did you find the kids receptive to your wisdom, or did they think you were someones mom who had gotten lost on the way to the cafeteria?

Did you need to use the restroom more often then those around you (and not merely to write your name in the mens stall in the interest of securing a date to the Friday night basketball game)?

Did the teachers talk too fast for you, or were you too fast for some of them?

Were you able to provide eyewitness accounts to historical events dating as far back as 1775, or were you in fact present when fire was discovered?

Did any of the younger, more age appropriate students ever comment that you resembled a velicoraptor?

Speak to me, oh wise (and suddenly depressed) aged student!

Well, speak to him I did, providing eloquent speeches rife with buzzwords such as "goals," and "resources," with the article scheduled to appear next week at a newsstand near you. (Or me, depending on your geographical location.)

And of course, since I already had the reporter on the phone, I decided to ask how I too might become a staff writer for the Journal. Wrapping up our impromptu interview, a contact name and phone number was provided, I promised to forward him my bio with a picture that was relevant no less than 1 year and 16 lbs ago, and our work was done. For the record (since we appear to be keeping comprehensive records at this time) here is my illustrious bio, bullet pointed for my convenience:

Licensed Practical Nurse, 2005
Future Nurses Association, Secretary, 2005
Associates of Arts, Psychology Major, 2006
Phi Theta Kappa, Vice President of Service, 2006
Peer Mentor Program, Student Advisor, 2006
Adult Student Advisory Board, Student Advisor, 2006
Triton College Student Association, Senator, 2006
The Fifth Avenue Journal, Writer, 2006

And once in a while, I even study for my tests and complete homework on time, too. Make sure you add that to the article. Damn, I am busy. What have I been thinking?! (Well, Christmas is going to have to be canceled for one thing, I'll tell you that.)

Anyway, as the excitement began to subside regarding these most recent developments (and when 10 minutes became available in my schedule) I then received yet another phone call from a newspaper requesting an interview in relation to my work at the college. I initially assumed that it was a merely a follow up to the first article, only to realize moments (okay, many moments) into the call that it was actually an entirely different paper calling regarding an entirely different topic!

This latter topic concerned my work in the Peer Mentor Program, which was implemented by my school earlier this year to support those students who may find college life challenging (like me.) By pairing a student at risk with one who is hanging on by their fingernails above an abyss, the program serves to enhance the educational opportunities of the mentee by merit of the support of the mentor. So far, the strategy has been effective, and I can honestly say that I enjoy doing it, if for no other reason than I sincerely like to help people. The story was picked up by the Proviso Herald, a subsidiary of The Chicago Sun Times, which was potentially a big deal to me. Having been designated as an Editors Pick who has won awards for comedy pieces I've submitted over the years to various publications and websites that feature a circulation of 500,000+ readers, in addition to publishing this blog which receives an average of 11,000+ hits at a time, it was still exciting to have my name appear on the same website that mentioned Roger Ebert in a column right beside me.

As both a writer and a reader about myself now, I have to say that I'm having fun with both roles, although I'm particularly fond of the direct quotes by others that announce what Riley said.

Next week, in fact, both the Proviso Herald and the Fifth Avenue Journal will be running feature articles concerning me regarding the aforementioned Adult Student Advisory Board, Triton College's Title III Program, and finally an article I've written as social commentary on the topic of academic honesty will be published in November entitled For Whom The Bell Curves. Much to my pleased surprise, the editor of the Fifth Ave Journal liked my article so much that she's now commissioning me to write specific articles as a contributing member of the staff on an ongoing basis, and trust me, I can always find something to talk about (well considered or otherwise.)

That's right. Riley said it, and she's going to be saying more in the future. Watch for it a newsstand near you.

Why I Write

2010-12-05T11:22:00.002-06:00

I am reposting this entry in honor of my good friend Michele, who passed away on December 18th, 2004.

She is still deeply missed.

People ask me occasionally why I write, and what I intend to do, if anything, with these thousands of words and images that are continuously running through my mind.

I often explain that to me, writing is an expression of art, and that it's my goal to create images that will bring ideas and feelings to life.

I write to communicate to others what I see, which is considerable. I am, in fact, sometimes overwhelmed by the amount of information that inundates me on a daily basis, most of which I can never quite dismiss as I sadly notice every nuance, fleeting glance, or quiet gesture.

I am sensitive to everything, it seems, and because there appears to me to be so much going on that is left unsaid, I believe adamantly that someone needs to tell these stories. It might as well be me.

When my friend Michele died, for example, I was devastated at the loss and all that it represented. Without the presence of this one person, the world was a different place. It had been modified, there was an emptiness in the lives of many people where there had once been the promise of an ongoing story. After all, we are all characters in each others stories, and without even one anticipated key player on our life's stage, the ending is forever changed.

I wrote about Michele because she impressed me deeply as a person. She made a difference in my life. She exemplified qualities of friendship and integrity, and was honest, courageous, and kind. I know that she would have taken a bullet for me if the situation required it, and I would have done the same for her. People like Michele don't come into your life every day, and her absence has served to help me formulate my expectations of what it means to not only be a friend, but to receive a friend, my perceptions having been forever amended in this area.

When I posted my original article about Michele in 2005, there was no expressed intention to direct attention to it. I was unaware if it had been read by those close to Michele, and was in fact concerned that my observations may have upset them in some way. I was cognizant of the delicacy of the situation, and I wanted to remain silent while I respected their considerable grief. If any of Michele's family members had seen the article about her, I hadn't been told.

And then I received this email from Michele's cousin and good friend, April:

Hi Kim, (for lack of a better introductory sentence),

I have to tell you my own little story....

Here I am with four children, barely having the time to check my emails on a regular basis. But for some reason they have been occupied for the past couple hours. I sorted and read all my emails, checked the weather for the week, looked up some possible gifts etc, etc, etc.

About ready to log off, I decided to go and check my "favorites folder". And I saw your folder, "Kim's Stories". I had definitely bookmarked it after I sat one night for hours reading all your stories. Which is truly incomprehensible because I can have the attention span of a gnat at times. But anyhow.... I just knew, I just knew you had to have a story about Michele. So I checked your January Archives hoping for one, and there it was.

Now, everything I do everyday is a reminder of Michele. We talked everyday, ran silly errands, vented, etc. I look out my kitchen window every day and see her house and it looks empty. I drive by thinking I will see her in one of her damn t-shirts smoking out the patio door - but nothing. I see and hear the boys playing in the yard and no Michele. For as much as everyday is a reminder I love to hear how much she meant to others. Because she touched so many in so many different ways.

I sat there reading your blog, every sentence twice. You nailed her on the head. Your words are so well chosen, you are so articulate, so honest. There is so much depth in your stories (all of them) but especially this one. I felt saddened and happy at the same time while I read. We all think god, what if? What if you would have went to the Christmas Party? Would it really have changed the outcome? We all live what if. ESPECIALLY DAVE. And we can't. We have to realize God has a master plan and although we can't always understand it, things happen for a reason. Now I am not this highly religious person. The most I have gone to church was this year when my daughter made her communion. But I truly have to believe this theory because nothing else makes any sense.

I think we will all relive the last time we talked to her. I talked to her at 5pm on Friday. I had just left the doctors office. I was calling to update her. She said she "had to go to a Christmas Party". She didn't really feel up to it by the end of her shift. But I even said, Hey, go out and unwind, have a good time. She said I know. I was due in two weeks and she was so excited, changing the conversation back to me. I ended up having Francesca on Christmas Eve just 6 days later.

And here I am still teary eyed at a moments notice when a thought or a picture crosses my path. Sad for the loss of a relative and a friend, but honored at the opportunity to have had her in my life.

Thank you for sharing your story and pictures,
April

Thank you, April, for letting me know that my story mattered.

And that is why I write.

What Makes a House a Home?

2010-11-19T09:33:00.000-06:00

Having spent entirerly too much time surrounded by unidentified clutter and the confusion that ensues, I decided recently to modify my environment.

A home, I realize, should be a haven, an island of calm in the midst of the storm, not a cause celebre for a daily meltdown as we search for that elusive missing shoe or eat out of cartons while we talk on the phone with the TV blaring in the background. A home should instead embody qualities of peace and tranquility, where items are easily retrieved, laundry is neatly folded, and both cats and kids are accounted for at least 60% of the time.

I decided I wanted to live in a place where I wasn't rushing around frantically trying to shove three months of unopened mail under the bed and turning the lights down to avoid evidence of dust bunny tumbleweeds every time the doorbell rang. I wanted to be able to offer hot coffee and a plate of readily available cookies to visitors on a moments notice, and never to be embarrassed that there was a forgotten used plate left behind in the microwave or splattered toothpaste on the bathroom mirror.

In essence, I wanted to get organized, get it together, and be my own Maria, once and for all.

My friend Maria's home is spotless. There are no Target sale ads on the coffee table, no books about ghosts or travel misadventures on the couch, no unwashed dishes in the sink, and no rug is ever left unturned. A team of photographers from House Beautiful could descend on her at 5:00am after she has had a mere 20 minutes to recover from a bad cold, and her house would still be immaculate. Just like the conception, only cleaner.

Maria, because of her organizational skills and ability to whip up a 7 course meal in 30 minutes, is always prepared for guests. I find this amazing, as I require a weeks notice and a visit from Edna the Polish Cleaning Lady to allow someone to crane their neck around my warily opened front door by contrast. There is never a moment when she is not creating an ice sculpture, polishing doorknobs, or milking a cow in her own backyard. She cans fruits and dips others in chocolate presented on fine china. At my house, the best you could hope for was some conversation and a can of Nehi Orange pop while I searched through the dark recesses of a cabinet for a lost package of potato chips. Dinner is served! Viola!

Ah, but no more. I have reached a Martha Stewart turning point, and it really is a good thing. I am in touch with my inner Julia Child as well, the stove and blender having both been introduced to me as workable kitchen appliances. It will be an ongoing project to incorporate these homemaking themes into my daily life, but the return on my investment to date is proving to be well worth it.

People who are organized and whose homes reflect warmth, camaraderie, and conspicuous lack of dust impress me. How do they manage? To be fair, often times they don't work outside the home, and they sometimes have a team of husbands, cooperative kids, or little dogs with feather dusters tied to their paws to help them, but I decided I wasn't willing to allow myself an excuse not to achieve this kind of environment on my own anymore.

Maria has become my Martha Stewart Life Coach, I have dutifully turned my television to The Food Network, and let the transformation begin.

Kim Riley, Domestic Engineer

In striving to become a domestic engineer, if not an outright goddess, the advice I have been given is to do all of the little things, everyday. Don't allow anything to accumulate! Put it away, don't throw it on a chair! Make lists of what you need to buy or do or accomplish! If you don't really need it, toss it, and yes that includes back issues of Tiger Beat magazine from 1977!

Maria is strict and scary sometimes, but I have seen my floors for the first time since 2007 when I began working 85 hours a week as an RN, and I'll be damned if they're not hardwood, after all. I enjoyed the sense of accomplishment I felt when I discovered ground zero at the bottom of the multitudes of "junk drawers," that define my space, and it was a moment of triumph when I reunited missing socks and put my 212 purses on a well organized closet shelf.

I am finally getting my affairs in order, and now I can actually begin to live!

In the past, I had embarked on a closet and drawer Organization Campaign when involved in a different kind of affair with an ex-boyfriend who was going to move in with me. This provided me with a basic incentive to clear at least a 4 by 4 ft space for his projected 10 by 10 ft amount of things. Compromise is the foundation of a good relationship, and in his honor I was also going to give him one drawer and a designated area under the bed where he could feel free to lose his shoes with me. And, because I really cared, I offered the ultimate sacrifice, which was to part with some Duran Duran T-shirts and a leather mini skirt (circa 1984) that I thought I might need some day, so he could put away a maximum of two pairs of jeans and four socks in a crowded drawer in his new home. Now, I am nothing if not generous. That is true love.

When the relationship ended, though, and he did not move in, it was clutter and excess as usual as I continued to room with the images of Simon LeBon and John Taylor. At this point, however, I have seen the error of my ways. Ex-boyfriend or Duran Duran (or not), this is my home, and I need to clear a path for myself if for nothing else!

Once my current Organization Relief Crisis Intervention work is done, I do plan on putting the following ad in the Chicago Tribune, so I can share a much improved space with a hopefully more appreciative guy. Sorry, Simon.

Wanted: A brilliant man who is a cinematic marvel of masculine achievement. Must appreciate Kierkegaard, Beethoven, and Calvin and Hobbes. Should be predisposed to witty repartee and willing to move heavy furniture on demand. An obsession with Comedy Central, The Discovery Health Channel, and back issues of Crime Beat magazine a definite plus. Winner need not be present to win. No animals were harmed in the writing of this ad. Enter my house at your own risk. I am not done cleaning it. Yet.

But I digress.

Sometimes, the Fireman Still Come

In addition to maniacal cleaning, I have also determined to become a cook. Not a better cook, per se, but merely a cook. It's all one can hope for at this point.

In the interest of presenting my son Dan with that strange phenomena known as a Hot Meal, I decided to surprise him with an impromptu dinner recently. Utilizing little known kitchen secrets, I managed to cook some Prince mostacolli and bottled sauce to perfection. I used the timer on my stove so as to not overcook the pasta, which was a godsend, as I generally wait until the water boils over and the mostacolli weighs 125 lbs soaking wet before I proclaim "I think it's finished!" I located what I now know is called a colander (instead of "where is that thing that drains stuff") and tossed the al dente (or Al Bundy) pasta with real butter to give it something, although I'm not sure what. More cholesterol, perhaps?

In addition to this main course, I also made a mixed salad, garnishing it with croutons, and even put some garlic bread in the oven to make it a well rounded if shocking dinner event.

And here's where it got ugly.

Apparently something in the oven, which we can only hope to identify as the Ghost of Dinners Past, set off the smoke detectors. Unfortunately, this has happened before, and the usual remedy I employ whenever the house fills with smoke during dinner is to simply run through the house throwing open the windows while I yell "fire in the hole!" immediatly followed by "does anybody want some Pepsi?!" This time, however, the problem was more ominous, as it was the carbon monoxide detector that was deployed.

I know my cooking isn't fantastic, but is it highly toxic as well?

When both the alarm in my apartment as well as the one in my sons upstairs college dorm area were simultaneously set off, I was alarmed myself. A flashing red light accompanied the screeching alarm, the device insisting that we !move to fresh air! I was more than willing to cooperate, but seeing as it was raining heavily I wasn't quite sure where we would move to without ready access to a parka and a rowboat to enhance our escape. Opening the windows, I shouted to Dan "call 911!" and dinner was officially postponed.

When the fire department arrived, three fireman in full gear stormed my dinner party. Wielding a disturbing array of crow bars and axes, the first thing I was asked once they were inside was "did somebody burn some toast?" Smiling sheepishly, I pointed at the kitchen and said in a decidedly Special Ed like manner "I made dinner."

Oh. Well, in that case, of course it's logical that the Chicago Fire Department would need to become involved. Let us know when you decide to make dessert. We'll be in the neighborhood.

I watched them go throughout the house snickering, carrying handheld devices that fortunately indicated that there was no carbon monoxide poisoning presently underway. After apologies were made to the nice firemen, I found myself peering with confusion into the oven after they left. What had all of the commotion been about?! It was a loaf of garlic bread for Gods sake, which in most kitchens would not be considered a weapon of mass destruction! With the smoke having cleared as the sirens faded into the distance, I closed the windows and asked a visibly nervous Daniel if he would like to join me for dinner. He politely acquiesced, but refused to put down the fire extinguisher in the event that I decided to reheat something without allowing him to move to higher ground.

I am determined to get this cooking thing right someday though, so I can open a restaurant. I'm going to call it The Chernobyl Inn.

Serenity Now

Along with cooking and cleaning, I decided to try and raise my own domestic goddess bar by creating a relaxing atmosphere to help clear the air of noxious fumes and confusion. The aromatic scent of exotic incense now wafts through dimly lit rooms. Scented candles gently flicker on tabletops and dressers, while soft music plays softly in the background from 7:00am to midnight, reminiscent of your local Kmart or Carson Pirie Scott.

In the kitchen, I have a device that simulates the sound of a gentle rain shower sans thunder. My 55 gallon fish tank supplies a secondary water feature, important in providing a peaceful balance to the environment. Icicles will soon be hanging from the soffits outside which will twinkle in the afternoon sun, and the scent of Renuzit Apple Pie air freshener drifts through the kitchen air which enables me not to bake anything for real.

In a word, I have made a concentrated effort to simulate a quiet and calm environment around here for once, and goddamn it I intend on keeping that way or heads will roll! It's all about Feng Shui, baby. Manufactured Asian peace, with no MSG added.

Fang Shoe. Fong Schwee. False Sweet. Free Songs. Fond Memories. It's all there.

I don't speak Chinese, but I love the Feng Shui philosophy so much that I decided to become Hooked on Phonics in an effort to find out more about it. A good first step was to discover how to pronounce it so I could formulate coherent book related questions at Borders that didn't readily betray my pronounced Chinese deficit.

Hi. Could you tell me where you keep your Fungus Show books? You know, the ones about all of those unidentified items in my refrigerator?

As it turns out, Feng Shui is actually pronounced Fung Schway. It's the atmospheric equivalent to participation in an all loving daisy chain with Timothy Leary and the cast from Laugh In, and it will make you happy. Embracing the concepts of Feng Shui will enable you to improve your chi, although not necessarily your golf game.

Chi is Chinese for positive energy. It should be allowed to flow freely throughout your house, with the same imperceptible gentleness as when a water main might break or a toilet might overflow. Normally, this type of flow would create stress for even the most elevated Zen Master, but when chi is involved you're supposedly carried away in it's life force and nothing can genuinely trouble you. So call the plumber softly, please, and never raise your voice.

In the interest, then, of acquiring good chi, I looked at all of the pretty pictures in the books, called my ex-husband to ask him which way was south (which I'm quite sure greatly enhanced his sense of remote tranquility), and commenced to move my furniture. My windows are now more open and receptive, and the lovely flowers that adorned the counter top looked grand just before the cat knocked them over. My dining room table remains a troublesome "poison arrow" for lack of available space, however, and barring the involvement of an architect or allowing myself the creative release of knocking down walls myself, I'll just have to allow that little bit of poison to flow. Like the aforementioned carbon monoxide, I'm hoping the incense will help diffuse it, so we can all live together in one accord.

A serene, well organized, loving atmosphere is really my ultimate goal in strategizing these atmospheric events, cleaning expeditions, and cooking emergencies (or shall we say cooking efforts.)I believe it can be accomplished, and I'm hoping I won't need to solicit the help of David Copperfield to create my magic.

To my credit, I have noticed a more kind and loving countenance on behalf of my son after having implemented these changes, who has responded well now that I have amped up the harmony and turned down the chaos. Guests and relatives seem more contented and friendly as well, commenting on the scent of the candles or the warmth of the lights. I'm finding that it's all in the presentation, and very little in the wrist. Home is what you make it, and I am finally discovering that I can present a tasteful and attractive environment once I have successfully cleared away some of the dust and clutter and replaced it with a lovely table setting and some decorative cookie treats. Maria will undoubtedly be impressed, and I may even be ready for a visit from House Beautiful in the very near future.

Click your heels three times and say it with me, everybody. There's no place like home.

Chatting with Maria

2010-11-12T08:27:00.002-06:00

It's always nice to talk to Maria.

Maria, as we know, is one of my very best friends. We remain as such because our personalities are well balanced, although she is decidedly the more balanced of the two. For example, Maria is concise and organized and always knows exactly where both her car keys and her kids are at any given time. I find this quite impressive, seeing as both my car itself, as well as my kid, are perpetually missing on at least 4 out of 5 days.

I look to Maria for support and direction in life, while I think she looks at me as a cautionary reminder of all of those things she should avoid to keep herself on the straight and narrow. While she is home watching tearjerker movies on Lifetime Television for women and sorting through recipes, I am instead watching politically subversive comedy shows and waiting for the Hot Pockets to be done in the microwave. When I'm not actually out in the world getting discombobulated on expressways, having confrontations with law enforcement, or forgetting to stop at McDonald's for all of our fine dining needs, that is.

I admire Maria's ability to run her house like a captain on a tight ship, while mine is more like a Ship of Fools in a perpetual state of mutiny just before it hits a sandbar. Maria has got it together, in a sense, while I have most definitely lost it.

Allow me to demonstrate.

On Cleaning

Kim: Wanna hear something funny?
Maria: Oh, here we go.
Kim: The other day, the sun was hitting the living room TV at such an angle that Daniel was able to write DUH and a smiley face on the screen because it was so dusty!
Maria: That's an indication that you need to clean it! Duh.
Kim: I think it was prehistoric monkey dust, and as such my TV is now a historical artifact, so I can't clean it.
Maria: You need to get a Swiffer.
Kim: I can't. My doctor said I'm not allowed to lift heavy objects.
Maria: It's a duster, it's not heavy.
Kim: Manual labor doesn't suit me.
Maria: Oh, all of the excuses already!
Kim: I'm not done yet. The TV is all the way on the other side of the room, so I can't reach it.
Maria: Well, you're in luck, because the lightweight Swiffer comes with an hand held attachment.
Kim: Does it come with a Consuela attached to it?
Maria: A Consuela attached to it!
Kim: How about a Juanita? Think of the millions they would make! Swiffer Duster, With A Juanita In Every Box!
Maria: You are insane.
Kim: It would be a very big box, but I would buy it.
Maria: I know you would, but wouldn't it just be easier to dust it yourself?
Kim: What, and deprive Dan of his God given right to create spontaneous artwork in our household dust? I couldn't do that to him, it would hurt his self esteem.
Maria: Then live with your dust!
Kim: That's prehistoric monkey dust to you, Consuela.

On Cooking

Maria: I made chocolate covered orange peels today. I saw it on the Food Network.
Kim: The Food Network! I never watch that because a.) they won't give me samples through my remote and b.) they are not enabled for scratch and sniff interaction.
Maria: You're supposed to watch them cook and then write down the recipes!
Kim: That is a lot to ask. Really.
Maria: This was an easy recipe. First, all you need are oranges...
Kim: Do I need to go to Florida with Juan and Carlos and wander around in an orange grove to get them?
Maria: You go to Dominick's, in the produce department.
Kim: Good, because going out all day in the Florida sun to get a bushel barrel full of oranges would be a bit much, don't you think?
Maria: For you, yeah.
Kim: I might fall off the truck. Or maybe Juan would push me.
Maria: If Juan wouldn't, Carlos would. So listen, now, I'm going to tell you how to do this!
Kim: I have a pen. I am ready to learn. But can we skip to the chocolate part now?
Maria: No! First, you have to peel the oranges, and then boil the peels.
Kim: That's weird.
Maria: No, that's cooking.
Kim: And then, you dunk them in chocolate, and we all live happily ever after!
Maria: No we don't! First you have to add sugar and cinnamon, and let the orange peels cool off.
Kim: This is getting complicated. Outrageous, even. Do they sell this stuff at Fannie Mae?
Maria: It's too expensive, and you can make it yourself!
Kim: I like Fannie Mae. Maybe I could get Juan and Carlos to take me there.
Maria: You are crazy.
Kim: I'm not the one who's been boiling orange peels all day.
Maria: I guess you have a point, but I'm the one with the chocolate covered orange peels right in front of me.
Kim: Oh, you are such a confectionery tease!
Maria: But not necessarily insane.
Kim: Maybe not.

On Transportation

Kim: I am suffering from Vehicular Envy.
Maria: Vehicular Envy?
Kim: It's a Freudian term. It means my car is a piece of bat guano, and that everyone else's is nicer and bigger than mine.
Maria: I've seen your car. Freud was right.
Kim: It's tragic, really. I went to Wisconsin recently, and even the Amish have better transportation options than I do.
Maria: When you're willing to ride an oxen, you know you need a new car.
Kim: I was thinking more along the lines of a Yakmobile. They get better mileage. Utilizing a beast of burden is usually a cost effect means of transport.
Maria: I had heard that.
Kim: I waved at Abraham Yoder and his wife Prudence when they went past me in their covered wagon, and I was jealous.
Maria: Oh, look at the spokes in that wagon wheel!
Kim: And that donkey's ass was the best!
Maria: Maybe you could ask Abraham and Prudence to take you to their neighborhood covered wagon showroom.
Kim: For all of my covered wagon needs.
Maria: You never know, they might be able to get you a deal.
Kim: Buy one horse, get one free! And we'll even throw in a case of Budweiser! And an ear of corn.
Maria: Maybe they would give you a sheaf of wheat as a lovely parting gift.
Kim: Or a loaf of bread, since I'm not exactly sure what a sheaf of wheat is.
Maria: If you watched the Food Network you would know!
Kim: Listen, I have enough responsibilities trying to buy a Yakmobile, so don't push me.
Maria: I hope Abraham's donkey bites you on the ass.
Kim: Too late. He already got me on a drive by.
Maria: I'm sure you deserved it.
Kim: No doubt.

And these are just a few examples of why I like talking with Maria. She's insightful, and almost never hides behind the curtains and pretends she's not home when I go over to her house unannounced. She even makes me soup and cookies without my having to ask, which is always greatly appreciated. Believe me, you can never have enough soup and cookies in life. It's just necessary.

Maria is a good friend, and I always like to chat with her. And eventually, if I pay attention, I just might learn something. Or at least one can only hope.

Dining With Pablo

2010-11-09T23:47:00.001-06:00

Just to give you an idea of how ridiculously busy I have been, here is a story about something that happened back in July. Yes, July. I am nothing if not a procrastinator...maybe I'll write something about that another day.

Ah, the Fourth Of July. A time of fireworks, celebrations, explosions, and absconding with a fine dining experience on stolen china from the Belmont Harbor Yacht Club.

Wanting to experience the bright lights of the big city on this holiday, I had gone downtown with my best friend Maria, her kids Frankie and Anthony, my boyfriend who often acted like a kid (and who has since been dismissed), and Maria's collegiate niece Christina with her boyfriend, Silent Jonathan. Piling into Maria's big wheel funny car SUV, it was all systems go as we anticipated the adventure on the road ahead, and all while remaining relatively quiet in the back seat considering the number of passengers involved.

Thank you for your contributions in that area, Silent Jonathan.

Maria's husband Frank, who smokes a mean cigar and is a well connected outfit kinda guy (he always wears the nicest clothes) had made arrangements in advance for our caravan of as yet to be disclosed neer~do~wells to receive a police escort to a private lot originally intended for police use only. This of course made us all feel incredibly important, our heads all ego inflated to the size of Bullwinkle's during the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade while we followed a squad car with sirens screaming to our very own special parking lot.

Get out of the way, dorks and common folk dependent on the use of metered parking or public transportation! We have a date with destiny, or at least with the police!

When we arrived at the police station near the Belmont Harbor Yacht Club, we were motioned towards the lot with a nod and a smile, the officer making a quick getaway as he drove away with the sirens now silenced (just like Jonathan.)

Pulling into the first available space, and feeling incredibly PC and well within our rights to do so, we were surprised to be apprehended by another cop who did not share our delusions of grandeur.

Cop (rolling his squad car window down and eyeing us warily): Excuse me, are you authorized to park here?

Maria (prepared to make us walk from an alternate parking space in Wisconsin for lack of response): ?

Kim (leaning over Maria and saving the day): Oh, good afternoon, officer! Happy Fourth of July! We are authorized to park here, yes, thanks!

Cop (resisting the urge to smile at me to enforce his official copness): Well, okay. Go ahead.

Maria: !

Everyone Else : ?!

What? We're parking, aren't we?

Laughing at Maria's look of disbelief as she stared at me and shook her head, I advised her to "hurry up and pull in" before anyone else came and questioned us about our choice of spacious parking!

Once in, everyone finally climbed out of the SUV with enough coolers, backpacks, and steamer trunks to make it appear as if we were scheduled to depart on one of Gilligan's three hour tours. Heading for Belmont Harbor but not confident that we would locate the SS Minnow, off we went. And of course, as we walked away I couldn't resist commenting about our law enforcement encounter once the cop was outside of hearing range and we were on our way. I'm just like that sometimes.

Kim (mumbling under my breath like a homeless person with a shopping cart): Can you believe that? Are we authorized?

Frankie (11 years old and completely on board with my inherent sense of rebellion): Yeah, who did that cop think he was, anyway?

Kim (gaining momentum now that I had a fellow dissenter beside me): Who is he to question us?

Frankie (grinning broadly and picking up the pace): That cop should mind his own business!

Maria (inserting parental disclaimer here): Kim! Don't tell Frankie to question the police!

Kim (pushing the envelope while I wink at Frankie): Are you authorized to tell me that?

As it turns out, she was, and I was forced to rest my case, lest Maria rest it for me.

When we arrived at Belmont Harbor, we were pleasantly surprised to find convienently located picnic benches that provided a lovely view of the privately owned boats before us while the Yacht Club itself was a mere 40 feet to our collective left.

"Why don't we just sit here?" I said breezily. "We can watch all of the Bitsy's and Thurston's float around in their boats and use the bathroom in the Yacht Club if we have to."

And so it went, our wandering band of nomads settling in with our abundant assortment of rations. We had Twinkies (for the kids as well as the kids in all of us), sandwiches, crackers and cheese, wine, Gatorade, and Corona, all of which was deemed fully able to sustain us until the anticipated fireworks show began at sunset or the end of the world was upon us, whichever came first.

Ah, life was good. But after a mere 20 minutes of waiting for what was projected to be two hours until the show, I found myself quickly becoming restless.

I proposed that we walk out onto the pier and introduce ourselves to the various Buffy's and Chip's, who were all sitting comfortably on their own personal yachts right in front of us. Suggesting that we tell them that we were considering making a purchase of such an item ourselves once we won the lottery or someone's aunt died, we could then politely request to see the inside of the cabin.

Nice buttons and dials, Skip, I like it! It's much nicer than the yacht I used to own. What? Oh, I lost it in a poker game, but I plan to get a new one soon. Oh yes I do indeedy.

I knew exactly what I would say to get us on board with the in crowd! Once I had become immersed in an entirely fabricated conversation such as this and subsequently became Skip's friend, it was simply a matter of time before they would offer us to all join them, pull up their anchor, and invite us to go for a little test drive!

So, Chip. Buffy. How's the mileage on this thing?

Unfortunately, I wasn't successful in convincing anyone amongst my motley crew to get on board with this idea, and was then forced to sadly watch the the lifestyles of the rich (but most likely not famous) unfold before me without any hopes of participating. We were not going to crash anyone's boat parties, Kim. No way!

And then I was handed a Twinkie and told to Be Quiet.

Later in the evening, still restless and tiring of watching Anthony and Frankie chase each other with sticks and various blunt objects, I suggested to Maria that we go inside the Yacht Club on the pretense of using the bathroom. Could there possibly be a more staid or rational plan than this? At least it was something to do.

Let's go see how the other half lives, Maria. Do you think they use Charmin?

When we approached the very elite door of the club, I was only slightly deterred from entering by the fact that you obviously had to be a member with a key card to do so. Maria, ever the compliant non member, was ready to shrug her shoulders and walk away when I grabbed her arm and whispered "wait! We'll get in!"

Moments later, a society maven wearing a star spangled glitter top and too much perfume waltzed past us, key card in hand. When she opened the door with one wealth induced swipe, I quickly reached for the handle and said "thanks" as we walked in directly behind her.

"I cannot believe you just did that," Maria said with a laugh as she followed me into what was certain to be trouble. "You are too much!"

Shhh! We're in, aren't we?

We wandered around for several minutes, investigating T-Shirts under glass and nodding pleasantly at the bartender as if we belonged there. There was a juke box in one corner, waiters poised to take requests in all of the others, and then, what's this that beckoned to me from the adjacent room straight ahead?

Was it merely a mirage, or an actual members only buffet that served to tempt and tantalize us? Bam!

Kim (with the exuberance of one regarding her first buffet after arriving from Ethiopia): Oh my God, it's a buffet! Let's go!

Maria (ready to turn on her honest heels and run at any moment): Oh no, uh uh, no way.

Kim (tugging at her sleeve): They think we're members, it's okay!

Maria (tugging in the opposite direction): But we're not members!

Kim (cognizant of this, but not in the least bit concerned): Well I'm going! Watch this.

I winked at her over my shoulder as I smiled and walked purposely towards the buffet. A well coiffed elderly woman ahead of me was overheard to address the buffet server as Pablo, so I followed in like kind as she filled her plate and walked away. Stepping up to the extravagantly prepared candle lit buffet right behind her, I boldly picked up my fine china dinner plate and greeted my new friend.

"Well hello, Pablo!" I said with friendly bravado as I made a sweeping gesture in regards to the feast before me. "And what do you recommend tonight?"

He didn't miss a beat. As far as Pablo was concerned, I was Mrs. Thurston Howell III, and he was pleased to humbly serve me whatever I chose to have that evening. So of course I had him pile it on, and all while I looked over at Maria keeping her safe distance and tried not to laugh.

With two plates filled to capacity in the interest of sharing my spoils back at our non members picnic table, I politely asked Pablo if he would be a dear and make a separate desert plate for me too?

Oh, si Senora! Pablo likes Kim, in spite of her secret poverty and complete inability to own or operate a watercraft.

Thanking him profusely, I walked back towards Maria with a bemused smile and raised eyebrows as I sauntered right past the Belmont Harbor Yacht Club employees, heading straight for the door we had recently snuck into.

"It's okay to eat outside, isn't it?" I asked a waiter near the exit. "Oh, yes mam," he replied energetically. "It is quite fine!"

"See Maria?" I whispered as she snickered while holding the door open for me as we walked out, "they said it is quite fine."

Once outside, we weren't 15 ft away from the door when both of us burst out into such uproarious laughter that I all but dropped the plates I had been so skillful in acquiring. Rushing back to our humble picnic bench, everyone regarded me with wide eyed wonder as I set down my china dishes filled to the brim with high end food samples.

"I can't believe you did that," everyone said in grateful unison as they reached for silver fork, only then to turn to Maria and say, "and I can't believe you didn't!"

As we dove into and devoured our bounty like crazed pirates, I realized that we were only 40 ft away from the buffet we had sampled from. Looking over my shoulder, I noticed what appeared to be Pablo watching us with suspicion. Hey. Wait a minute. They don't look so rich from here. Are they really Belmont Harbor Yacht Club members? What about those two kids beating each other senseless on the lawn? And why did they bring backpacks full of Cheeto's and Gatorade if they're so rich, huh? Where is their yacht?

Pablo, Pablo, Pablo. *Sigh* Don't worry your pretty little head about it. Just be a dear and pass us another pastry, will you?

Of course, I found Pablo's spy demeanor amusing. Pablo the Waiter Cracks the Case of the Belmont Harbor Yacht Club Bandits. Story at 10! Maria, on the hand, was patently disturbed by it. Go figure.

We're going to get arrested. The police are going to come any minute! Hurry up and eat!

And there we were, with the proverbial silver spoons in our mouths for once in our sad and sorry little lives, and Maria wanted us to hurry? Yes. Now. As it turns out, she also wanted to intercept our silverware and hide the evidence as well.

After our feast, the now empty china and silverware taken away from us, Maria had A Plan. Insisting that we not simply return the plates for fear of being apprehended by a Yacht Club SWAT Team the moment we tried to reenter the room, she insisted emphatically on hiding the plates and making a run for it instead. Rushing towards the water of Belmont Harbor, ever the housekeeper even when at an outdoor picnic, she commenced to quickly wash the dishes in Lake Michigan, and all while looking around nervously and asking if the police were coming yet. Buffy and Skip meanwhile regarded Maria strangely as she knelt scrubbing dishes and mumbling near their yachts, and all I could think was "see, don't you wish you would have just gone along with my Plan A and tried to crash one of the parties, instead? Now look. We're wanted fugitives for stolen chipped beef, and you're washing dishes in Lake Michigan!"

It was sad, really. What had become of us?

Loading the stolen china in her son Frankie's backpack, Maria was now determined to keep it with us for the remainder of the night to avoid being arraigned. Deciding that as fugitives we should relocate for the fireworks, which now paled in comparison to the excitement we felt while eating a dangerously acquired dinner, we picked up camp and moved on.

Clink. Clatter. Tinkle.

Maria's self imposed china burden was quite noisy from within Frankie's backpack, and she seemed only mildly amused when I insisted on teasing her about it. Hauling it all over the lakefront on her back like Quasimodo from the Old Country, she resisted all attempts to just toss the dishes in the lake and be done with it. C'mon, Maria. Just aim for the stratosphere and give it a hearty fling! It could be like a discus toss, or perhaps we could use the plates for skeet shooting.

Crash. Shatter. Clang.

Hmmm. So, whatcha got in that backpack? Sounds like stolen dinnerware to me. Looks heavy. I wonder whose idea that was, anyway? Hey, Maria, here comes the police! Let's ask them what we should do with it!

Smash. Boink. Broke.

After a very long walk, some anticlimactic fireworks, and the prospect of hauling the now cracked china back up the same hilly terrain we had just scaled on the way down, Maria finally agreed to dispose of the hot plates once and for all. We all congratulated her on her courageous move, except for Silent Jonathan, who never really says much about anything.

All illegal activities aside, however, the chipped beef was grand, the Twinkies were even better, and a good time was had by all. Except perhaps Maria, who has yet to be able to stand up straight after enacting her law abiding stance as Quasimodo of the Old Country with her backpack full of broken dishes.

Supporting her bowed frame as we walked happily back towards our illegal parking space, we wiped the last vestiges of powdered sugar crepes and raspberry jam tortes from our mischievous little faces.

Who said that fireworks were the main source of excitement on the Fourth of July? Personally, I think it was all about Pablo.

666, The Number of My Nephew

2010-11-01T11:00:00.006-05:00

Caution! There are teenage vandals amongst us! And thank God, for once it didn't involve my son Daniel.

My 13 year old nephew Damien, with one other neer-do-well friend, chose to adopt a life of crime on Halloween. In spite of many opportunities to do legally sanctioned Fun Things, such as attending haunted houses, watching horror movies, or simply going trick or treating, Damien and his friends instead chose the low road.

The road, of course, that leads to the Wooddale Police Department.

Now, it wasn't as if Damien hadn't been warned. Being somewhat genetically predisposed to crimes and misdemeanors (look at poor Aunt Kim) you would think that he would pause for thought while running down the street with a carton of Grade A large eggs. What would be the consequences of my folly if I get caught? Would there be repercussions of any nature? Might there be pending court dates and a raison d' etre not to involve myself, such as having to face the Wrath of Dad? Maybe I should go home and make a little omelet, instead.

None of this, unfortunately, occurred to Damien as he advanced through the night looking for hapless victims. There were eggs to be thrown and buildings to hit, and I'll be damned if I'm going to miss this adventure!

Damien, as it turns out, knows some kids who are of the criminal element. Which is to say, they are career criminal kids, and have done this type of thing before. Shaving cream, toilet paper, you name it, and they have freelanced in said mediums. To bad there were no mediums around to predict the outcome of their ill chosen decision.

Fernando the Foul: Hey Damien! I have an idea! Lets go throw eggs at that kid Brandon's house! I'm already in a lot of trouble with his parents because of past incidents involving poor judgment and the inability to outrun a squad car, so let's go there!

Damien the Doofus: But what if they see us? Their house is lit up, the door is open, and they appear to be silhouetted while sitting before their large, panoramic view window.

Fernando the Foul: We can throw the eggs, man, and run away real fast!

Damien the Doofus: Um, okay. You're a really good friend Fernando to invite me to join you in committing an act of criminal mischief. Thank you. I'll ask my mom to pay your bail money.

Now, to be fair, Damien is truly anything but a Doofus. Having tested with an IQ of 132, he comes from a long familial line of genius types who as yet can't manage to get through the day without an encounter with law enforcement. Like me, he believes he can outwit or outrun just about anyone, and talk himself out of any given dilemma. What he failed to factor into this equation, though, is that his dad Roger is as strict as General Norman Schwartzkopf on crack, and therefore has little patience or sympathy for his Gifted Boy antics. He's watched Malcolm in the Middle, just like the rest of us.

In a conversation held prior to the fateful events of that evening, Roger laid down The Law.

No eggs!
No bacon!
No shaving cream!
No razors!
No running in darkened gangways!
No criminal mastermind planning!
No fun!

Infractions of any kind would not be tolerated! If any of the above laws were not observed, their would be swift and severe penalties!

What Roger told him, specifically, was that if he got into any trouble whatsoever, he was going to cut all of his hair off, presumably with a Flowbee. Now that's a fate worse than death if I ever heard one, but apparently all Damien heard instead was the broken English of Fernando's siren call as he said "yo Damien, c'mon man! Lets go!" And throwing caution to the wind, the eggs were then in flight. In full of view of that kid Brandon's parents.

A kid can only run so far while trying to carry a carton of Grade A large eggs. Any grocery items are cumbersome, really, but eggs are particularly tricky as they tend to fall on the ground with ease, leaving a Denny's like trail that leads right back to the aforementioned Wooddale Police Department.

Damien, breathless and soon to be a featured guest on America's Most Wanted, presumably ran headlong into the obscurity of a relatively quiet residential area, but it was already too late. Brandon's parents, none too pleased that their house now featured a breakfast item on their exterior walls, had already called the police.

My sister, meanwhile, had issues of her own.

When I innocently called her to say hello, she was in the midst of this now escalating drama. The squad cars were in her driveway, Damien and his dairy products were nowhere to be found, Brandon's parents stood frowning and displeased in her kitchen, her dog had peed on the floor in reaction to all of the excitement, and she was, reportedly, wearing a full Blackbeard the Pirate costume featuring numerous skull and crossbone images, as well as some very dorky furry slippers. She was planning on simply answering the door for trick or treaters, she said. She wasn't expecting a SWAT team to descend upon her after Damien planned a coup.

When all was said and done, however, apologies were made as the dogs barked in a raucous cacophony of sound, and the matter was politely resolved right there in the midst of Kathy's chaotic kitchen. Damien, it was decided, was basically a good kid who had temporarily gone bad when given the option of participating in an unauthorized experiment in junior vandalism.

Roger, meanwhile, did not think that forgiving Damien and removing the souffle from Brandon's house was punishment enough. He would go bald for this infraction, and we would determine if there was a 666 on his scalp once and for all!

Damien, now starring as Jarhead, is also being subjected to a lengthy official Grounding, the likes of which have not been seen before or since. Roger will call the house every 15 minutes, every day, to ensure that he is on the premises. He will not be fitted with a more merciful house arrest monitoring device, apparently because Roger is quite sure he will devise a clever means of removing it from his ankle using butter and a chainsaw.

He has committed a crime, and now he must repent! Damien must now go bald and be subjected to ongoing telephone harassment to repay his debt to society!

Next time, I recommend that he wear a disguise and run faster. Poor little Jarhead.

When Irish Eyes Are Blinded

2010-10-20T23:06:00.003-05:00

I got my first pair of glasses in kindergarten. Since kindergarten for me commenced during the late 1960's, my mother thought it fair and fashionable to send me out into the world wearing glasses that made me look like Catwoman, only goofier.

I lost my Catwoman glasses at least once a week, thereby making a persistent spectacle of myself. This was one of my most vivid childhood memories, whining that my father was going to kill me as my mother entreated me to "retrace me steps" while I fell about in the shrubbery, sobbing.

Unfortunately for my compromised sense of style, the Catwoman glasses always reappeared, where my parents insisted they remain affixed to my face on a 24/7 basis.

I was lost without them, to be truthful. I'm sure my teachers sent home warning notes of doom to my parents that read "we regret to inform you that your daughter is retarded," when I was unable to comprehend anything not placed two inches away from my face, only later to revise their position to say "oh, she's just blind...and maybe a little slow."

As the years went by, my status as resident Mr. Magoo did not improve. Misplacing my glasses was a cause celebre' for a nuclear meltdown, as entire search parties were dispatched to "find them now!" Sans glasses, I was reduced to inching along walls, feeling peoples faces with chubby sticky fingers and begging our dog to take me to the bathroom. Tiger! Toilet paper! Good boy!

This total dependence on unbecoming eyewear was tolerable a kid, but as I got older, I reasoned I no longer wanted to sport what appeared to be Mr. Peanut monocles over both of my damn eyes.

At the age of 14, I was finally sent to the ophthalmologist for my first pair of contacts. This was a rite of passage, a foray into girly adulthood. Contacts, I imagined, would make me foxy (in the common vernacular.) Boys would fall adoringly at my feet, the heavens would open to behold my glory, and all would be right in the fashion world.

My epiphany reached manic proportions when I discovered that these new hard contacts came in colors, and I could therefore model specifically colored eyes at will. It was like playing God.

In the doctor's office, I was regarded thoughtfully so as to determine which color would be best for me. Nodding analytically, the doctor told me with a finality that forever pronounced me exotic "cosmetically, I would suggest green." Ooooo. I have green eyes, like a real Catwoman! For weeks, I told anyone who would listen, "well, the doctor said that cosmetically, he would suggest green."

The only problem with my new green contacts, however, was that wearing them was akin to having two cinder filled frisbee's placed over my eyeballs. With each involuntary blink my eyes were aflame, my cornea's seared, giving me the compulsion to tear at my eyes while screaming "I do believe in Mary Worth!"

Blinking incessantly like a Tourette's victim on speed, these hard contacts were torturous in the extreme. Tears would pour copiously down my face, my carefully applied teenage mascara smudged wantonly around my eyes a la Alice Cooper.

And, of course, hard contacts are also as the name implies. They are hard. Human eyes, conversely, are not hard. This lack of surface compatibility makes for some interesting torque, and my contacts were prone to being ejected from my eyes at the smallest provocation.

My boyfriend at the time, a 6'4 comedian named Scotty, found this propensity for contact popping highly amusing. Laying on various couches and backyard swings that lazy summer, he would forever prompt me to "do it, do it!" Now this request was not directly related to anything amorous, but rather he wanted me to merely blink and pop my contacts out so we could cop feels on each other as we looked for them. And once again, when they were nowhere to be found, there I would be again falling about in the shubbery looking for them....gee, do you think they could have popped all the way over here?

Although using my missing contacts as an excuse to cop feels on my boyfriend was unique and innovative, I longed, like a crazed partygoer swinging wildly at a pinata, to see. I wanted to be healed. In seeking a miracle, I sought out my Irish friend, Mary Catherine, whose older brother was a priest living in the basement of their families Chicago bungalow.

Entering this Catholic House of Wonders was a sacred and scary undertaking. Bleeding saints watched ominously from behind gilded picture frames, while unforgiving Mary's stared unseeing with their lifeless statue eyes. Crucifixes stood poised to bless over every door as well, and candles burned silently for the prayers of family sinners. And that was just the upstairs.

In the basement, cool and damp in its catacomb religiousity, actual sconces filled with holy water were affixed to the walls while rosaries swung eerily from doorknobs and window frames. The priest wasn't home, but maybe God was.

"We're going to be in trouble!" Mary Catherine gushed in her Irish brogue. "My Brother the Father is going to be a wee bit angry if he finds out we were here!" "Oh c'mon," I said excitedly, ever the instigator, "we're here for a miracle!"

Taking off my glasses, which after years of progressive myopia were now the depth of Italian wine bottles, I commenced with my ritual.

Me (taking a deep solemn breath): Hold my glasses, Mary Catherine.
Mary Catherine: Oh may the good Lord forgive us for our trespassin'!
Me (with a sweeping gesture): Wait! God is going to perform a miracle to behold, and your Brother the Father will be blessed by our trespasses.
Mary Catherine: Saints help us!
Me (melodramatic): And now, the miraculous healing.

Dipping my fingers in the blessed sconce water, feeling holier than thou, I tilted my head back in a worshipful stance as I dribbled the Lords bounty into my blinded Irish eyes.

Hosannah, hasannah, sannah sannah ho.......

Blinking, holy tears ran down my face as I looked around the church basement in curious wonder.

Mary Catherine: Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, can you see?!
Me: No. I'm still fucking blind.

As the years went on, I progressively succumbed to depths of blindness that would rival Stevie Wonder in a darkroom wearing a blindfold, although I did finally graduate to soft contacts and orthopedic glasses that were "rolled" to make the lenses thinner. So I could pick them up off of the table. So I could see.

I haven't given up hope that I may receive a miracle yet, although a trip to Lourdes may be a prerequisite to ensure this wonder. Either that, or just accept the fact that a life of visual aids, polite knowledgeable dogs, and various other Special Accommodations are what one can expect if their Irish eyes are blinded.

Why My Parents Are Insane

2010-10-18T09:34:00.000-05:00

Without my glasses, I am as blind as Helen Keller wearing a blindfold during a blackout.

I have been wearing studious glasses since I was a kid, and have resented my dependence on them for at least as twice as long. Of course, they have gotten more studious as the years have gone by (see: dorky), leaving me to wonder fearfully if I won't in fact be entirely dependent on Lassie sometime in the not too distant future, but for now I can thankfully continue to rely on my glasses.

If my parents would be careful about not stealing them from me, that is.

My father, until recent years, has always had 20/20 vision. Or even 10/5, if you count how ridiculously accurate he always was in spotting my sister Kathy or I getting into a boys car from 300 ft. away, or how he inevitably noticed the last vestiges of a puff of cigarette smoke as I waved my arms frantically to dissipate it just before I took off running in the opposite direction. Dad missed nothing when I was a teenager, although he's slacking off a bit now with his eagle eye spy routine since I am presumably an adult and it doesn't really matter anymore. Fortunately for me, he doesn't realize how inappropriate that whole adult thing is in relation to me, and what he can't see anymore won't hurt him. Way to go, Dad! I went that~a~way!

My mom, on the other hand, spent my entire childhood walking around looking like a crazed stenographer, wearing her elaborate glasses like a true Endora. In her alternative persona, which involved the use of a mini skirt and a blond bouffant, she would often refuse to wear glasses at all in the name of vanity. This caused her to bump into lampposts or walk into mannequins but she never failed to apologize for it.

"Oh, excuse me!" she would politely tell a well dressed statue in the womens department after she all but knocked it over. "I didn't see you standing there!" Oh, no doubt, mom.

Inching along walls in our house and tripping over furniture, this latter persona also provided a convenient excuse not to be caught cleaning too, because who could see the clutter, anyway? Not mom. She wasn't wearing her glasses.

Needless to say, I have followed in my moms footsteps, and without glasses, I am but a train wreck in a room full of books myself, selectively unable to find the laundry that needs to be put away while I trip over a rug on my way to the couch. Without my glasses, I discovered early in life that I couldn't really read any of the books that surrounded me either, and being unable to find my glasses then became the equivalent of a Level One Trauma. Trying to discern shapes and colors, I would wonder hopefully if that diffuse image that just entered the room might be a person who could help me on what was sure to become a frantic search and rescue mission.

"Is it you?!" I would call out to virtually anyone who might be listening. "Have you seen my glasses?!"

And to think that it was my very own parents who put me in this desperate situation in the recent weeks, my glasses having disappeared without warning! Now that's evil incarnate.

I Can't See Clearly Now, My Glasses Are Gone

My glasses attained MIA status this past summer. After the first couple of days with no sign of them, I became increasingly nervous as I was forced to wear my contacts for uncomfortably long periods of time. As the days turned into a weeks, my contacts beginning to weld to my eyes which were now as red as Barnabas Collins starring as Dracula, it was little more than Dark Shadows that I could see as I realized sadly that my glasses appeared to be gone for good.

Where could they be, I thought maniacally as I looked in the same places I had searched just hours or days before. Did they get thrown away? Where the hell were my glasses?!

In desperation, I dug a pair of glasses from circa 1980 out of the bottom of one of the many junk drawers that define my house, and decided with resignation to just wear them until another miraculous option presented itself. These glasses, aside from being old and therefore no longer valid in so far as my 20/450 vision was concerned, were decidedly not stylish, either.

The right arm was missing, and the left lens popped out every time I turned my head. The frame itself was so bent, that the armless side rose a full three inches above the left side, where although the lens was intact, my need to see still could not be fully supported when the lens on the other side insisted on flinging itself across the room as a direct result of my having simply breathed. If I bent over, they fell off just before the errant lens ejected too, and they didn't particularly care if I was standing over a litter box, rapidly agitating washing machine, or a spinning blender when it happened, either.

To say that I walked around looking agitated myself was an understatement, and I understand that I appeared to be deranged as well.

The Mental Patient Cometh

I even had to go out in public with this twisted wreckage on my face if I hoped to operate a motor vehicle on short notice. I had to stand before bank tellers with my head on crooked as I politely asked them " would you hand me my lens, please" as it suddenly and unpredictably flew across their counter, to which they often responded with a little gasp. I had to talk to retail clerks as they tilted their heads sideways, trying to focus on my one good eye as they kept a safe distance and regarded me with fear and trepidation.

Not only was this not a glamorous look for me, but it veritably screamed Escaped Mental Patient while I silently screamed for the return of my real glasses on a daily basis.

As logic would have it, I had asked my mom repeatedly, who lives in the downstairs apartment, if she had seen my glasses. This seemed reasonable to me, and I was hopeful that she might at least buy me a clue. "Do you have any idea whatsoever," I asked plaintively, "where they might be?" And of course the answer was always a resounding "no honey, sorry! " as she tripped the light fantastic, a Gracie Allen type with intact hardware sitting on top of her own nose as she left, so what did she care? After all, she could see just fine, so what was the problem? "Oh, and by the way, Kimmy, " she would say before the door closed behind her while my lens inevitably popped out for the 36th time that day "your glasses are a little crooked, sweetie. They look funny!"

Gee, thanks mom. I hadn't noticed that personally, although the greater Chicagoland area was most likely beginning to talk.

And then, what's this?

A Thief Amongst Us! But Of Course Nobody Saw A Thing

After weeks of pronounced myopia, I walked unsuspecting into my kitchen early one morning to find my mom standing there in her Cindy Lou Who nightgown. Having come upstairs for a visit, she swishes past me, all 5 ft '1 of her, on her way to my living room. Splashing a trail of coffee on the floor and talking aimlessly about nothing in particular in her decidedly cartoonish manner, I am suddenly compelled to interrupt her. Astounded at the sight before me, there are my real glasses, sitting in plain view in the middle of my kitchen island!

I was so elated upon finding them there that the lens once again popped out of the old glasses I was wearing, causing it to become a dangerous trajectile as I eagerly reached for the ones before me. At least I wasn't flying a plane when it happened, right?

"Mom!" I said excitedly, anxious not to be an unwilling member of the Geek Squad any longer, "where did you find my glasses?! I've been looking everywhere, for weeks!"

"Oh," Mom replies breezily as she sips her coffee and pushes up her own intact spectacles "those aren't yours, honey! They're just a pair I got at the Dollar Store. Or maybe your father got them, I don't know. I'm not sure where they came from, really."

What?! Are you insane?! These are mine I thought with astonishment, although I was as yet unable to speak.

"Your father and I always just get those cheap reading glasses," she blithely continued, oblivious to the psychological trauma I had endured while I walked around looking like a maniac for three weeks. "They only cost a dollar at our store, you know the one we like to go to? Well, we bought these, and oh, they were so strong! They're really strong! Every day, there we were, trying to wear these glasses, and boy if they just weren't the most powerful magnifying glasses we had ever seen!"

I'm standing there with my mouth hanging open, my desperately needed 300.00 dollar prescription glasses now safely in hand, which my mom had obviously picked up absentmindedly during one of her many travels through my apartment. Let that be a lesson to us all. Never let your absentminded mother into your house. You never know what she'll wander off with.

"Gee," she continued. "They are something else! I didn't even know they sold magnifying glasses like that at the Dollar Store! I would wear them for a little while, and then I would give them to your dad, you know, just for reading the paper. I would pass them to him, here Dave, you try them, and then he would pass them back to me, and we tried and tried to wear them, we really did! Finally we decided they were giving us headaches, so I just threw them in that Dominicks bag I keep with all of the other reading glasses in it. Oh boy, they are something! Whew!"

I am speechless, thinking about the previous day when I encountered a neighbor who took one look at me in my psychotic broken 1980 glasses and asked softly "are you okay, Kim? You don't look so good."

Souper Sales Tuesday

"Anyway," my mom added, "when your father went to meet his friends for soup last Tuesday, he decided to bring the glasses with him, thinking maybe one of the guys could use them! Which was really nice of him, because some of his friends are almost blind, you know, and he thought maybe he could sell them to someone at least. There was no use letting them sit in the bottom of that Dominicks bag forever, that's for sure!"

The bank teller had laughed at me, Mom, and my lens popped out when I was driving 92 mph on the Kennedy Expressway, and I could have died!

"So your dad passed those glasses around to every single person that goes for soup on Tuesdays, and everyone said they were too strong!" she said as she shook her head. "Your father said that there were at least 20 guys at lunch that day, and can you believe that every single one of them tried those glasses on and no one wanted them, even for a dollar?! They really shouldn't make them that powerful, it's just too much! Anyway, your dad and I thought maybe you might want to try them, since you lost your glasses. Go ahead, " she added cheerfully, "try them on!"

I stood flabbergasted for several moments as I envisioned my parents passing my glasses back and forth between them while they watched Jay Leno, and all while I fumbled around in the dark in the apartment directly overhead. But all was not lost, of course, because at least the room full of truck drivers declined to purchase them for a dollar in spite of my dads best sales tactics.

"Mom!" I said in a breathless rush of words, dumbfounded at the details she had just provided to me, "these are my glasses! They are not from the Dollar Store! I've been wandering through life blind and insane for three weeks while you and dad took turns wearing my glasses and then dad tried to sell them to a bunch of truck drivers?!"

Oh~my~God.

"Well, he didn't try to sell the glasses right away" she finally said carefully, "we did have them in our Dominicks bag for at least one week. Are you sure they're yours? Here, how many fingers am I holding up honey, just count them!"

MOM! They are MY GLASSES!

They're Certifiable, No Doubt About It

So there you have it. Proof positive. My parents are insane, but at least I no longer look like I am as I wander around the city with my head on lopsided.

Looks can be deceiving, you know?

Just ask my parents, as they sit there squinting with their Dominicks bag full of reading glasses and at least one theft to their credit. Apparently they've decided that fencing stolen goods taken from my house isn't going to be profitable for them, seeing as they were unsuccessful in selling even one thing for a mere dollar.

I think my parents need to focus on another little hobby from this point forward, or at the very least I need to keep an eye on them. Now that I can actually see them, that is :-)

The Insane Family Photo Album

2010-10-17T22:47:00.002-05:00

Here are my parents, my dad possibly trying to train his dog Cleo to be the seeing eye dog that everyone would undoubtedly need in the near future. Like, yesterday.

In a much later photo, Cleo is not available, but my mom is at least making an effort to acknowledge that she is blind by modeling these cool and groovy glasses. Well, kind of.

And this is my mom in her blond bouffant "I only wear glasses when I don't want to cause traffic accidents or find my way out of a familiar room" look from the 1960's. Glamorous, but decidedly dangerous.

In one of our "it's 4:00 am, time to get back on the road" early vacation photos, my mom wears her Ray Charles sunglasses even before the sun rose behind us in an effort to avoid having to see me and my sister. These dark glasses were also worn to try and disguise how pissed off she was to be getting back on the road at 4:00 am per my father, and with two decidedly goofy kids around her to boot. And look at me on the right, in my silly red shorts and luminous glasses. Who let me go outside looking like that, anyway?!

Finally, here I am at approximately 9 or 10 years old, a confirmed dork resplendent in my red bathrobe and gold I Dream of Jeannie shoes. Guess who picked out these glasses for me? I have lived a hard life. Scary, too.

And thus ends the insane legacy of a kid in enforced glasses.

Politically Incorrect Riley's Daughter

2010-10-16T16:51:00.002-05:00

A close friend called me earlier today seeking advice while in the midst of a personal melodrama that had evolved, in part, from the fact that her husband is not politically correct. He is, in fact, honest and opinionated, and evidentally made no immediate apologies for the attitude that ultimately cost him his job.

His employer was a jagoff, and he walked. As a result of this impulsive act, now he can repent at leisure from a perspective of self satisfied pride while the bills roll in and they wonder how they'll pay them.

In this scenario, there is something to be said for at least trying to be politically correct.

My father was always a lifelong advocate of telling it like it is in spite of the fallout, political or otherwise. I recall hearing him rant and rave on various work related issues for years as I was growing up, a Teamster and union steward and "stand up guy" ready to fight for his men on a moments notice. He had no fear whatsoever, no qualms about telling the mob bosses or the head of the Teamsters union that they weren't going to fuck with him, that they were all "toothless lions," and that he wasn't going to back down, no matter what!

The fact that my father was a sergeant in the Army and a Navy aviator during the Korean War did nothing to soften his rough edges either, and let's just say that he was never politically correct. He made enemies as well as friends in high places, and was in fact written about (under his nickname Sonny) by childhood friend and Chicago columnist Mike Royko who artfully detailed the political structure of the Daley administration with which my dad was so well acquainted. In retrospect, it's amazing that he didn't end up on permanent vacation with Jimmy Hoffa for all of his extremely vocal contempt for those in corrupt power, and with whom he had legitimate points of contention over the years.

Toothless lions, indeed.

For all of his bravado, though, and for all of the hard won victories he amassed on behalf of those who came to him for assistance, my dad paid the ultimate price. You don't spend years and years getting into brawls and telling off people who are essentially mob connected and live to tell the tale. Well, maybe you live to tell the tale, but you do not necessarily pass go, nor do you collect 200.00 dollars.

What you do collect, instead, is far less than the money you are entitled to after having been a hard worker as well as a hero on behalf of the men he supported for so long. The union leaders he had fought so vehemently ultimately screwed my dad out of the majority of his pension, and in his anger, like Serpico he took the bullet and retreated, too proud to ask for favors from those he had represented at the union hall. And all of those who benefited from his arguments, who let him take the bullets, now phone my dad from their condo's in Florida with money in the bank and plenty to burn.

My father will denounce some of these people, saying angrily that they were ass kissers, or "suck holes," and that he doesn't have what they have now because he refused to "play the game." All of this is noble and good, and I respect what you're saying, dad, but they're the one with the pensions and the houses on the beach.

So maybe there is something to be said for being politically correct?

As my fathers daughter, I too have a reputation for refusing to bend over or back down in the face of adversity. I will champion the cause for those in need of defense at a moments notice, and would catch the bullets in my teeth for them if I thought I could do it in style. I was referred to as a "warrior" by nervous coworkers during a previous employment incarnation, as I set about trying to single handedly take on management in the interest of making our working environment better for all concerned. Although there were considerable changes as a result of my efforts, I made enemies in high places and needless to say I don't work there anymore. I have a pronounced tendency to talk first and ask questions later, and God knows I have walked out on jobs and people and situations in which I could no longer reconcile their petty misbehavior with my proud and idealized notions of the way things should be instead. I want everyone to be upright and brave and honest, and when they aren't I am out of there, and usually with a cutting remark just before the door slams shut behind me.

This is not good, and is as far from PC as one can be without going off to the Big House for sentencing.

With all of this introspection being carried on, however, I have recently made a conscious decision to try and become more politically correct. To learn to be quiet when I should and speak up only if there's a definite need. I am trying not to save the world seven days a week, and am making a concentrated effort to be on a self imposed hero's hiatus for at least three out of five days at a time. I am learning to nod my head and smile politely when I really want to roll my eyes or give someone the finger, and to say Friendly Things to people whom are so transparent in their complete lack of character that I would normally not give them a second of my time, much less greet them in public.

But that's not how you act when you're politically correct, because when you're politically correct, you're always Nice. Just ask Miss Manners. She'll tell you.

I know that this stance is difficult, at best. It's not my style, and I desperately hope that I will be independent enough in the future, financially and otherwise, so that can I can freely tell people at will to go to hell if that's what the circumstances call for. That is true freedom, and is the escape awarded for those who triumph.

And to win, unfortunately, sometimes you just have to be politically correct.

A Casual Blog Update

2010-10-07T01:21:00.000-05:00

Breaking news~

1.) I went to get my nails done and almost got into an altercation with a diminuitive Asian man. I think he is angry because he is diminutive.

I wanted him to use pink powder when filling my gel nails, and he said "cho mee chow ching cho choo!" to another nail tech guy, who then came over and said to me in English "he say you give hard time! Nail no pink!" "Well," I replied dryly, "if he said I give good time, then I would have to agree with him. Hard time? Me? Never."

He turned and said to the irate Asian "foo me no choo chin chow mein!" One can only assume it was in my defense. The irate Asian then left the room. I was then left with a non irate Asian with a bad cold who was sniffling all over his little Asian hands while he commenced to do my nails just the way I like them. I am happy to report that my nails are now very pink and shiny, although I will most likely end up with a highly communicable head cold as a result of this encounter. When I finally left, both of the little guys were hiding behind the counter and quaking.

That's right. Do what you're told boys, or I'll send you back to Vietnam in a Fedex envelope.

2.) I recently went to Ed Debevics. Frenchy was our waitress, and I was disappointed that she didn't tease me more. I wanted a full show, complete with insults, jokes, arm wrestling, and jousting. Bring it on Frenchy! I think she may have been afraid of me, in my black rhinestoned top and very cool boots. She must have thought I was on Desperate Housewives or something.

With the threat of a hostile takeover imminent, and to enhance the show, I asked if I could use the microphone at the reservation desk while my friend Melissa and I waited to be seated. I wanted to tease people myself, point out customer oddities in the spirit of Don Rickles, and tell everyone to "hurry up, eat, and get out!" so we could be seated. My friend Melissa was delightfully mortified, as she is still too young to appreciate that outrageous gestures are the spice of life, and that once you've lived for awhile you really don't care anymore what people think. Which is why old people talk to themselves and wet their pants in public. First the desire to perform microphone antics at Ed Debevics overtakes you, and then the incontinence hits. And that's just how life is.

Melissa had nothing to worry about, anyway, because they wouldn't give me the microphone so I could play too. I hate those Ed Debevics guys.

We waited amidst a sea of 800 teenagers to be seated, which was about 799 teenagers too many. They gave me a little paper hat, and I wore it proudly whereas Melissa was convinced that her hat made her look like a misplaced sailor. This made me laugh, and I encouraged her to wear it while I laughed and sang In The Navy until Frenchy came around and upstaged me. We paid 28.00 for two cheesburgers and were mildly entertained by the dancing waitstaff. They would not let me get on the counter and dance with them. I hate those dancing waiters at Ed Debevics.

3.) I had a road rage like encounter on the way home from downtown. I was being tailgated, and I resented it. I reduced my speed with the full intention of annoying the truck that was trying to drive inside the trunk of my car. He put his brights on and blared his horn at me. I allowed him to pass, and the chase was on.

As revenge, and while laughing at the fun and excitement of it all, I now began to tailgate him. I put my brights on, and was so close to his bumper I could have heard him sneeze (somewhat like the Asian in my previous tale.) When he switched lanes, I did too. When he veered back to an adjacent lane, I went with him. I was growing fond of him, and I didn't want to be separated. When he took the exit ramp, I left the expressway and decided to go home, too.

Hey, he must be from my neighborhood!

Melissa, in her little paper sailor Ed Debevics hat, was now frantically trying to unbuckle her seat belt so she could slouch more effectively. Convinced we were going to get shot, she yelled "my God Kim, we're going to get shot!" "No we won't," I said confidently, our 50 Cent CD blasting in the background. "He's running scared! Watch!"

Sure, enough, he made a sharp right at the very first opportunity, heading off down an obscure side street to avoid the likes of me.

That'll teach you to flash your brights and tailgate me, mister. Bye now.

And thus ends my Casual Blog Update.

Memoirs of a Moviegoer

2010-10-06T22:52:00.000-05:00

My local Blockbuster store is going out of business, and I cannot help but assume that these recent turn of karmic events are directly related to their having charged me late fees for years. I couldn't pay, and now you can't stay in the neighborhood! In a gesture of reconciliation, however, and to help them increase their rapidly diminishing bottom line in a moment of sympathy, I purchased a previously viewed copy of Memoirs of a Geisha and a bag of stale M&M's for a mere 5.99. I wish I had had the opportunity to go see Memoirs of a Moviegoer instead those of the Geisha you see depicted at your left. I'm sure it would have gotten a better rating than I'm willing to ascribe here. Read on.

This movie, striving to be an epic film of great sociological and soap operatic significance, was one of the most depressing things I had seen in a great while. Having accepted an invitation to go to out to dinner at a Chinese restaurant during which I would not be expected to pick up the check, it was a matter of protocol and good manners that I politely acquiesced to purchasing a Chinese movie to reciprocate.

Theme dating. You have got to love it. In retrospect though, I think I would have preferred mexican food followed by Zorro on DVD instead.

Memoirs of a Geisha opens with a bleak scene depicting a young girl (our friend Geisha) being heartbreakingly torn apart from her sister after her father sells her to a Geisha house. Just what exactly a Geisha house is still requires explanation, but suffice to say that she was not on an extended vacation.

Filmed almost entirely in what I would describe as gun metal grey or early nuclear winter, we watch this poor pending Geisha get beaten, whipped, and betrayed, and all while ferociously hated by a jealous current Geisha who has apparently made it her life's work to torment this poor kid. This rival, a formidable foe, is a bitter and vicious girl who sets out to undermine the prettier Geisha at every opportunity. Succumbing to a catfight with our lonely heroine in one disturbing scene, the rival succeeds in eventually burning the house down around them both, leaving our victim sobbing in a crumpled heap as flames threaten to engulf her.

Gee, I'm really having fun now. May I have some popcorn please?

As the movie drones on and on, I was all but wincing as I watched this unfortunate girl being manipulated and betrayed by virtually every person she came in contact with, leaving me no choice but to decide that everyone on this planet of Asian descent is inherently evil and must be stopped. And it rained a lot in this movie too, which added to it's starkly uninviting cinematography and all pervasive sense of impending Asian doom.

When the young whipping post finally comes of age, a "Mother" (the Asian equivalent of a Madame, I think) from a rival Geisha enclosure adopts her with the intention of grooming her to become THE Geisha around town. She will take the tea houses by storm, dance the dance of 1000 dragons, and finally sell herself to the highest bidder!

Great. I would like some M&M's please, to go.

Having fallen deeply in love with a politically powerful man who had shown her the only kindness she had ever experienced by buying her a snow cone and providing a handkercheif to hold it with, she determines to win him over by launching an international stalking campaign that traverses at least one world war while clutching his worn souvenir handkerchief to her faux white breasts. While she worships him from afar and yet loses him repeatedly, we are ultimately graced with an image of the shamed and lonely Geisha standing atop a mountain, where she throws the handkerchief from the only man she will ever love into the watery abyss below. A narrative voiceover informs us that she has lost hope, and I have now become inherently evil myself because I am longing for her to jump off the mountain in pursuit of the handkerchief so I can turn off the DVD in favor of watching The Three Stooges on VHS.

Yes. Just do it already.

Finally, our Geisha chances upon her beloved once again after WWII, recalling with great fondness how she had loved him through all manner of psychological torture and physical abuse as she pursued him in gratitude for the snow cone he had bought her all those many years ago. Amazing. Imagine what she would have done if he had given her a Moon Pie and a glass of chocolate milk.

At the end of the movie, our heroine finally finds herself alone in a garden with no brazen enemies left to watch her angrily from behind a Bonsai tree as they plot against her. She is at peace now, but there is of course one element still missing. Turning suddenly to face the one man she truly loves as he approaches her in the garden, the sun actually comes out in this final scene of romantic triumph. As the Geisha admits her feelings for him and yet fails to acknowledge that she lost his handkercheif, the camera pans out as they engage in a kiss that is many years overdue.

Well it's about time. What was she waiting for? A banana split?

I give it two fans and one and a half egg rolls, at best.

Backstage Pass on a Motown Saturday Night

2010-09-24T00:30:00.000-05:00

Rerun! Rerun! Or is it redrum...

I always knew I wanted to work in the theater.

My opportunity came recently, when Triton College staged a Motown Saturday Night event featuring tribute singers who spend their time and talent replicating the acts, sounds, and persona's of others who have gone before them. As a singer myself, I would personally never choose to merely imitate another person's success. I would feel that I had sold out somehow, or that I was overlooking my own style or unique talents, but those who do opt to work as tribute singers often do a good job of it, even if it isn't entirerly original. In fact, the argument could successfully be made that because of the expectations on behalf of fans who are looking to be entertained by a beloved A-List star who for whatever reason (budgets, schedules, death) is not available, the tribute performer is the next best thing.

They have tough acts to follow, and in that sense they had better be good!

I met some of these good performers on Saturday night, my friend Kathy's husband Ken having approached me to help out with a concession stand where they were planning to serve fried chicken (which was somewhat stereotypical, incidentally, if you think about it.) I reluctantly agreed, as food service is not really my forte, but I reasoned that I may somehow be able to extricate myself from these planned responsibilities to seek out greater things if the opportunity presented itself.

And knowing me, of course I was determined to make sure that it did.

The concession line proceedings were slow, at best. It seems there wasn't much of a market for stereotypical fried chicken and grape soda, so I quickly excused myself to go wander around backstage to be where the action was.

Fashioning myself as the Best in Entertainment Official Event Photographer (as I was the only one who thought to bring a camera, even if the batteries were not reliable and the slightest movement on behalf of a subject caused the focus to become little more than a hurried blur), I purposely strode into the dressing room backstage to meet one of the performers. Hi! I'm here to talk pictures! And you are......

Kelly Owens, the Tina Turner tribute singer, was genuinely pretty, extremely nice, and ultimately proved herself to be quite talented as well. I wanted to encourage her to take her show on the road as simply "Kelly: Very Talented Person" and forget all of the imitation driven shows, but no one had asked my opinion as to what Kelly's long term career plans should be. So instead I just asked her to smile for the camera, and there it was. My first photo op.

And starring Kelly as Tina, with Melissa in the mirror in the background.

In the backstage area, I was excited and felt that I was doing something mischievous and unscripted as I investigated the makings of a show from behind the scenes. Walking out onto the stage behind the still as yet closed curtain, I surveyed all of the details of the trade, such as the carefully placed blocking on the floor to the positioning of the overhead lights. There were ropes and pulleys and cables galore, all of which I wanted to tug on to see what would happen if I did. Fortunately for me, my friend Melissa was in tow, and as an actual theater student who has worked backstage in a professional capacity, I was advised strongly not to do anything of the kind.

Fine then. I'll just loiter and take pictures. I am the photographer, you know. Gee, I wonder how that whole chicken thing is coming along, anyway?

When the show was ready to start, I was firmly ensconced to the right of the stage where the performers were planning on making their entrances, and I wasn't leaving for anything. I loved this vantage point, where I could survey the talent during their last minute preparations (the soloists reviewed their lyrics while the group performers did a last minute rehearsal of their carefully choreographed moves). I reasoned that I could get some really good pictures from here, and photos of the show would be of far greater interest in the long run than passing out food at a concession stand or making change without a calculator could ever be (which for me would be the equivalent of working without a safety net.)

So camera in hand, I took it upon myself to modify my job description, and may Colonel Sanders forgive me for it someday.

Hanging around backstage like that was where I was supposed to be, Ken deferred to my interests and gave me additional responsibilities that were directly related to the show itself. In retrospect, this may have proven foolhardy for all concerned, but I was anxious to try it anyway.

Ken (wary but desperate for the help): When I go out on stage to introduce the next act, slowly open the curtain behind me while I pull the mic stand back, and the Temptations will enter from the side.

Kim (excited and grasping the rope to the curtain in anticipation of my very important job): Okay!

Ken goes out onto the stage now, as planned, and introduces the act. I am peeking at him around the closed theatrical curtain, nervous and waiting for my cue. Confused when I don't see him moving the mic stand back as he talks, I wonder whether or not I really should open the curtains.

Kim (frantic and tugging on the rope): Melissa, should I do it?! Isn't that what he said?

Melissa (grabbing the rope too, both of us intent on either pulling it down from the rafters or swashbuckling out onto the stage like two erroneous Errol Flynns): I don't know! I'm not sure! Maybe! Try it!

Some help that was.

I gave the rope a hearty tug, and it flies back in an ungraceful manner, leaving Ken momentarily stunned as he feels a brisk breeze behind him. Suddenly deciding that I had opened it too fast, too far, and too soon, I then made an unprecedented stagehand move that will forever see me assigned to the concession stand in the future. Pulling the rope on the opposite side to correct what I viewed as a mistake, I now reversed the direction of the curtain, quickly closing it behind a stupified Ken now trapped on the other side.

Ken (sounding like the Wizard of Oz even though he was not as yet behind the curtain where I was): The curtain should be opening here, folks, and our next act, The Temptations.....

Kim (ready to swing from the rope like Tarzan now in an effort to correct the problem): Oh my God! Melissa, he does want it open!

I give it a yank, and the curtain parts with a sudden forceful surge like the Red Sea at high noon. But then, what's this? Another voice of speaks to me from on high!

The Temptations (in a chorus of confused directives that leave me longing to go sell chicken after all): No! Not yet! Don't open it! We're not ready! Leave it closed! Hurry! Close it!

Gasping in surprise at the forcefulness of their commands, I yank the curtain closed yet again. Whoosh!

Ken (frustrated now and about to come kill me, if only he could find the opening of the curtain to get backstage): As soon as the curtains open folks, the show will go on....

Goddamnit!

I give the rope a pull yet again, and Melissa and I look at each other and try not to laugh in anticipation of being sent to the principals office for our inability to follow simple instructions and open a curtain. When Ken came bounding backstage after the Temptations finally entered at stage right, I apologized but couldn't help but see the humor in it. Didn't you see the humor in it, Ken?

Well, maybe he would see the humor later on. Right now, what he needed was a piece of chicken.

Without direct supervision and being quite the nuisances, Melissa and I wandered off to investigate other details of theater life. In the course of this investigation, I managed to knock one of Tina Turners wigs, needed for a costume change, off of a strategically located chair and onto the floor. Moving the chair to try and reach the wig, I managed to somehow push it underneath a complicated series of ropes and pulleys, where it quickly became entangled. At that precise moment, Ken reappeared, looking unhappy.

Ken (booming, and still recovering from Curtain Shock): Where's Tina's wig? It was right here!

Kim (pointing to what now looked like a dying beaver under a fence): Oh, is that it? There it is!

Ken grabs the wig, shaking his head in disdain while looking at me with suspicion. Holding it up in the dim backstage lighting, he hands it to me and asks me to "do something with it" as he walks away.

Kim (regarding the messy wig like it's the pelt of an extinct Mastedon): I wonder if a wig can be brushed? I mean, should I comb it?

Melissa (reaching out to touch it and speculate with me): I don't know! Maybe we could just shake it out or something?

It sounded like a good plan, and there we stood laughing and shaking the wig repeatedly like Italian housewives standing out on a balcony beating a rug. Failing to fully resuscitate the wig, I wondered momentarily if the concession stand was as successful as I wasn't in the backstage arena, and decided to return to my previous plan of being the photographer of the show, already in progress.

Ken with Kelly, who looks well coiffed in spite of certain stage hands who should know better.

Ken with Smokey Robinson tribute singer Alphonse Franklin, who insisted that there was no memo between he and Kelly regarding their complimentary red outfits.

A view of the Temptations from behind the scenes. Not the best angle, but I loved being a part of the production management team, even though Ken would have probably preferred that I had simply remained on the chicken management team.

Returning backstage after having gone up front to take a few additional pictures of the act, I happened upon Melissa wearing the directors headphones that enabled her to communicate with the crew in the booth. Having received an impromptu promotion, she was apparently now involved in giving directions regarding the lighting as well as the sound, and I of course wanted to try my hand as an aspiring Cecil B DeMille, too.

Melissa as Cecil B DeMille. We just liked wearing the cool headset, that's all.

Putting the headset on, I was now an Unofficial Event Director too. I quickly took it upon myself to ask the Triton employees in the booth to amp up the lights and give us some volume, please! I then instructed them to enable the bright pink and yellow lights to the left and right of the stage, and although I had not been instructed to do this, I assumed it would look just great! If not, we could always use the lights to make shadow puppets that would then be projected as monstrously large abstract works of art on the screen behind the performers.

I'm sure the Triton crew members had begun to wonder amongst themselves about the myriad voices asking them to do numerous things over the headset, thinking, Hey! None of these people are Ken Lena! They were a cooperative crew, however, and seemed willing to do my evil bidding. Turnabout really is fair play, though, and having just been asked by the crew via my trusty directors headset to pull the curtains back just a little bit more, Melissa was in the process of following my direction and doing just that when I was busted.

Uh oh. Here comes Ken. Apparently I was mistaken, and I was not the director, after all.

Now it was my turn to wear the cool headset, although I was apparently quite mistaken that I was the Unofficial Director of the show.

Relinquishing my headset with reluctance, I again reprised my role of photographer, the concession stand and it's stereotypical snacks now but a distant, fleeting memory. And thank God for that. Returning to my photography, I took a few additional photo's which turned out quite well, I think, even if I did have to ask for new batteries for my digital camera from the Triton staff.

Ken, the performing artists, and the Triton College sponsors who helped me enhance both the lights and the sound of the show as well as providing me with batteries for the camera that took this picture.

From left to right, The Temptations, Kelly, Alphonse, and The Temptations.

Finally, at the end of the evening as the theater emptied and everyone prepared to go home, I went forward onto the stage where I really wanted to be to pose for my own picture to be taken. As a singer, I missed the opportunity to be actually on the stage myself, although I was happy to help out by taking photos of the featured performers. I had performed for years when my son was small myself, and had recorded several songs, but then life happened and it all went by the wayside. I wanted to bring that back now, onstage, front and center, which was also the least likely place for me to get into trouble, too.

Kim. Chicken Manager. Photographer. Curtain Opener. Director. Performer.

I liked that last one best of all. Wish me luck!

Break a leg! But not really.

The Tao of Kim

2010-08-11T09:14:00.002-05:00

This is the Tao of Kim.

Each moment we live provides us with the hopeful promise of a changed life, contingent upon the willingness to be open and change ones perspective if need be.

If you don't trust your intuition, engage your common sense, and learn from both your mistakes as well as those made by others, you will never grow or change.

After much thoughtful consideration, then, here are some things I've learned along the way. Some were hard lessons, while others occurred to me in moments of inspired revelation.

So here it is, everyone. My version of the true meaning of life, not meant to be in any specific order, but rather presented in a continuous flow. Just like life's experiences.

1. The greatest gift you can exchange with others is the gift of time.

Gold foil is pretty, and who doesn't like decorative bows. But there is only so much value in a thing, no matter what its purchase price. If you really care, if you really love someone, give them you. Spend time with them. Have long conversations, talk a walk together, or just sit together and enjoy each others company. I would much rather receive that than any store bought gift. Don't buy something, wrap it up, drop it off, and leave.

Just spend time with someone you care about, because time is the most valuable gift of all.

2. If someone doesn't want to be with you, let them go.

When someone cares about you, they will want to spend time with you. They will want to see your face, hear your voice, and share your thoughts whenever possible. If you're available, and yet they choose not to be with you, then let them go. Desperation is never an attractive quality, and as sad as the realization is that they have chosen to be elsewhere, you have to release that person. Love and respect are never about manipulation and control.

3. How do I love thee? Let me check the living room.

Women spend an inordinate amount of time worrying about relationships, and will wonder continuously about whether or not they are actually in one. Do you think he has feelings for me? Do you think he'll ever commit? Here's a very simple answer to that question: look around the room. Do you see him? Is he there? Has he been there within the last 24, 48, or 72 hours? Has he made a firm commitment to be there in the near future? Does he actually show up? If the answer to any of these questions is a resounding no, then you can safely assume that you are not in a relationship, he does not have feelings for you, and he most definitely will never commit.

Men have given up kingdoms, left countries, and fought wars over the women they love, and if he loves you believe me he will come find you. Anything less is just talk.

4. Talk is really cheap, and actions shout when words are long forgotten.

The most accurate measure of a persons intentions lies in their behavior towards you. How do they treat you? Are they kind, warm, reliable? Are they consistent, available, supportive? Are they there for you? If they aren't, no matter what they may have promised you verbally, their actions indicate otherwise. This unspoken language is what you need to listen to carefully as you watch and observe.

Talk is cheap, and a measure of a man is in his actions, not in his words, and after all, when all is said and done, the only person you can control is yourself.

5. If you love someone, tell them.

Love comes in many colors. It can be romantic, platonic, or brotherly. It can be an expression of desire, genuine friendship, or mutual respect. Any of these reactions to another person can be experienced as feeling love for them, so why not tell them?

In 2004 my friend Michele was killed in an accident less than 24 hours after I had seen her for what was to have been the last time. During our impromptu 20 minute get together, I had the sudden urge to hug her and tell her that I loved her, but discounted the impression for fear of appearing odd or strange. I never saw her again after that day.

If you love someone, tell them now. You never know when it may be your last chance to do so.

6. Life and love are hard enough as it is. Play fair.

Relationships are in a continual state of flux and change. Emotions are never fixed, and with each passing day or heartbreaking experience, we slowly evolve into the person we are meant to be. It would be unrealistic to assume that because you loved someone at one time, that you would always love them in the same indefinite and predictable way. People change. They meet other people who change them. And sometimes the decision is made to end a relationship.

If you do decide to end a relationship, I think it's reasonable and fair to assume that you should be kind about it. Pay any outstanding debts you may owe them, give them a sincere apology, and offer to help them in any other way they may need before you leave. Be a decent person, even if you can no longer be the lover or husband or wife you once were. If you do any less, you have set a precedent for cruelty in your future relationships, and you will reap what you have sown. It's a law, and I have seen it in action.

I know someone who fell in love with a married man. There is no doubt in my mind that this mans marriage was unhappy, and that he had essentially outgrown the person he was with. It gives one pause for thought if she was actually the one person he was intended to be with, or rather someone he met along the way that had served her purpose for whatever stage he was in when they originally crossed paths.

Everyone who appears in our life has arrived right on time, and if they leave, you can trust that that timing was right as well.

But how can we reconcile his having met someone that he was genuinely excited about and with whom he was potentially more compatible with the fact that he already had a wife? What was his ultimate responsibility in this, and what was the fair and decent thing to do?

He ultimately chose to divorce his wife, but both he and the other woman were extremely cruel about it. They flaunted their relationship with total disregard for the woman's feelings, degrading and demoralizing her every step of the way. To add insult to unnecessary injury, the new girlfriend harassed his wife at every opportunity as well while her husband coldly looked the other way. Finally, the wife was driven out of her home after her husband divorced her, and watched in what must have been total devastation as this new woman quickly took over her once familiar world. She had taken her husband, her house, her daughter, and even her dog. Forced to live in a small apartment and work long hours as a single parent after the divorce, I'm sure the loss would have been all the more tolerable if her husband had at least tried to be nice to her in the midst of it or if he had defended her in any way whatsoever.

They didn't play fair, and someday it will come back on them when they least expect it. And that's when they'll discover just how hard life can be for them, too.

7. Everyone needs help of some kind. Go find these people.

Make it an objective to look for ways in which in you might help other people, and chances are you won't have to look very far. There is nothing more valuable or worthwhile than to extend yourself to someone who needs you without expectation of return. You cast your bread upon the waters, and the world has become a better place for having made the effort.

I was walking down a busy downtown street one day when I found a dollar in my pocket. I felt a sense of expectation, because it was unanticipated , and therefore had the sudden idea that I wanted to pass that sense of hopeful expectation on to someone else. "God," I said under my breath, "show me who might need this dollar!" I walked less than half a block when a woman approached me and asked sadly "do you have a dollar you can give me? I want to get a cup of coffee." Do I! I gave it to her happily, and felt completely in synch with the universe for having done so. It was only a dollar, but it was a lesson and a gift as well, and you can't put a price on that.

Recently, I was on the bus when an older man stumbled on with a handful of crumpled documents but no money in his hands. The bus driver told him emphatically that he would have to pay, or he would have to get off the bus as the man desperately searched in his empty pockets for the needed change. "I just came from court," he said sadly. "I don't think I have enough money, and I'm too tired to walk." It was snowing out, cold and gray, and I watched momentarily as he lunged back and forth with the movement of the bus as he tried to hold onto his paperwork and find the elusive coins he needed.

The bus driver angrily told him again that he would have to get off at the next stop if he didn't pay, and the mans shoulders slumped as he accidentally dropped his handful of pennies on the floor of the bus, desperate and ashamed.

"I have the money," I said suddenly, getting up to pay his fare. I smiled at the man and helped him pick up his pennies, and gave the bus driver a disapproving look as I fed two dollars into the machine. Was it really worth it? Would you make a man with no money and obvious problems walk in the snow over two dollars?

In the end, I gave him my seat too, and all with the hope that he would be revitalized by this unexpected kindness. He didn't know me, and he would never see me again, but there was that one time that some woman paid his fare, and he hadn't even asked her too! Maybe life isn't so bad, after all!

8. There really is sunlight behind every cloud. Go up in any airplane on a cloudy day and you can see for yourself.

Everything in life is interconnected. We live in a metaphysically correct universe, where everything is in order, even if we don't understand the exact mechanisms of it. Quantum physics states that in the time space continuum, we create our own reality as well as the realities of those whose lives we touch everyday. Why not strive to make that reality as positive as possible?

Everything happens for a reason, so don't panic. We are all moving towards our goals, even amongst the superficial chaos. Expect something wonderful to happen, and wait for it with hope and a smile.

9. Find something nice to say. There's something positive to be noted even when regarding negative people.

Have you ever encountered someone whose very presence exudes negativity? They are unhappy, they are hostile, they don't like you, they are almost making you feel ill for being near them.

You can always try and modify that dynamic by saying something nice. You can always find some small compliment to pay someone, even if you have to really search for it, and if nothing else it will make you feel better for having made the effort before you walk away.

I had an encounter with a woman in the recent past who was intensely jealous and competitive and disliked me as a result of her own insecurities. In spite of how much this hurt me, I decided that I was going to try and say something nice about her to counteract the hateful things she was saying about me. Regarding her sadly one day, my head tilted to the side in quiet thought, I finally said "You know I just have to tell you, you have a beautiful smile."

She regarded me with surprise for a brief moment, uttered a quick "thanks," and walked away. I can't say definitively if this small gesture changed the dynamic between us altogether, but it made it feel more comfortable for me. I wasn't going to involve myself in her hatred, I wasn't going to become overwhelmed.

I never see her anymore, but hopefully she will look back on this experience someday and realize that it wasn't me who was the enemy, it was herself and her own lack of confidence.

10. When you're viewed as somehow extraordinary, the ordinary will sometimes resent you without reason.

If you stand out from the crowd in any way whatsoever, expect to attract criticism from others. People will be jealous, and they will inevitably want to silence your voice or dismiss your thoughts as irrelevant, when in truth they have no relevant voice or thoughts of their own, hence the resentment.

If you're big enough to attract notice, you have to realistically anticipate that you're big enough to attract criticism, too.

Eventually, though, being extraordinary, you just smile anyway and go about your life. Let the critics be ordinary and mean by all by themselves. It's sad really, because that's all they'll ever be.

11. Refuse to involve yourself with competitive people. You don't have anything to prove.

There are leaders and winners in life, and there are followers and losers. Inevitably, those who win are sometimes resented by those who lose, for obvious reasons.

When you have attained the goals you set out to achieve, while those who would oppose you stand outside the winners circle and hope that you'll eventually fail, just keep moving.

There's always another winners circle around the corner.

12. When someone tells you who they are, believe them.

If a person repeatedly tells you "I really am a bitch," or "I'm just a jerk," take them at their word. After all, they know themselves much better than you do, and why subject yourself to needless pain or aggravation engaging with someone who is veritably stating that they are not nice? View these statements as the person having laid the foundation for future injustices, which they'll expect you to tolerate as a result of the lack of confidence you demonstrated by being involved with them to begin with. Save yourself the hurtful recriminations and relinquish the victims torch to someone else who really wants to carry it. If a person doesn't appreciate or respect you and deliberately hurts you instead, let them do it on someone else's time.

After all, you're far too busy and much too nice to waste even one more minute on people who don't really care about you.

13. If someone hurts you, deny them you.

It's an important distinction to make, I think, that forgiving others that hurt you does not mean that you need to necessarily engage yourself. If someone doesn't value your love, time, or friendship, the healthiest decision you can possibly make is to divert your attentions elsewhere, and move on. This implies true courage and self respect, and refusing to allow others access to you that blatantly do not appreciate that access is paramount to recovery.

Protect yourself. Just back off.

14. Give yourself the gift of goodbye.

I have the gift of goodbye. It's not a gift I like to use, but sometimes it's as necessary as it is painful.

When someone repeatedly hurts you, choices are being made in each instance. They are choosing to disregard your feelings, and you are choosing to overlook their behavior in exchange for having that persons presence in your life. Have you told them what's upsetting you? Did you explain how it makes you feel? Have you tried to negotiate a compromise, set the record straight, or outlined what you can and cannot tolerate in relationship to them?

And having done all of that, do they keep hurting you anyway? If the answer is yes, you need to tell them one last thing.

Goodbye.

15. Victims really do exist, just try not to be a willing participant.

It's easy and comforting to try and reassure yourself that there is no such thing as a victim, as you opt to view the entire concept of victimization as stemming from the perspective of personal choice. And that may be true in some instances, but not in all.

This was a startling revelation to me, and I found it upsetting to consider.

I recall reading a story wherein a young girl had been walking home from church one evening when two men in a van pulled up and suddenly abducted her. There was a flash of partially remembered color as witnesses recalled how the door had slammed, the van speeding away while the girl screamed. All that they ever found was her gym shoe, left behind on the sidewalk when she was forcibly pulled off of her feet, and one might argue, off her path in life itself.

People do get murdered. They get robbed. They trust someone who betrays them or they sacrifice themselves for something that ultimately didn't matter.

Sometimes bad things do happen to good people, and all we can do is trust that even in these instances, it will all turn out for the best. There was a reason for it, even if it doesn't make any sense right now.

Still, we can consciously decide not to become a victim in those instances when we are aware of it, and avoid making choices that would identify us as victims of our own making.

There are such things as victims, but don't let it happen to you if you can possibly help it.

16. No one ever gets away with anything. Not really.

There really is no such thing as a perfect crime.

I always find it fascinating that with the advent of newer, more sophisticated forensic techniques, crimes that would have been previously unsolved are instead held up in the light of day for all to see. The criminal is aprehended, and the victim receives justice.

Even in those instances when forensic science fails, though, there is still spiritual law and moral justice. If you hurt other people, someone is going to hurt you. If you deal treacherously with others, you will eventually be betrayed yourself.

With these thoughts in mind, taking matters into your own hands or looking to seek revenge is really very unnecessary. Sometimes, the greatest punishment that a person can suffer is having to be themselves. They will have to live with the ramifications of their actions and choices, they will have to coexist within their own body, in their own mind, as a spiritually or morally corrupt person.

Let's say for example that they stole from you. What did they really gain, and what did you truly lose? They're still who they are, even though they may now have something that had once belonged to you, while you have one less thing but you're intact as a person in spite of the loss. So who's the real victim?

They won't get away with it indefinitely. No one ever does.

17. Forgiveness isn't an option, but it is a choice.

We have to forgive people who have hurt us, or we'll end up hurting ourselves. No matter what the injustice, it is in our best interest to find it in our hearts to forgive others regardless of how difficult it may be.

One of the most touching instances of forgiveness that I have ever read was described in Corrie ten Boom's book entitled The Hiding Place. Having been captured by the Nazi's during Hitler's reign of terror after providing a hiding place for some Jewish friends in her home, Corrie and her family were sent away to one of the death camps. She and her family suffered unspeakable abuse there, and many of her family members died.

She and her sister Betsy were beaten and whipped, spat on and worked until the point of exhaustion and actual death. When Corrie was released years later as a result of a "paperwork error," she was determined to bring her insights and experiences to the entire world, as she had been set free and transformed by love and forgiveness.

One evening years after her release, when addressing a large auditorium as a public speaker, she was paralyzed with dread when she saw one of the most vicious German gaurds from the camp she was interred in walking directly towards her. Ironically, she had been talking about the need for forgiveness that night, and here was the opportunity to apply theoretical concepts where there was a genuine need. She was confident that he hadn't recognized her, as she was but one of thousands, but still she was unable to respond as the old fears overcame her.

"Fraulein," he said as he extended his hand, "I enjoyed your lesson regarding forgiveness so much! I myself was one of the guards at Ravensbruck, and tell me, do you believe that God can ever forgive me for the things that I did there?"

She couldn't move, she was unable to speak. She did not take his hand. "God," she prayed frantically, "you are going to have to give me the strength to do this, because I can't do it by myself."

Out of sheer willpower then, she made the choice to accept his hand in forgiveness, and as direct result felt a physiological sensation of warmth surge through her as she actually experienced genuine forgiveness in that moment.

That's sometimes all it takes for a reconciliation to occur, is having an open heart and a spirit of willingness. It is such a feeling of relief to forgive others or to receive forgiveness yourself; why would anyone deprive themselves of it?

After all, life is meant to be a learning curve, we all make mistakes, and we're all in this together.

I Believe That!

2010-07-29T12:36:00.009-05:00

I have a new hobby, and for once it doesn't involve the use of firearms or secret excursions into the dark side of life accompanied by men sporting body piercings, although I am reconsidering the latter as secondary hobbies.

At this point in time, I am an avid Church Hopper.

I have decided that it would be interesting to experience all manner of miscellaneous and sundry religions up close and personal, all the time. Not to simply read about them in a book, or theorize about them during class, but instead to actually go to various churches, in person, and check it out!

In this existential adventure, I am likened unto an investigative reporter wearing a tarnished halo, pen and paper in hand, ready to review.

What do they believe? Why do they believe it? What is their concept of God, the afterlife, the meaning of our existence? And, most importantly, will there be cookies and coffee offered in the foyer after the service?

This strange new hobby reminds me of the obscure comedy Harold and Maude, where an eccentric Ruth Gordon and her suicidally obsessive friend spend their time crashing the funerals of strangers in the interest of seeking a glimpse into life's profundities. And of course I loved that movie, and am surely destined to turn into Maude myself any day now. Like, next week.

Wanting to precipitate changes in my own perspective and glimpse life's profundities myself, here I go crashing religious ceremonies instead. With a bag of popcorn and a respectful if somewhat humorous countenance as I slip into a distant seat, smiling broadly and ready to take notes, I nod as I look around the room with expectation. Hey, everyone seems to be wondering as they regard me strangely, who let her in here, anyway?!

Shall We Chant?

I had never been to a Buddhist concert before, and had no idea what to expect. The whole idea of attending such an event seemed novel to me, so when my friend Carol invited me to visit the Buddhist center she belongs to, I was more than willing to go.

A Buddhist concert at a Buddhist center! I envisioned entering a dimly lit enclosed inner chamber, swirling with incense and the sound of tinkling bells, the worshippers reclining on brocade silk pillows while they listened in rapturous interest as someone whispered Profound Truths in time with decidedly eastern sounds.

Confucius say funky!

Would there be cobra's in baskets there? Would people have flowers in their hair and
beads around their necks? Would there be gold chalices and heavenly perfume?

The answer was no, no, and no. But I liked it, anyway.

As it turns out, in an apparent effort to encourage outsiders to become involved in the goings on at a Buddhist temple, they offer a monthly secular concert with the intention of attracting the general public. Once inside, they then invite you to attend authentic Buddhist activities, none of which were represented by the band on stage that night. It's a bit deceptive, but effective in so far as getting people to wander into the center. There was an eclectic mix of people, and it was more a rock concert than a Buddhist anything. Maybe I had gotten a reprieve, in a sense!

The music, decidedly non eastern, was a thunderous blend of rap, jazz, and hip hop, the lyrics thoughtful and the sheer volume of it enough to bring you to your feet
to cheer and carry on unabashedly. There was no incense, no hookah's, and no apparently no Asians. Most Buddhists, as it turns out, are black, which was a surprising discovery for me to make.

David Carridine is now channeling Kanye West, so have patience, grasshoppah.

One notable characteristic that was shared amongst the members of the Buddhist temple was their genuine kindness. These people were very nice. They were polite and warm and I am not exaggerating when I say that Carol introduced me to at least 30 people, while countless others approached me out of curiosity as they extended their hands in friendship to me. I felt like George Bush before his approval rating had slipped, and wondered when my election was going to be held. Everyone was very friendly.

This was very telling, I decided, and although I don't share their views, they must be doing something right to be this sociable and nice!

In my journeys throughout the center that evening, I was eventually led into a small room with a makeshift altar, several wooden pews, and a large framed poster with indiscernible Chinese symbols painted on it. Ah, the Buddhism commenceth. There was a large brown metal bowl beside the incense laden altar, which I was told it was used as a gong to herald the beginning of a meditative session. Either that, or this is where they filmed The Gong Show for Taiiwan.

"And then what do you do?" I asked with sincerity as I looked around at the pharaphenelia. "What happens next?"

Well, they chant.

Being an open and demonstrative group, Carol and several others suddenly sat as if on cue in one of the long pews together, folded their hands in unison, and began to chant in a melodious if monotone manner.

Nom Mayanga Ma Yee Ay. Or something.

I sat silent and wide eyed in an adjacent aisle, my eyebrows raised and my mouth forming a polite if surprised little "O". Oh. So that's what you do! I decided I had better keep my eyes open as they worked their magic, as I most definitely did not want to miss it if anyone levitated or evaporated into the mist.

When they were done, with no David Blaine like phenomena evident amongst the group, I was still confused. " But what does it mean," I asked eagerly when they opened their eyes at the end of their chant. Are you trying to induce an actual change in consciousness? Do you feel a palpable change in your spirit? Do you chant a lot of things, or just that one thing? Are you trying to achieve a specific goal, or is this an ongoing process with no measurable conclusion?

Well, I was told, it makes us become better people. We are channeling a universal vibration. We are, like, transcending the ordinary and stuff.

Okay. That's a good enough explanation for me.

Although I wouldn't personally use these techniques myself, there was no denying that these people seemed calmer, breezier, and more relaxed than most. And if it's that right for them, then it is right, in a very literal sense.

I decided that I like Buddhists, and was impressed that they seemed to have found personal truths by which to transform their lives.

There were no walls there, there was no judgment. At one point, for example, I had somehow cut my finger during the concert, and was embarrassed by the endless amount of blood that would not stop flowing no matter how much direct pressure I applied. Murder in aisle three! When my friend Carol noticed my dilemma, she gasped and ran to get another member of the center, who quickly came and knelt before me with a first aid kit. Exuding warmth and concern and possibly wondering at the depths of my stupidity, she gently bandaged my hand. As I apologized profusely for troubling her, she could not have possibly been more loving or kind as she regarded me with her upturned face and friendly smile. There were no black people or white people in that moment, there were no Christians or Buddhists. We were just two people, one of us bleeding with enough force to require being surrounded by yellow tape that said Police Line Do Not Cross. It was a transformative moment for me, in a sense, whether I was grievously wounded or not.

These Buddhists are good, I thought to myself, so they must be doing something right.

Midnight Mass Madness

Having been down this path before, I thought it might be of value to return for a late night mass with the perspective of a detached observer.

There would be incense and creeds, blessings and monotonous replies, yawning and clock watching. Still, I could sit in the back, quietly eat some Reese's peanut butter cups wrapped in decorative Christmas foil hidden inside my purse, take notes, and watch the show as if it were a play of sorts! I thought this was a grand idea, and proposed to various family members that they join me.

C'mon, it'll be fun! We'll politely decline the right to dip our hands in the holy water, refuse to genuflect, and steal a couple of the programs as souvenirs! Let's go!

But no one would go with me. Gee, I wonder why?

I was determined to go and revisit the drama of my youth, experiencing the melodramatic glory of the Catholic mass from the stands, as it were. As a kid, I was in the choir for several formative years, and therefore spent every Christmas Eve in an obscure upper room above the altar, where our breathless soprano voices could be heard wafting mysteriously from behind the abstract cut outs in a wall that hovered above the priests during their show. Sister Marie Paul, a formidable nun with a big overbite and a bad attitude, was always around to crack the musical whip, and we had better dare not ever do less than make like the Mormon Tabernacle Choir for Catholics, anyway. So I was very serious then, very sincere, and sang as if my very life depended on it. God was real to me, and I was the prototype of the honest if questionable Catholic.

And now, all I wanted to do was go and mentally berate them with my Reese's peanut butter cups in hand, tsking and shaking my head in disdain for all that I no longer believed? Oh, for shame! My sister Kathy believed that I was ultimately going to behave inappropriately and get myself arrested for heckling. I was going to roll my eyes at one Catholic too many and someone was going to have to go pick me up, either off of the floor if I lost a fight, or at the police station if I won. And again, no one wanted to accompany me so I could do this?! Shocking.

So I went by myself.

It was warmer out than it had been, and I decided to walk across the park to the church. Donning gym shoes with my dress clothes, like the most urbane downtown professional on her way to heckle a mass, I had a spring in my step and an air of humorous expectation about me. I smiled at the Christmas decorations on my way and all but nodded cheerfully at the endless array of immobile white lawn reindeer. I was going to Midnight Mass! I wonder if I'll get struck by lightning?

Arriving at the church, the towering statue of St. Francis catching my eye for a moment as it stood unseeing and surrounded by countless poinsettas, I wondered momentarily just what exactly it was that I was doing there. Are you crazy?! Well, maybe. But I'm going in.

The atmosphere was silent and dour, as usual. Ah, just as I had recalled. Even within the context of what should have been a cheerful Christmas environment, everyone proceeded with stiff formality and elaborate Signs of the Cross to their places at the head of the church. Part of the pretension of Catholicism actually mandates that you move as far towards the front rows as possible, just to ensure that you've been seen. The reason why most people go to mass, anyway, is to see and be seen. Why else would you subject yourself to the boredom of it if not to impress your local priest? Unless, of course, you regard Church Hopping as a hobby and a sport, like me, and are there to shake things up a bit. This was also my motive back in the 1970's, only my attitude was exponentially worse now, if that was at all possible.

Look out sisters! Here comes Kim Riley!

I whispered "oh, huhlooooo," as I was handed my program, the contents of which I would be expected to follow to the letter. Peace be with you! And also with you, no rilly, I mean it!

Alright Kim. Knock it off!

I sat in the back, of course, to allow those desperate enough to require the approval of others to take their rightful seat beside the grandiose altar. Make sure you smile and wave, everyone! What would the neighborhood Gladys Kravitz types think if they believed you had missed the midnight frickin mass?! Pagans.

I went through various motions throughout the ordeal...uh, mass.....and suddenly remembered why I had left the church to begin with. I wanted to abscond with the chalices and collection plates and bring them to a homeless shelter, where me and some hobos would melt them down over a fiery trash can and make gold coins for distribution. I wanted bring the flowers to hospitals and thumb my nose at the ushers. Finally, what I wanted to do was leave. There was no love there, no emotion, no God.

Let me tell you this, people. God is not a Catholic. Not even close.

Is he a Lutheran? Maybe. A Methodist? Could be. I'm pretty sure he's not on board with the Jehovah's Witnesses, as evidenced by my ex-husbands involvement there. I'm not sure where God goes to church, really.

But I'm determined to keep hopping around while I try and figure it out.

WHaT tHe BleEP dO THeY kNoW?!

2010-07-21T19:05:00.000-05:00

Oh, I am so disappointed!

I attended a philosophical study group this weekend that was supposedly based on the principals outlined in the fascinating book WHaT tHe BleEP dO We kNoW (I'm having fun with letters, by the way) and was very upset to find that the group was comprised primarily of IdIoTs and WiErDo's! And of course me.

Devastating.

This is not necessarily breaking news, but some have described me as an impatient person. In fact, I have been described as impatient even on days when I haven't drank two pots of coffee and eaten a handful of cookies before I left the house, but the people I met with on Sunday were absolute zOmBieS!

Looking around the diverse array of attendee's, I was dismayed to see a unusual amount of people who were incredibly sTrAnGe. Glazed eyes, bed heads, spacey. I wanted to talk, to respond, to explore, to make spontaneous discoveries, and this is who I'm meeting with?!

It looked the dayroom at a state mental facility, without the arts and crafts.

In addition to the bizarre spectators, there were also very specific Rules of Participation involved in this study group, none of which seemed reasonable to me. To be enabled to talk, for example, one was required to be in possession of either a small inflatable volleyball (like Wilson, only without a face) or a little stuffed animal. As each person finished talking, they passed the toy to an adjacent person who had signaled their desire to talk. Mute and childlike, we were forced to demurely raise our tenative little hands to signal for a toy so we could have our say. Adding to this ambiance was the fact that we were all huddled on chairs in the children's section of the large bookstore where we met, and after 20 minutes of this I was about to say BleEP tHiS and leave, but I stayed for the duration in spite of myself.

Finally, having apprehended Wilson myself, I stubbornly refused to relinquish him for the remainder of the session, which was funny in a conversationally perverse sort of way. Apparently the joke was on me, though, because I soon discovered that if you spoke for more than the previously determined 3 minute maximum, an incredibly spiritual woman wearing 42 lbs. of jewelry and a long flowing dress (whom I wanted to slap) would bang a small table top gong, thus ending your speech and causing you to feel like a real Cast Away. And of course this happened to me more than once during the two hour meeting. Needless to say, I was very annoyed by the entire situation.

And then I thought, WhAt tHe BleEP!. I know more than they do! I'll just go home, read my book, and discuss it with my (presumably normal) friends later.

So much for my philosophical study group. WhAt tHe FuCk.

I'm Not your Bitch!

2010-06-29T23:39:00.000-05:00

I was having a conversation with my friend Lisa recently, wherein we discussed how many people in our lives had tried, unsuccessfully, to make us be their bitch.

Now, in the common vernacular, being a bitch is not necessarily equated with being a bitch, per se. In this context, a bitch is a verb, not a noun, and is a therefore a title that can be imposed on you only if you're compliant.

Lisa and I decided that we are not, in fact, compliant, and that we were therefore not available to be anyone's bitch. Or rather I personally decided to at least try and be a noun related bitch, as opposed to demonstrating my usual penchant for taking care of the world and trying to save everyone allowing me to be viewed as a menial, verb related bitch.

We decided, amongst uproarious laughter, then, that we can't be your housekeeping bitch, or your doormat bitch, or your photocopy-at-the-office bitch, or your time-to-make-the-donuts-bitch. We also aren't available to be your see-ya-later bitch or your I-didn't-get-your-message bitch or your sorry-I-ignored-you bitch.

We decided that we would much rather be bitches, the noun, to save ourselves from becoming bitches, the verb.

It's simple semantics here, people. Very basic stuff, and not entirely shocking if you think about it.

It does sound bitchy, I know, but if you don't defend your rights in life and maintain a healthy independence and self respect, people will be all too pleased to make you be their bitch! Or buy their donuts. Or wash their windows. Or clean their closets, for Gods sake.

And that's really a bitch.

The Lost Boys

2009-12-19T11:00:00.000-06:00

Years ago, I had the good fortune of crossing paths with a man who was extremely wise and insightful, and who genuinely touched my heart as well as that of my son and his friend during what was anticipated to have been a mundane school meeting.

I have often thought of this encounter, and although I don't recall the man's name, I would love to thank him for the kindness and support he demonstrated on behalf of two fatherless sons and their mothers.

Daniel is a grown man now, a fully trained EMT, and by the grace of God has not been lost. Thank you, sir, for communicating to these kids their value, as it was support such as this that they needed along the way to become the men that they are now.

Daniel, like many of his friends, essentially grew up without a father. My ex-husband abandoned us in an apartment on Fathers Day weekend, 1990, when Daniel was 11 months old. Announcing to me that Thursday morning that he was going to pick up his paycheck, he did not return home that night, leaving me fearful and distraught while I wondered what had happened to him. What had happened, essentially, was that he had forwarded our rent money to his girlfriend in Texas to enable her to buy a one way ticket to Chicago so they could set up house with each other, utilizing funds from our savings account to do so. When he finally reappeared three days later, only to inform me that I should have someone come get me because he wasn't coming back, I recall sitting on the floor of Daniel's well decorated nursery, the teddy bears and balloons I painted on the walls now a mockery of the family life I had tried to uphold, sobbing while surrounded by all of my worldly goods packed away in Hefty bags.

In spite of my grief, I tried to reason that Daniel's feelings would be spared, as he was basically too young to understand what had happened. As the years went on, I realized that this hopeful expectation was somewhat unrealistic, as his dad rarely acknowledged him. There was no dad for Daniel to admire him at Little League games, applaud at his piano recitals, or remember his birthday. Still and all, I tried to cheer twice as loud on behalf of what two parents would have meant to him from the sidelines, while crying private tears on his behalf as well. And all, of course, while at one point working three jobs to meet ends meet, and never less than two.

I know that this has been very painful for my son to have experienced, images of him waiting by the window when he was 5 or 6 for a dad that never showed up when he said he would, a little boy wondering aloud why he couldn't go away for a Cub Scouts camping trip or get help with his math because there was no dad who cared to do it.

Like many who have been raised without the support of a father, Daniel is one of the lost boys. Being a difficult and painful topic, it is often not easy or pleasant to discuss.

During this recent meeting with a simple school administrator, then, I was amazed by the ability of this complete stranger to dispense the most extraordinary advice under ordinary circumstances. I was so entranced with his ability to care, to listen, and seek out the heart of the matter that I came away from the conversation I observed not only edified, but believing that I had had the privilege of witnessing the exchange outlined here as a gift.

When Daniel and his friend Ryan were required to meet with this school administrator recently concerning their plans to transfer to another school in the coming year, myself and Ryan's mother attended the meeting as well, as there were papers to sign and final transcripts to review.

None of us had ever met this administrator, and the general consensus was that we would come and go as quickly as possible, addressing formalities and treating this encounter as the casual business exchange that it was meant to be.

Glancing at the paperwork before him, the administrator regarded both Daniel and Ryan solemnly. What were their goals? Were they planning on attending college? He provided anecdotal information about paths chosen and where they might lead, and advised the boys that if they did not make their own decisions in life, someone else would make their decisions for them.

Leaning forward, he said softly to Ryan, "Your file notes that your father passed away. When did he die?"

This question was obviously not anticipated, and I watched Ryan's face tense as his appeared to grind his teeth, his muscles visibly flexing. He looked past the man for a moment, his eyes appearing lifeless and empty. "Five years ago," he finally replied, color rising to his face.

"He died of cancer," his mother added quietly.

"Does it still hurt?" the man asked gently but pointedly. "Have you gotten over it?"

Ryan, saddened and struggling with the emotions raised by this question, set his jaw and nodded without making eye contact. "I've gotten over it," he said with a valiant attempt to sound brave and give what he thought was the right answer. "I'm okay."

There was a stillness in the room, a thoughtful, pensive quiet.

"Don't get over it Ryan," the man said with compassion as he leaned closer to him. "It's okay to hurt, to cry, and to remember. He was your father, and it's okay if you never get over it, do you understand?"

Ryan's jaw muscles tensing further, nodding his head, blue eyes staring while lost in thought and memories. It was not difficult to sense that he needed to hear that. This comfort and support, if even from a stranger, was a healing balm for a broken heart. Tears beginning to slip down my face, I glanced at his mother, and she was crying too. Daniel wordlessly got up and pulled two Kleenex from a box and handed it to us as he regarded his friend with sympathy.

Turning to Daniel, the man said softly "your file notes only your mothers name, and the space where your fathers name should be is blank. Do you have a father?"

Mesmerized by the depth of the emotion in the room, Daniel replied almost inaudibly "my parents are divorced."

"Do you know your father Daniel? What is his name?"

"Michael," he answered with same vacant stare his friend had displayed in response to his fathers death. "I don't see him very much. He left when I was a baby."

The man regarded him thoughtfully for a moment, and said "do you understand Daniel, that sometimes a man has not learned how to be a good husband or a caring father, because no one loved him enough to teach him how? And his absence can feel like a death, can't it?"

Daniel nodded, careful not to look into the eyes of this man lest he begin to cry himself.

"Does he spend time with you?" he asked with genuine interest. "Is he involved in your life?"

Daniel shook his head no. "My mom does everything for me," he said hollowly. "My dad lives in Carol Stream, I think. Sometimes he'll come over, but usually I don't see him."

The man nodded slowly. "Daniel," he asked softly "do you want to leave your fathers name blank in your file? Do you want to write his name?"

Daniel stared momentarily at the paper. His father was not Unknown in the sense that we didn't know who he was, but he was Unknown in that he never cared to really know his son. I watched Daniel closely as he regarded his options.

"Even if you don't give him a name," the man said "you still had a father."

"I don't feel like I ever had a father," Daniel whispered.

"You may not have ever had a dad," the man said softly, "but everyone has a father. Some of us have a good father here in this life, and some of us only have God as a Father to count on. If your dad let you down, you can still go to your Father."

Handing Daniel the pen, I cried as I watched him check the box next to Unknown while simultaneously writing Michael in a hurried scribble.

"You're still not sure," the man said. "And that's okay. Your mom is here, and she obviously loves you very much. When was the last time you told her you loved her?"

"This morning," he said decisively, momentarily oblivious to the fact that his friend was in the room. "I always tell my mom I love her because I do."

"And that makes you a very fortunate boy, even if your dad lives in Carol Stream and doesn't see you much," he responded. "Your mother loves you, and I am here to tell you that your Father in heaven does too. He is never really Unknown to any of us, Daniel, whether your dad let you down or not."

There was not a dry eye in the room, and the atmosphere was charged with a power and warmth, all of us being touched by the depth of these philosophical insights.

"Daniel and Ryan," he concluded firmly, "no matter what your circumstances, both of you have a Father."

And with that thought in mind, maybe these boys won't be lost after all.

This is a recent photo of Ryan, Daniel, and my father, who provided parental support and guidance for my son during his childhood. In honor of my father's lifelong commitment to him, Daniel legally changed his last name to Riley in 2007 when he became 18.

Midnight Raccoon Rescue

2009-12-18T23:11:00.000-06:00

rac*coon (ra-koon') n., pl. -coons or -coon.
1. A carnivorous North American mammal having black masklike facial markings and a black-ringed bushy tail.
2. And a bad attitude.

On this episode, while other people with complacent lives were relaxing and watching TV before going off to sleep, I found myself enmeshed in a high tech raccoon rescue melodrama.

Sitting quietly in my house minding my own business, which is no easy feat for me, I was startled to hear a high pitching crying sound coming from outside. Walking out on the front porch, the light of the full moon (along with my next door Italian neighbors 400 watt light bulb porch light and motion censors) illuminating my path, I went out to investigate.

It seemed to be coming from across the street. It was a trilling, chirping sound, a terrified whine, like one might sound when discussing their bank account three days before payday. I crept slowly across the front yards of my neighbors towards these pitiful cries, all the while hoping no one was heard to say “there’s Kim Riley out on our lawn at midnight! Call the authorities!”

Tresspassing tenatively onto my neighbor's property, I was startled to come across a Raccoon Convention being held in their gangway. The larger ones, the size of wildebeasts, began hissing at me in unison. Stopping in my tracks, I wondered what one does when being approached by hissing raccoons the size of wildebeasts. I then realized simultaneously that the cries of a baby raccoon, the source of all the commotion, were coming from directly above my head where the baby raccoon appeared poised to jump off of my neighbors roof with the intent to land on my upturned face. As the mother raccoon advanced towards me, teeth and claws gleaming in the moonlight, I hastily decided that what one does when under seige by wildlife in a neighbors gangway at midnight is let out several high pitched screams and start running.

Appraising the situation from the safety of my house that offers no greater wildlife encounters than my son and his friends, I decided I needed to call in some reinforcements. So I called the police.

Me (in a state of raccoon induced trauma): Hi, rescue 911?

Police(sighing): Well, sort of. How can I help you?

Me: There is a family of raccoons in my neighbors gangway, and one of the babies is trapped on the roof, and the mom was chasing me!

Police (still sighing): And? Your point? We don’t arrest raccoons, lady.

Me: Well, I want to help the baby get down, but I’m scared! Can you send someone from your raccoon rescue division?

The cop was probably thinking, it’s always during the full moon that we get phone calls like this one. I was directed to call a “pest control” service, and after whining as petulantly as the baby raccoon that I didn’t want him to be hurt or captured, I was politely wished a good night, lady, and told to work it out with them myself.

Scanning through the phone book, I was pleasantly surprised to find a 24 hour animal control service, complete with a happy raccoon cartoon graphic that illustrated their obvious raccoon awareness.

A call was placed.

Raccoon Avenger Man: Guardian Animal Control Services.

Me (sounding desperate and therefore a moving target for a sale): There’s a baby raccoon trapped on my neighbors roof, and he can’t get down! He’s crying.

Raccoon Avenger Man (sizing up his sales options) : Well, we can send our low flying plane to swoop down over the house, hover momentarily or make several passes as need be, and attempt to scoop up the baby raccoon, at which point it will be airlifted to safety. That will be 800.00.

Me: You have got to be kidding! This is a one story brick bungalow, not the Sears Tower! I could probably jump up and touch the gutter with my hand, and I’m only 5’7!

Raccoon Avenger Man (realizing I may not be that easy of a sale after all, and adjusting his strategy accordingly): Well, for a one story brick bungalow, I could probably execute the rescue for 600.00. Our low flying plane, which is used for crop dusting and trips to Vegas on the weekends, is the method we employ to remove potentially rabid wildlife from elevated locations.

Me(pacing and gesticulating wildly): I don’t have 600.00 to pay you to fly a plane over my neighbors house in the middle of the night!

Raccoon Avenger Man (trying out Plan B): Hmmm. Well, there is another way we can do this. I can use a trajectile netting device. This device will enable me to shoot a rocket launched net in the general vicinity, where it will hopefully descend over the misplaced raccoon, allowing me wrangle it off of its current rooftop location.

Me: What do you mean, shoot a trajectile?

Raccoon Avenger Man (attempting to sound like the Voice of Reason) : I pull a trigger, and the net, at the end of a long grappling hook, is catapulted at the target, in this case the wandering raccoon. That would be 300.00.

Me(amazed at his complete lack of reason): 300.00?! Can’t you just put a ladder against the side of the house, and gently pick him up?

Raccoon Avenger Man: No, sorry. We don't use ladders. This is a high tech wildlife recovery establishment, mam.

Me: This is crazy! I think I’ll try and go over there with a chair, and climb up there myself.

Raccoon Avenger Man(tsking and most likely shaking his head): I wouldn’t suggest that mam. Raccoons are generally very wily and intuitive, and they would most likely sense that you are not a trained Wildlife Recovery Expert, and may attack accordingly.

Me: He’s the size of a kitten!

Raccoon Avenger Man (now so desperate to close the sale that he lapses into mental retardation): OK. Here’s another idea. I could throw a stick of dynamite up there.

Me (convinced that I have misdialed and accidentally contacted Crank Yankers) : On my neighbors roof?! At midnight?! Are you kidding me?!

Raccoon Avenger Man (sounding suddenly like Barney Pfife): This is a serious operation, mam. I can use, say, a half a stick of the good stuff, and I guarantee that raccoon will come down.

Me (not in the market for being arrested and taken to court): Yeah, along with my neighbors roof! And not to mention the property damage! If you blast a hole through their ceiling in the middle of the night, don't you think that they might notice that, and become a little upset?!

Raccoon Avenger Man (making one last pitch): I can wear really dark clothing, and run away very fast. That would be 150.00.

Oh my God.

Laughing hysterically, I thanked him for all of his wonderful if insane ideas, and went home to get what I decided would be appropriate raccoon rescue gear. I had A Plan. I was going to be my own Wildlife Avenger.

Sizing up the nature of the situation, I quickly decided what items I might need to relocate the baby raccoon, as well as extricate myself from potential attack from the Grand Poobah mother raccoon and other extended raccoon family members.

I quickly armed myself with a pair of Playtex Living Gloves, a dining room chair, a blanket, and a squirt gun. Dragging my supplies out the front door, the blanket trailing across the ground as I put the squirt gun in the holster of my pocket, bright yellow gloved hands clumsily grasping the wooden Windsor style raccoon rescue chair, I was going to just do it myself.

Creeping across the street well after midnight, I was momentarily
detained when my son called out to me from his second floor bedroom window "mom?! What are you doing?!" Wrestling with my cumbersome paraphernalia, I replied “I have to go catch a baby raccoon!” Dragging my supplies onto my neighbors property, I could still hear him yelling “mom, are you crazy? Stay away from the raccoons!” We’re going to end up on Jerry Springer yet.

Setting the chair down in the gangway near the side of the house, I scanned the roof to determine the last known location of the baby raccoon. Hearing what I though to be a rustling sound, I though, ah ha, while I quickly mounted my dining room chair, blanket and gloves prepared to wrangle, and peered up at the gutter. Where was the raccoon? What was that sound? I pulled my squirt gun out and whispered suspiciously "alright, where are you? I'm going to get you! I'm just trying to help!"

A scraping sound. Movement. A door opening? Footsteps? Boy, that is one big raccoon....

I almost had a seizure when a booming male voice, that of the homeowner, quickly disengaged me from my Wildlife Rescue Adventure. Startled, I pulled out my squirt gun and aimed without thinking at my disgruntled neighbor.

"May I help you?" he asks sarcastically, eying me as one might an escaped psychiatric patient with my Playtex Living Gloves brandishing a squirt gun, blanket draped over my shoulders like a cape, standing on a chair and hanging off of his gutter at midnight. "What on Earth are you doing?!"

Uh, trying to rescue wildlife? Hey, at least I didn't let anyone throw a stick of dynamite up there, it could have been worse.

In attempting to explain myself, I slowly realized that the raccoon, my alibi, was nowhere to be found. With my neighbor looking at me quizzically, his slippered foot tap tap tapping on the ground with impatience, I was forced to relent, release my grip on his gutter, and come down off of his roof.

Rolling his eyes, the neighbor went back into the house, telling me to ensure that I take all of my stuff with me when I went home now.

Once on the ground again, my blanket cape sliding from my potential hero's shoulders, I was startled once again to hear a rustling sound. Looking around hopefully, I peered into the darkness. There, in the yard, was the mother raccoon, the lost baby having been retrieved by utilizing her own raccoon ingenuity!

With no witnesses, she turned to look at me as they walked away, and I thought I may have seen her smile. I smiled back, happy to have at least tried to have been of assistance in this Midnight Raccoon Rescue.

A Bigger Family

2009-12-18T17:30:00.002-06:00

I have always wanted a big family, or maybe to simply own my own division of the NFL. Large families capture the essence of American Family life, as depicted in Norman Rockwell paintings or while observing large groups of wandering nomad polygamists in the Utah desert.

The idea of a big family, then, has always been appealing to me, most likely because I have not had this experience personally. I have never had to contend with someone stealing my toothbrush, absconding with my pajamas, or wearing my underwear without my consent. Unless, of course, you factor in that one disturbing incident with the ex-boyfriend from LA.

Kidding.

A big family, and children in particular, bring life into a home, as well as peanut butter and jelly messes and Spiderman toys. When children become teenagers, they sometimes bring the police, as well as ex-cons and dorm buddies who fall asleep behind furniture while girls run topless through the kitchen at 3:00 am, but that's another story altogether. In spite of these foibles and risks to ultimately appearing on Court TV if the cast of characters become too diverse on a wild Saturday night, it's the warmth and camaraderie that is by far the greatest benefit of having a loving home filled with a lot of diverse and interesting people.

And that's why I moved a Russian Ukrainian Hat Dancer into my parents laundry room without their knowledge or consent when I was a teenager.

My philosophy is, essentially, that there is always room for one more. Be it a cat, a wayward bird with a broken wing, or my ex-husband, I have always had an open door policy to whomever may need to come in and sit a spell.

My parents, however, do not share my largess.

I met Terry the Ukrainian when I was 14 and he was 16. He had come over from a distant and blustery land (other than Canada or Ypsilanti Michigan) to stay with relatives, and had precious little to defend himself in this culturally shocking environment than his black furry hat, broken English, and the ability to entertain us with his cassock dancing ways.

A lost soul perpetually loaded up on Smirnoff's, I liked him immediately. So when he explained that his relatives were being difficult, expecting him to go to work or something, I did the only sane and reasonable thing under the circumstances. I told him he could come live in my parents laundry room. For free.

This seemed perfectly logical at the time, and I didn't see any particular reason to alert my parents regarding my new boarder, a situation which I hoped would evolve into an international adoption proceeding, thereby providing me with the Russian cossack dancing brother I never had.

Supplying him with a bright yellow sleeping bag covered with 1960's jargon such as Make Love Not War, and Groovy Baby, I prepared his new room beside the washing machine. I gave him two cans of corn, a can opener, a spoon, several cans of pop, a flashlight, and a battery powered radio. Bidding him a cheerful goodnight, I told him that I would see him in the morning.

Morning came very very quickly, and with a resounding shout, when my mom happened suddenly upon Terry snoring in his tighty whities, tripping over him with a basket full of laundry and a bottle of Tide in her hands. Letting out shrieks the likes of which have not been heard since Mike Tyson bit the ears off of Evander Hollyfield, I knew my act of goodwill was not being appreciated. And of course, my parents knew exactly where to go to reveal the source of the problem.

Kim Ann?!! Get down here right now!

I had been busted, along with Terry's personal pride and my mother's sense of balance.

Following the screams of my mother, having been surprised at finding a Ukrainian foreigner asleep in his black furry hat in her laundry room, the screams of my father commenced immediately thereafter.

Dad (brandishing a weapon and circling Terry with evil intent): What are you goofy?! There's not gonna be no Ukrainian foreign kid living in my basement!

Me (wearing purple Donny Osmond Fan pajamas and a pout): But Dad, he's my friend!

Dad (tugging wildly on the groovy sleeping bag while trying to relocate the drowsy and alarmed Ukrainian): He's got can's of corn open in here with spoons in em for Chrissakes!

Me (shrugging): I made dinner.

Dad (leaping over the fallen foreigner while confiscating canned goods): You are not keeping him!

Well, my dad was as good as his word, as well as his tendency to threaten the very existence of foreign cassock dancers, and Terry was bid a fond farewell. So much for my noble plans to open a Ukrainian Halfway House in my parents laundry room.

In the renewed quiet of our home, I began to subtly plot how I might someday just adopt the former cast of the Brady Bunch instead. Or maybe get a hamster or two. Or three.

Some Thoughts on Forgiveness

2009-12-18T14:36:00.000-06:00

I have a distinct talent for overlooking, and consequently forgiving, the bad behavior or others.

This generosity is most often extended to those I love most, but also to friends that betray me as well as casual strangers. I have a penchant for viewing life with the most painful sensitivity, where everyone has potential, everyone deserves a break. Even in spite of what they may have done to hurt me.

One instance that comes to mind, and is the inspiration for this post, involves an experience with my ex-husband. Having abandoned my son and I in an apartment, he ultimately left me brokenhearted and with no recourse but to move, the love and finances offered during our marriage abruptly withdrawn. There was another woman, somewhere else he wanted to lay his head, and I was out.

The circumstances surrounding this divorce were excrutiatingly painful. I recall doing little more than crying for a full two years, his girlfriend calling to harrass me on a regular basis while I tried to work and hold it all together. My jobs, my sons need for me, my sanity.

When he and this woman, now his wife, consequently fought, my ex did as he had always done. He turned to me for support. He came to my house, and wanted to know if he could stay the night while he decided what to do, how to leave, where to go in the long run. He of course then readily assumed that he would sleep with me, and thereby reconvene our relationship, but I refused. I wanted, unlike him, to do the right thing, the noble thing, the honest thing.

"Mike," I told him firmly, "you need to go home to your new wife."

I have since that time have people tell me, oh, that would have been the best revenge! She would deserve to have him go back to you after all that she did to break up your marriage! But this wasn't about revenge, it was about being honest, refusing to allow jealousy or anger to motivate me, and ultimately, respect for myself as well as others....whether those others deserved it or not.

When he returned to her, she came into my house for the first time in two years. The "fucking bitch" she had screamed at for needing child support, the "whore" she had hated so much who cried on the phone while she screamed in the background that Mike was not a "babysitter" for his own son, now stood sadly before her, allowing her a moment to talk. Quietly, with eyes lowered, she thanked me for talking to Mike and calming him. She thanked me, almost inaudibly, for sending him home to her. She looked in my eyes for a long moment then, seeing me as I was for the first time, and left a changed person.

I never saw her again after that day. My ex-husband had left her as he had done everyone else in his life, and that in itself was all the revenge she needed to suffer. My hands were clean.

Not long after, Mike contacted me to ask me if I knew of anyone who might help him move. His brother had not spoken to him since the time that he left me, in support of myself and my son, and I softly offered to call him and ask him to help. This is in stark contrast to that Fathers Day weekend in 1990 when he abandoned Daniel and I, and veritably counseled everyone, including my two good friends Don and Jim, not to help me. After all, his new girlfriend was so incredibly nice, while I was labeled a bitch to enable him to justify his adultery.

When my father learned that I had in fact encouraged Mikes brother to reconcile with him, he was livid. How can you help that bastard?! After all that the son of a bitch had done to you?!

He reminded me about Mike maligning me to Don and Jim to the extent that they turned their backs on me, of sitting on the floor crying and not knowing where to go. And now you were going to call people to ask them to help him?!

I recall looking at my dad quizzically while he relayed these memories, my head tilted to the side, these distant images flooding my mind as if they were someone elses movie. Suprisingly, I had no hate in me, no desire for revenge. In fact, I hadn't even remembered some of the things that other people might have taken bitterly to their grave.

I had forgiven him, because I had loved him once. And that was all I needed to know.

Saint Kim has Left the Building

2009-12-17T22:21:00.000-06:00

Yes, Saint Kim has left out of a side exit, and is now with Elvis, who has also left the building.

I just reread my two recent posts, and I sound like I am filling out an online application for cannonization. Fortunately for me I am not even remotely Catholic, or I might have to soon sign merchandising contracts for relics I support, or maybe I would simply sit here smelling of roses while blood trickled out of my mysteriously wounded hands.

Okay, thats a little over the top and quite offensive, and so much more like me.

The sad part is, though, that I am really that damn nice. For you astrologers out there, I have Mercury, Venus and Neptune conjunct in Scorpio, a warm and demonstrative Moon in Leo, and a Jupiter Chiron conjunction in Pisces right on my ascendant, which is also in Pisces. I never had a chance! I love with abandon and forgive without discretion and am basically opening myself up to be trod upon, every day of my life.

In this society, kindness is equated with weakness, and my loving refusal to launch vengeful attacks leaves others wondering if I do in fact have Playdough for a brain. No, but my optimistic faith in the Big Picture, and heartfelt belief that we are all characters in each others stories and that everything eventually turns out just the way it's supposed to will help me live longer, right?

No cancer, arthritis, or alcoholism here, folks. No way. I forgive you. I may even love and express deep sympathy for you, even if you don't deserve it. But who really does? We all make mistakes. Life is just like that sometimes.

Blinding you with the light of my halo,

Saint Kim

The Irony of Meaningful Coincidence

2009-11-24T20:05:00.016-06:00

This is an encore presentation,originally posted several years ago.

Note: This is a very long story. It’s more of a book, really.

I have been in a very philosophical mood lately. It may be the rainy afternoons, or the depth of my concerns, or maybe the fact that I sat bewildered as to how I could have possibly spent 8.00 dollars at Panera Bread for a teeny sandwich, a cup of soup, and some bland lemonade, and all as I stared out the window, writing this, clutching my empty wallet and wondering. I had wanted to go somewhere quiet. I had wanted to go where I could write in my journal and not be disturbed. I had wanted to go where I wouldn't be robbed. (In that case, I shouldn't have gone to Panera Bread.)

But I digress.

While pausing for philosophical thought, it occurred to me, once again, that life is continually intermingled with coincidences if we care to look for them. We decide spontaneously to take a different route, and come across a long lost someone, we are preoccupied with financial concerns, and look down only to find a quarter in the street. These are the moments when God winks at us as if to say "I see you, I know you, I care."

I have encountered these remarkable (in retrospect) coincidences so often in life that very little truly shocks me anymore. Initially, yes, I can be thrown into confusion or misunderstanding or fear, but when the dust settles, I generally have the presence of mind to say "okay, why did this happen? What does this mean? What was I supposed to learn here?"

One of my greatest learning curves, which involved a swirling miasma of coincidences, involved a situation in which I lost virtually everything I owned when my house burned down.

Scheduling Delays and The Hand of Fate

It was a Friday night. I was attending Wright College (when am I not attending college, really) and taking boring computer classes. I recall wanting to take the EMT classes to enable me to become a paramedic, but my father talked me out of it (out of fear for my sanity, safety, and well being.) Sadly, I relented. I would focus on business. I would work in offices. I would be isolated under glaring fluorescent lights, interacting with shallow people who had nothing more interesting to discuss than what Susie had said about Mary, and I would die inside. Was that my fate? Please, someone check my pulse, because I'm not sure if I'm still breathing.

Such were my thoughts on the night that everything changed.

I usually left right away after class had ended. My son was only nine years old at the time, and I was in a hurry to get home to him. For some reason, on this night, I uncharacteristically decided to stay and talk with another student. Allowing myself to be caught up in conversation, I lost track of the time while we laughed. Suddenly, looking at my watch, I exclaimed "I have to go! I'm going to be really late!"

As it turned out in retrospect, it was a blessing that I was late.

Friday night was also the night that my son Daniel attended Awana meetings at our church, and my father would pick him up as a favor while I was in class. Fearing the Wrath of Grandpa, Daniel usually left as soon as he was told, but on this night he stayed and ran and played and dodged all attempts at capture. Rather than becoming angry, my father found himself caught up in a conversation with another exasperated Grandpa, and Daniel was allowed to play for much longer than originally intended.

Which turned out to be a very good thing.

Meanwhile, on my way home, I realized that I was almost out of gas. Annoyed, I decided to stop at the gas station rather than risk having my car stall midway home, thereby confirming my status as a poor planner unable to decode simple dashboard signs. (E does not mean Enough.) While I was filling up the car, three huge fire trucks raced by frantically, with what appeared to be a fire sergeants red sedan directly behind them. With sirens screaming, traffic veered to allow them to pass while I stood with my mouth open at the gas pump. "Wow," I remember thinking. "I wonder what's going on?"

My house was on fire and was burning quickly, that's what was going on.

On my way home moments later, I spontaneously decided to make one additional stop. Pulling into the parking lot of a convenience store across the park from where I live, I recall standing perplexed, a newly purchased gallon of milk in my hand as I watched the chaos unfolding on my very own block from a distance. What was happening? What were all of those fire trucks there for? Was someone hurt?

Still having no idea that my life was in the process of changing dramatically even as I drove those few city blocks, I quickly turned down the alley of my street to reach home. It was the only route I could take. The street was completely blocked with emergency vehicles.

As I was driving towards my garage, I was startled and beginning to feel a sense of mounting panic when I realized that yet another fire truck was parked behind my neighbors garage, directly adjacent to mine. Pulling my car onto the apron, I jumped out of the car and noted with increasing fear that the fire hoses draped over my back gate led directly to my house. It was my house?! Oh my God!

When I looked in my yard, I could see the ominous figures of firemen in full gear silhouetted inside my sons darkened bedroom window, smoke billowing forth as they broke the glass violently with an ax. Amidst the sound of shattering window panes, I looked in shock and horror at the flames roaring out of the roof and into the night sky, and veritably screamed in terror.

The gate was locked, and I could not get in. As if in slow motion, I frantically opened the garage door with the remote control on the visor, throwing it carelessly back onto the seat, leaving my car door open with the motor running in the alley as I ran through the garage and into the yard.

"Daniel! Where is my son?! Oh God! Daniel!"

There was shouting, screaming. A fireman grabbed me by my arm as I tried to run into the back door of the house saying firmly "You can't go in there!" "My son," I screamed "my son is in there!"

I tore away from him while he virtually blocked the back stairs, and ran calling his name through the gangway. Overhead, the fire sounded a tremendous crackling roar, a rush of heat and fiery embers showering down around me as the firemen on the third floor threw charred debris out of the attic through a now destroyed roof. Firemen were screaming at me to "watch out!" and "get out of the way!" as I literally ran between falling fiery objects on my way to the front yard.

Didn't they understand?! I had to get in the house!

"Daniel?! Where are you!"

When I reached the front yard, I was stunned. Momentarily freezing in my tracks, I looked around in complete bewilderment at the scene unfolding around me. There were at least 100 people in the street watching my life burn down around me, two television news stations talking about my tragedy to an audience of even more, several fire trucks, and an ambulance. It was a scene of complete and utter chaos.

I was about to collapse to my knees right then and there when a neighbor ran towards me, grabbing me by shoulders and saying emphatically "Kim! Daniel is right here! He's alright! Your father is here too! No one is in the house! It's okay! You’re so lucky no one was home, Kim!”

But it wasn’t luck, it was the irony of meaningful coincidence.

Reunited in the Chaos

When my son ran towards me from within the surging crowd, he and I stood clinging to each other for several long minutes while I cried. "Where were you?! I thought you were in the house, Daniel!" Generally, a public display such as this would have sent my son into a catalepsy of embarrassment, but in our mutual fear, we simply stood there and held on to each other while the fire raged.

Looking up at the flames with a terrible sense of foreboding and fear, I felt a surge of adrenalin as I suddenly rushed towards the front door in an effort to save my pets. My pets! They were in there! Again the fireman blocked me from entering while various people in the crowd shouted at me to "wait!" and "don't go in there, Kim!" I stood there trembling, hearing but not comprehending while flashes of fire and light overwhelmed my senses. "Where are Tom and Simba? Does anybody know?" I said beseechingly to the fireman standing before me. "I have birds and fish, too! Did anybody save my cats? Please will you go get them?!"

He regarded me with sympathy, but the fire was raging so out of control that I think we both knew that if my pets were in there, they weren't anymore.

I was in shock. People were talking to me, but I wasn't registering what was being said. I was trembling and whispering "oh my God, oh my God." It was all I could muster at that moment. The atmosphere was surreal, and everything around me appeared to be happening in slow motion. When one of the television reporters began broadcasting my experience from just several feet away from where I stood crying, I recalled feeling hurt and confused as to why the crowd seemed thrilled by this development. Why were our lives a source of news and entertainment? I watched sadly as people pushed to stand behind the reporter as he relayed my tragedy to the general public, the teenagers waving and smiling and laughing in an effort to be caught on camera for their fifteen minutes of fame.

I made momentary eye contact with the reporter. He did not ask me any questions. I think he knew I would be unable to respond coherently at that time. I walked away sadly with my head down.

I went and sat heavily on my next door neighbors steps. I was shaking almost violently now, and was absolutely heartbroken as I looked out at the chattering crowd. There were familiar faces, many people I knew, but I couldn't recognize them or talk or respond. I was too distraught.

Someone ran towards me then, my cat Simba’s limp body wrapped in a bath towel. Handing him to me gently, but with hopeful excitement, it strangely reminded me of the scene from the movie The Ten Commandments, when the Pharaoh lays his sons lifeless body in the arms of the god who is simply a statue, and who of course can do nothing to save him.

“Simba?” I whispered anxiously. “You found Simba?”

I hugged him and kissed him and broke down sobbing. He had urinated all over himself, and the towel was saturated, but I didn’t care. I was unaware of the extent of his injuries, and I simply wanted to hold him.

“Kim,” someone was telling me, “he has to go to the vet right now! The fireman gave him oxygen and got him breathing, but he won’t make it if he doesn’t go to the vet! You have to take him! You have to hurry!”

I looked at Simba, and then at the person talking to me, and back at my pet. Where was my car? Where would I go? I suddenly had no idea who the vet was, or where the vet was, although I had been there hundreds of times.

“I don’t know,” I stammered. “I don’t think I can drive. I don‘t know what to do.”

At that moment, four people came rushing towards me. They were two young couples, and I vaguely recall a young girl with blond hair and a pony tail. I had never seen them before. They offered in a rush of words to take my limp, almost lifeless cat to the 24 hour emergency vet. I nodded and said “thank you, thank you.” Someone gave them my name. They told me that they would come back as soon as he was okay. I nodded and handed Simba to them. I sat on the porch and stared motionless at the fire still burning inside my house, illuminating the darkness of the night sky.

The fire, we were later told, had begun in an electrical outlet in the basement apartment where my parents lived. When Daniel had come home from Awana’s that evening, the oxygen created by the simple act of opening the door to the apartment had created a back draft of sorts, which caused the fire to suddenly surge upwards, igniting the couch and curtains in its wake.

It happened just that quickly. My father told Daniel to “get out of the house now!” and within literally minutes, while on the phone with a 911 dispatcher, the fire had raged through the walls out of the attic roof. My father later explained that he had been forced to crawl out of the basement apartment, now thick with black acrid smoke while the once familiar room behind him was engulfed in flames, the windows exploding outwards around him from the intense heat as he ran out of the back door and into the street.

My son had run to a neighbors house, ringing the doorbell frantically while the sound of our smoke detectors screamed a futile warning into the no longer predictable evening. The sound of the alarms could be heard up and down the block, people later relaying to me that they had paused fearfully to listen, wondering what the sound meant. One neighbor later told me that she was in her living room, and saw “an orange flash” out of the corner of her eye, followed by the sound of explosions and shattering glass.

These images haunted me for a very long time as I thought of how terrified my pets must have been, trying to hide from this danger with nowhere to go and no one to help them.

My birds, I was later told, had died instantly. As fragile lovebirds, Kaylee and Kanike were overtaken by the smoke, and would have simply gone to sleep. When I later found them in their cages, it did appear that that’s what happened to them. My cat Tom, a rescued stray, had been found in the kitchen near the back door, having succumbed to the same black smoke. I felt grief stricken and guilty that I had taken him in off of the street, wanting to give him a home to live in, only to see him die months later in what was supposed to have been a better place. I had ultimately failed to save him, after all.

Saving Simba

But Simba, my kitten, had somehow survived this trauma. The fireman who was on duty that night, coincidentally, knew me personally from our church. He recalled that I had cats, and as a kind and heroic person, Bob had rushed into my house to try and find them.

He later told me that Simba was for all intents and purposes dead when he found him. He had succumbed to smoke inhalation, and a heavy bookshelf had fallen on top of him during the chaos that ensued. I was later told by the vet that his spinal cord was injured, he would never walk again, and that his retina’s had detached from the lack of oxygen, which had left him blind. I denied acceptance that any of these diagnoses could not ultimately be overcome, and I flatly refused to have him euthanized.

It was no mistake, I reasoned, that this specific fireman had been on duty that night, and Simba had been found for a reason. Bob had even given Simba mouth to mouth resuscitation before rushing him out to the ambulance to give him oxygen in an effort to help him breath.

“When he bit me,“ Bob said comically, “I knew he was going to make it.“

“It was so good you were there to help him,“ I had said gratefully in reply.

“Yes,“ he laughed, massaging his hand where Simba had bitten him weeks earlier “it wasn’t good for me, but it must have been good for the cat.“

Simba languished in what was the equivalent of an animal ICU for two weeks. He had a tracheotomy tube, was in an incubator, and was suffering seizures. The bill was mounting daily, but I refused to “discontinue extraordinary interventions.” I believed that he was not only going to survive, but that he was going to recover fully “as if nothing had ever happened.”

I made my pilgrimage to visit daily, and spent long afternoons arguing on the phone with an endless round of veterinarians who were trying to convince me to either let him die, or come forward immediately to pay the bill, whichever came first. Simba’s planned triumphant survival had become almost symbolic to me in its magnitude, and there was no way I was going to let my kitten die and take the last vestiges of both mine and my son’s faith with him.

Simba was, after all, our baby. I had found him in our backyard earlier that summer, a tiny mewling hamster of a thing, with eyes still fused closed and an umbilical cord still precariously attached to his stomach. In yet another one of life’s coincidences, Daniel had been pestering me that hot summer afternoon to go and get some of his action figure toys out of my car in the garage, and it was then that I discovered Simba near death laying in the yard beside some potted plants. Scooping him up in the palm of my hand, I ran inside to report my findings.

Daniel and I took turns feeding and “piddling” him with damp paper towels for several weeks. We cuddled him and woke up during the night to feed him some more. When he slowly opened his eyes for the first time, I knew he believed I was his mother, and there was no way that I was now going to let him die in a sterile incubator in a cold room. Not for love or money or anything else.

Simba was going to live and come home, wherever that home may eventually be.

On My Neighbors Couch

After the fire had finally been extinguished, I stood sad and frightened on the sidewalk looking up at what had been my home. The pastor from my church, Pastor Steve, had driven over to stand beside me while the last of the flames were conquered, his arm reassuringly strong around my slumped shoulders . We didn’t talk, and I appreciated that. There was nothing to say in that moment. I was too traumatized.

The fireman walked throughout the house after the fire was put out carrying huge lights., which looked eerie in this sudden overwhelming darkness. The house made groaning, creaking sounds, and I looked in despair at the remnants of all of my worldly goods thrown from various broken windows onto my front lawn. My Halloween decorations now seemed a no more than a mockery of a holiday that Daniel and I would not be celebrating, and tears ran down my face as I shuddered at the magnitude of it all.

Still, I was unaware of the extent of the damage, and naively asked one of the firemen “can I go in now? Can I go home?” I was so exhausted and upset, all I wanted to do was go inside and go to bed. Regarding me curiously, he answered “you can go in, but you can’t stay here. The house is not safe.”

My neighbor, Jane, stood quietly with me. I wanted to go in, I had to see for myself. Where were our clothes? Where were Daniel’s toys? Where would we live? What would we do?

“I’ll go in with you, Kim,” Jane told me, all but leading me by the arm as we followed behind two firemen who agreed to escort us. I nodded and walked fearfully up the stairs, completely unprepared for what I found inside.

Equipped with one of the oversized flashlights used by the fire department, I gasped as the light illuminated what was clearly a completely destroyed house. Water ran in rivers from the charred ceiling. The kitchen was open to the night sky. The smoke was thick and overwhelming, and I coughed as I made my way to what had been my bedroom.

The draperies around my bedroom window had been destroyed by the fire. The television that had been on my dresser was veritably melted, like an item in a Salvador Dali painting. The staircase leading to the basement was virtually gone, having been burned beyond use, as was the staircase leading to the attic. Both of these potential exits shared the south wall of my bedroom, and I couldn’t help but note with a shiver that had Daniel and I come home on time, we would have been trapped in this room with no escape, all potential exits having been engulfed in flames.

Oh, thank God for the series of events that kept us from coming home tonight.

I sadly looked through what was left of my closet for something that I might possibly wear. All of clothes were either burned, saturated with water, or blackened with smoke. Having left the house wearing nothing more than a sweat shirt, shorts, and gym shoes, I gathered up some meager smoke damaged items from both my room as well as Daniel‘s , thinking that it might at least see us through. Through to what or when, I didn’t know.

Tonight was the first night of a very different life, and that was about all of the information I had at that time.

When the smoke became intolerable, and my neighbor and I began coughing, the firemen who had escorted Jane and I in insisted that we leave. Standing on the sidewalk with a small pile of barely salvageable clothes, my son having been taken to a neighbors house and my parents having left with my sister, I felt an overwhelming anxiety about leaving at all. I felt, irrationally, that I needed to remain close by, that my life was on the sidewalk now and I had to be there to solve problems and somehow control the uncontrollable. Everyone would be depending on me to do something about all of this, and yet I had no idea what to do.

“Kim,“ Jane said softly, “come with me. You can sleep on the couch in the family room for as long as you need to.“

Nodding, I allowed myself to be led away into the unknown.

Hopelessness and a Prayer

In her pleasant and inviting basement family room, I had all the comforts of home but far too much trauma and anxiety troubling me to appreciate it. I was shaking so convulsively that my teeth were chattering, and I felt cold and clammy in spite of the blankets that now covered me. I was fearful for my son, my parents, my pets, our lives. I was sobbing nearly hysterically by fits and starts. After hours of this emotional distress, I finally lay down and asked Jane desperately “do you have a Bible I can read? I think I lost mine in the fire, I mean, I can’t go get it.“ She apologized that she didn’t, and my last thoughts before I fell into a fitful sleep were “God, please get me a Bible.“

In the morning, I was awakened by the sound of the doorbell. Tiptoeing up the stairs to the front door, I took it upon myself to answer it as I was sure that I had kept Jane and her family awake for most of the night with my constant crying.

The light of the sun shone bright into my eyes, and I regarded the neighbor girl standing in front of me almost shyly. It was Ashley, the older sister of my sons friend Michael. She was a quiet and sensitive teenager who had spent many of her formative years making herself at home in my life, bringing her pet rabbits over to visit, asking me to braid her hair, or sitting out on my front porch with me on long summer days while she told me stories about her world.

“Hi Ashley,” I said hollowly, feeling emotionally and psychologically exhausted.

“Kim,” she said with great excitement, “look what I found!” I looked at what she had found with astonishment. In her extended hands was my Bible, completely untouched and without any visible damage whatsoever. In fact, I noted with mounting elation, it didn‘t even smell like smoke!

“Where did you get this?!” I asked her breathlessly. “Where did you find it?!”

“Over there,” she answered, pointing to a pile of charred debris on my front lawn. “It was underneath all of that stuff that the firemen threw out of the windows last night. I tried to get some of your other books for you, but this was the only one that wasn‘t burned. “

Months later, I stood grateful at the podium at church and told this story with great emotion, the congregation being deeply touched by this “coincidence.”But there were many other instances of God’s interventions that were yet to come.

If Even a Sparrow Falls

As upset as I was, I knew I had to go back into the house. Although both of my birds and my cat Tom had died, all having been removed quietly so as to not further traumatize me or my mother, I still had a tank full of fish in the house that needed to be taken care of.

I couldn’t bear the thought of them dying what was sure to be a long, slow death. The 45 gallon tank was home to at least 25 freshwater fish, and although I knew that it had been cracked and was partially full of fallen debris in the aftermath of the fire, I had noticed some life and movement the night before while briefly allowed back into the house. Asking my neighbor for a Tupperware bowl , a flashlight, and a plastic cup, I went back in to do a fish search and rescue.

Of the 25 fish, at least 10 were still alive. Balancing the flashlight precariously under my chin, I swept the cup through the now icy water and scooped them out, one by one, placing them carefully into the Tupperware bowl. When I was confident that I had saved all that remained, I got in my car and drove to the pet store to ensure them an alternative home.

After explaining my dilemma to the store manager, he was convinced of both the plight of my fish as well as myself as I stood before him forlornly in the same smoke covered clothes I had been wearing 24 hours earlier. Returning the assortment of bala sharks and neon tetras to the stores tanks, the sound of mewing kittens coming from the back room captured my attention. Mesmerized, I walked back slowly to look at them.

There were at least eight small kittens in a cage, and I wanted them all. I tried to put my fingers through the wires to pet them, my eyes filling with tears as I thought sadly about the loss of my cat Tom and of Simba’s hospitalization. They were so cute, and wouldn’t it be comforting to have one? I was only vaguely aware that a woman standing beside the cage was watching me intently as I whispered to the cats and tried to see them through the veil of my tears.

“Excuse me,” the woman beside the cage said as I looked up at her with embarrassment. “Are you looking for a kitten?”

“Oh,” I replied slowly, “I…I can’t get one right now. “

“I have a kitten that needs a home desperately,” she said hopefully, obviously not discouraged by my disheveled, smoky appearance. “I have never been to this store before, and I was just driving by, “ she explained further, seeming almost confused by her own actions. “I had this sudden urge to stop here! I felt that if I came in here and waited, someone was going to come in that needed a kitten! I know this sounds crazy….is it you?”

Tears began to roll down my face. I poured out my story regarding the fire in a tremendous rush of words, and of how I had lost my pets.

“Why don’t you come with me,” she told me softly while she nodded her head, “and I’ll show the kitten to you.”

Following her back to her house, I pointed with amazement at a photo on the mantle over her fireplace once we were inside the house. “I know that girl, “ I said with surprise. “Her name is Maria, and she cuts my hair at the salon that I go to!” “She’s my sister,” the women commented with equal amazement. “So, I guess that confirms it! You were meant to be here! Let me go get your kitten.”

Returning moments later from the basement, she presented it me with a tiny, eight week old Stevie, his blackened toes and fluffy fur leaving me all but screeching with delight. “Oh he’s adorable!” I gushed. “I’ll take him! I want him!”

That was seven years ago, and Stevie provided a tremendous comfort to me not only in the days following the fire, but in the many years that followed as well. I considered him to be a special gift, a provision of sorts. We needed him, and there he was.

Thanks, God.

Simba Comes Home to the Marriott

In spite of Stevie’s welcome presence in our now perpetually stressed existence, I still went faithfully every day for several weeks to visit Simba at the animal hospital. They were a 24 hour establishment, and if after coming home and making dinner and helping Daniel with his homework I went at midnight, I went. Interred in an incubator in their ICU, Simba would lay panting and glassy eyed, a tracheotomy tube in his throat.

The prognosis was poor, and eventually the veterinarians seemed more intent on recouping their financial investment at having treated Simba than they were in ensuring a full recovery. Heartbroken, I all but pleaded with them as I made small, apparently insufficient payments towards the quickly mounting hospital bill. When they began calling me at the hotel to ask me angrily if I “had anything to sell to pay the bill,” I was irate.

“My house burned down!” I told one of the doctors one afternoon. “I have nothing! I own nothing! I live in a hotel! Will you please just help my cat?! You will get paid! I will pay you!”

But it had been three weeks, and the hospital was no longer willing to negotiate. Simba would be removed from the ICU and placed in a cage until I paid the bill. Frantic, I called the insurance company to see if they would intervene on my behalf, but was disheartened to discover that pets are considered “chattel,” and as such were not covered by medical payments of any kind.

They were not going to let my cat die alone in a cage without treatment! There was no way I was going to allow that to happen!

I drove to the animal hospital emotionally distraught. When I arrived, I confronted one of the employees at the desk , telling her angrily to “get me my cat now!” Stunned at the confrontation, she went to get the manager, who tried to divert me to a private room to “discuss matters.”

“I’m not going anywhere to discuss anything!” I shouted, a crowded waiting room looking on in surprise. “Everyone here needs to know that this place cares more about money than they do about saving lives! You’re willing to let my cat die because I don’t have 3000.00 to give you right now?! Give me my cat, and I’ll take him someplace where the doctors actually care!”

“You cannot take the cat, “ the manager said coldly, “until you pay the bill in full.”

“I can’t pay the bill right now!” I said breathlessly, breaking down in great heaving sobs. “My house burned down, and I have nothing to give you! My paychecks are just barely covering food and clothes…my son doesn’t even have a winter coat! Give me my cat please!”

Looking at me warily, embarrassed by the cold stares of those in the waiting room now directed towards her with her heartless corporate stance, she relented. “I will give you your cat,” she said evenly, “but you have to sign a contract regarding repayment.” "Fine, anything, I will!" I cried with exasperation, the cumulative stress and despair all but debilitating me. “Please, just give him back to me! Please!“

When Simba was brought out to me, a wave of fear and depression overcame me. He did not look well. He was limp, obviously blind, non responsive. I wrapped him in a bath towel brought for the purpose of trying to keep him warm on the ride home, and wondered fearfully if I had done the right thing, after all. What kind of life would he have? Was I wrong?

I drove straight to our family vet to ask Dr. Valente, whom I trusted, to see him. If anyone could help him, Dr. Valente could!

The doctor regarded me solemnly as tests were performed on Simba. There were X-rays and eye exams and palpations of all kinds. “He is not doing well, Kim,” Dr. Valente said quietly. “He will never walk again. He’s blind. You will have to carry him to the litter box and palpate his bladder to help him expel urine. You will have to give him steroid injections daily, and I’ll have to show you how to introduce fluids by starting an IV. That’s really all you can do right now, and we’ll have to wait and see what happens.”

Grateful for his help and anxious for Simba to get better, I took home all of the veterinarian supplies and created a cat ICU right there in the hotel room.

I made Simba a bed out of a laundry basket, which I lined with plastic bags topped with bath towels. I gave him subcutaneous fluids and steroid injections as instructed. When it was time to eat, I fed him slowly with a spoon, like a baby. When I thought he might have to go to the litter box, I lovingly carried him there and held him. And every night, when he lay in his makeshift bed, my son would kneel down next to him and pray that he would get well, telling me with a smile “he’s going to be okay, mom. You’ll see.”

After days and days of this routine, which I also had to instruct my parents to follow while I was at work, Simba took a sudden and amazing turn. For the better.

A Miraculous Recovery

Daniel had been complaining of a stomach ache, and I allowed him to stay home one afternoon, while I took a personal day to stay with him. Feeding Simba his Little Friskies, I left him lying on his towel on the floor while I cleaned up, Daniel watching TV quietly in the hotel bedroom. When I came back several minutes later, I was confused to see that Simba had moved several feet from where I left him.

“Daniel?” I called out curiously, “Did you move Simba?”

He assured me that he hadn’t, and while we stood there wondering how he had moved, Simba decided at that moment to demonstrate his ability to move independently. Raising shakily on his weakened legs, he suddenly took several steps across the carpet, trembling but determined to walk!

“Daniel look!” I whispered in amazement. “Simba’s walking!”

He moved tentatively, with tremors overtaking him, but he did not stop moving once he had found a reasonable gait. It was slow, clumsy, but altogether miraculous as far as I could see. I rushed to call Dr. Valente about this sudden development.

“Dr. Valente,” I said excitedly when he came to the phone, having cited an emergency to get him there, “It’s Kim Riley! I called to tell you that Simba is walking!”

There was a momentary silence, as he sought to get his bearings and assimilate what I was telling him. “Simba?” he asked in apparent confusion. “Walking? Walking where? Kim, I showed you the Xrays,….he can’t be walking.”

“I know,” I said hurriedly, “I know what you said, but he’s walking right now! I’m watching him!”

“Bring him in,” he said gently but firmly. “I want to see him. And whatever you do, do not lay him on top of furniture! Even if he’s managing to move somehow, he cannot jump the way a cat normally would, and he will fall if you leave him unattended.”

The following day, when I came home from work, I was upset to find Simba perched on the uppermost back of the couch in our furnished hotel room. I looked at him with my mouth open, and immediately called in the troops. “Who put Simba up on the couch?” I said with frustration as I gently picked him up. “Dr. Valente said that he’ll fall and get hurt! You guys know he can’t jump!”

Everyone was of course adamant that they had done no such thing, and we regarded Simba in bewilderment as we considered the possibilities. “You didn’t put Simba up there?” I asked my son again as I set the cat on the floor. “Do you think he could have gotten up there himself?”

Minutes later, Simba confirmed that he preferred higher ground when he leapt to the top of the couch right before us, returning to the very place from which he had been unceremoniously removed just moments earlier.

Oh my God. As far as I was concerned, it was another miracle, and I couldn’t wait to bring him to see Dr. Valente to show him! When he saw him several days later, Simba had already been traveling throughout the hotel apartment, shaky but apparently none the worse for wear. He was still blind, so I had to direct him to the litter box as well as his food dishes, but he knew what to do once he found them. I presented the new and improved Simba to the good doctor, and he was genuinely surprised at these unexpected events.

“Kim, “ he said quietly, “this is wonderful, and far better than I had ever expected. But you have to keep in mind that he is still blind, and that will unfortunately not change. Animals though, like people, can adjust to a disability using their other senses, but to ensure a better outcome try not to move any of his things, and keep the furniture in the same place if you can.”

I assured him that I would do everything necessary to make life safe and comfortable for Simba, and took him home with a renewed sense of hope for all of our futures.

That weekend, I was standing quietly in front of the panoramic window of our hotel window which overlooked a wooded courtyard. It was a beautiful view, with pine trees and multicolored mums planted in the extravagant fall garden. Looking out on this calm environment gave me a sense of peace that otherwise didn’t exist within the context of my drama, and I would stand there for long moments just looking whenever I had time. Holding Simba, I watched with a smile as birds flew back and forth from the treetops, and all of my difficulties now seemed surmountable as I regarded the perfection before me.

Apparently Simba appreciated the perfection inherent in nature too, as I watched in absolute shock while he followed a bird with his gaze as it flew across the courtyard.

“Simba?“ I said almost inaudibly “you saw that?“ Holding him up in front of the window excitedly, I waited for another bird to fly past as I watched his reaction. To my ever increasing excitement, I watched him follow this one with his gaze as well!

“Simba can see!” I all but screamed to Daniel. “Come here and look at this! He’s watching the birds, he can see them!”

Calling Dr. Valente again, I imagined that he thought I was insane when I relayed my most recent discovery. When he asked me carefully to bring the cat in, perhaps now not quite so quick to dismiss the possibilities, I went the very next morning with a rapidly recovering Simba in tow.

He examined him by slowly moving objects before him, watching for Simba’s reaction. He tossed cotton balls on the floor to determine whether or not Simba could follow them without relying on his hearing to do so. He waved a feathered toy before him, and Simba followed it with playful determination. Up and down, back and forth, side to side. Finally, he put drops in his eyes and looked at them intently with a light.

Dr. Valente looked at me quietly for a long moment. Nervous, I said “ My son has been praying every day that Simba would be just like he was before the fire..." I looked down sheepishly as I wiped tears off of my face, waiting to hear what he had to say.

“Well Kim, “ he said softly. “You are absolutely right. He can see, although he really shouldn’t be able to." Pausing thoughtfully, his voice subtly breaking with emotion he added, "I guess there’s something to be said for the faith of a little boy, after all.”

When I looked back up at him, I could see that Dr. Valente was crying too.

We never gave up, and Simba was restored to us entirely. We still had innumerable obstacles ahead of us, but these small miracles greatly improved everyone’s hopefulness for increasingly positive outcomes.

The House with the Blue Door

With Simba now recovered, my family and I still had the aforementioned incredible amount of problems to overcome, the first and foremost being where we were going to live. The insurance company had ensured that collecting after our incredible loss would not be easy, and the prospect of rebuilding loomed distant on the horizon.

While we were initially interred in the hotel, we found it pleasant enough, and we were of course grateful that we even had the option. The daily access to maid service was curiously interesting, and we could freely visit the restaurant for the complimentary continental breakfast whenever we chose, but there was still no place like home.

With that thought in mind, I armed myself with my cell phone and the determination to improve our prospects for securing at least temporary housing. Setting out on what soon became a daily, ritualistic mission, I relentlessly searched for a rental house. Coming home from my work in downtown Chicago on the Metra train, I would get in my car and drive up and down the neighborhood streets searching for realtor signs indicating houses or apartments that may be for rent or sale. Calling the realtor with great hopefulness, I would inevitably be told that either the homeowner still lived on the premises, or that they were not interested in renting without the promise of a long term lease.

No one, it seemed, was interested in a displaced family living in their house on a short term basis while waiting for an old house to be rebuilt after a fire. A fire?! Their house burned down? Oh, well, no thanks. And then there was the inevitable sound of the dial tone, followed by another night of driving.

Until I found the house with the blue door.

It was, for all intents and purposes, a perfect solution to our problem. Located only one block away from our own house, it was both strategically placed as well as comfortable and clean. The owners had long since moved out, and were in the desperate and unenviable position of carrying two mortgages while waiting hopefully for this former house to sell. It has been six months, they told us with exasperation, and no one had expressed any interest in buying whatsoever. We, of course, were more than willing to help extricate them from their problem by having our insurance company pay them rent to cover their mortgage, while we in turn would have a beautiful house to live in for the duration of our exile.

Having accumulated a cell phone bill of 1,100 dollars while trying to find us home, and becoming increasingly upset with the insurance company’s ability to terrorize us by threatening to discontinue paying our hotel bill "today" if we didn‘t find a less expensive alternative, I was beyond relieved to have found this house. Elated, we were to meet with the homeowners, as well as a representative from our insurance company, to sign the rental agreement the following Monday. In just a few short days, we would be moving into an actual house again, and I was so excited!

On Saturday afternoon , while sitting in the hotel trying to address various other matters related to our plight, the phone rang. It was the owner of the house with the blue door.

“You’re not going to believe this,” she said with trepidation, knowing that I was going to be disappointed in the extreme. “We had someone, a couple, come look at the house, and they want to buy it. They have placed a firm bid on it already.”

I recall having sat motionless, staring and unseeing, my heart rate increasing as I was filled with anxiety. “Oh?” I whispered. “What does that mean?”

“We accepted the bid,” she answered carefully, “and I’m sorry but we can’t commit to a rental agreement at this time.”

Oh no. Okay. Yes. I understand. Congratulations. Yes. I’ll let everyone know. Yes. Thank you.

I hung up the phone, put my head down on the desk in the hotel room, and sobbed.

At the time I could not comprehend why God would have allowed that to happen. What were the odds of someone putting a bid on the home I had tried so desperately to find the very week that I was going to rent it? Did God want us out on the street? Hadn’t we been through enough? Slowly, sadly, I tried to look at the loss from a philosophical perspective. If the blue door was closing, another door would open. It wasn’t right for us, or we would have been able to move in. There must be someplace better, someplace we haven’t found yet.

I found it just two weeks later. A bigger house, brand new construction, with a full basement, a master bedroom and bath, a big yard. My son made friends on that block who are still in his life seven years later. I had personally never lived in something so new or nice in my life. I walked through the rooms with my fingers gently tracing the oak window frames and wondering at the shiny tile and couldn’t believe our good fortune.

We were given a one year lease with no hidden clauses, whereas the house with the blue door would have been rented on a month to month tenancy agreement. It would also have had to have been in a continual state of perfect readiness, available to be shown on a moments notice to potential buyers at any given time. In retrospect, this intrusiveness during a time of stress would have been a tremendous burden , and of course had someone opted to buy while we lived there, we would have been faced with the dilemma of moving yet again.

It appeared to me to be yet another instance of remarkable coincidence. As a continual reminder of the provisions made for us throughout this ordeal, I eventually had both the front and back doors of our newly rebuilt house painted the same color blue as the ones on the rental house we were denied.

So the blue door closed because it wasn’t the best door, but there were other doors that opened instead.

Rebuilding our Lives, One Day at a Time

We ultimately ended up living in the rental house for a full year while I all but singlehandedly negotiated with insurance companies, builders, and construction foremen on a daily basis. My fathers health had deteriorated in the chaos that ensued after the fire, and he was eventually hospitalized after suffering a heart attack, the stress overwhelming him to the extent that he was unable to assume responsibility for the rebuilding process. My son, meanwhile, was troubled with recurrent nightmares, frequent stomach aches, and had even begun sleepwalking, problems which I also attributed to the traumatic events of the previous year.

Still and all, when our home was finally rebuilt in 1999, we were enabled to move back in on New Years Eve, which was as good and symbolic a day as any to do so. Christmas was difficult to navigate, of course, as I spent the weeks prior to the move driving around looking for boxes and wondering who might help me move them. After all that we had been through, though, it occurred to me that just like every other problematical situation, a solution would find me soon enough. I just had to look for it, and wait with hopeful expectation, right?

The events of my life had confirmed that everything happens in its own time, and just as it was intended to be. The universe is essentially a beautiful place, and meaningful coincidences will follow you if you believe. I sometimes wonder if those of us who have an inherently faithful and optimistic attitude often suffer greater trials and are called to live through often intolerable grief because God knows that we can handle it. He has given us what we need to see us through, with the expectation that we use our experiences to help others.

As a strong and basically optimistic person myself, then, what is my personal responsibility when I suffer a setback? To gather information as a result of the disappointment, learn a painful lesson, and then transform the pain into a source of healing for others. To direct someone else to the light at the end of the tunnel. To tell you what happened, and therefore assure you that nothing is hopeless, that God doesn’t give us more than we can take, and that in the end, everything always turns out just as intended in our lives.

I think that this is the reason. I know that this is true. Just look at the evidence. There is more than irony to be found within the mystery of meaningful coincidence, as there are miracles to be found there too.

You just have to expect them, that’s all.

Aristotle on Demand! (It's Better than Comcast...)

2009-10-18T10:30:00.000-05:00

An analysis of Nicomachean Ethics occurs here, so get ready to philosophize.

I'm talking about happiness, love, friendship, marriage, it's all here!

You can change the channel if you want to, but I love this stuff :-)

What does Aristotle say about happiness?

First and foremost, Aristotle said that, ideally, everyone's goal is happiness. What that means may vary from person to person, but it's important to note that what we may assume may create happiness (such as acquiring money) is not a true source of happiness at all. Money, in this example, is a means of acquiring what we need in a physiological sense (shelter, warmth, basic provisions) that will ultimately enhance our quality of life, but these things are not the source of happiness itself. For the purpose of argument, money can be considered a means to attain those things or qualities which will contribute to our sense of comfort and happiness, but it is not the endpoint at which we would hope to find ourselves truly happy as a direct result of having money.

Now, striving for honor or recognition, for example, as a means of attaining happiness is somewhat more noble (in my opinion) than longing for money, but because being considered honorable is contingent upon other peoples opinions of us, it is capricious and potentially fleeting at best, too. Gallup polls, top ten lists, awards shows, and People magazine give evidence of this every day. If being honored by others (by the public or in the media specifically, but more importantly by your friends or family) is dependent on what others think of you, you will only be as happy as your latest review.

For me, happiness encompasses the experience of love. The most comprehensive, perfect definition of love I have ever read is found in the book of Corinthians, V. 1, chapter 13, and reads as such:

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails.

And if you find love, genuine happiness, in spite of any circumstances you may find yourself in, will never fail you either.

What are the three kinds of friendship?

The three kinds of friendship are described by Aristotle as those motivated by either utility, pleasure, or "friends without qualification," who are defined as those who are virtuous and good towards each other without expectation.

If someone is friends with a person primarily for gain, and they are essentially using the other person, the friendship is easily dissolved as soon as the other party is no longer considered useful. If someone is friends with another primarily for fun and pleasure (which Aristotle says happens most often in youth) the friendship again is more easily dissolved because no one or nothing can be expected to be a never ending source of pleasure or entertainment indefinitely. And when hard times come, these "friends" are suddenly nowhere to be found.

In the final example of friendship, experienced between what Aristotle describes as "good and virtuous people," there is a sense of utility that is an extension of caring and generosity, pleasure is experienced as a result of happiness in spending time together, and because the motive is simply to be a good and loyal friend, the relationship tends to be more permanent because it is not contingent upon what you can "get" from the other person, or what they can "do" for you.

So good friends, in a climate of moral excellence between those who trust and help each other as well as being able to relax and laugh together, are good for their own sake.

And thousands of years after Aristotle pointed this out, it's still difficult to count most acquaintances as really good friends.

How do these concepts relate to ideas concerning love and marriage?

Marriage can be a friendship of utility, as long as utility is not the prime motive. The word utility, to me, has a negative connotation, and although there's an expectation within marriage of providing mutually beneficial utilitarian services (housekeeping, work, shared financial support, raising children), to marry specifically for what another can do for you is, I think, ethically wrong (although it happens all of the time.)

Marriage is more appropriately a friendship of pleasure, and those who feel that they have married their "best friend" have a much better prognosis for long term success in their relationship. You can coexist without the (assumed) monetary focus of the utilitarian marriage, but you cannot coexist in an unhappy relationship with someone whom you don't love or enjoy being with.

Ideally, marriage should be between those who share a friendship of virtue, with mutual respect and happiness a counterpart of two people who genuinely care about and respect one another
in addition to the aforementioned qualities of utility and pleasure. They're all interrelated, and each kind of friendship provides a component of a healthy and successful relationship.

A marriage of virtue is less common, I think, because people do tend to focus on others as a means of financial support or convenience, as in a marriage of utility, or as unrealistic sources of perpetual ease and eternal love, as in the marriage of pleasure. A virtuous marriage, on the other hand, recognizes the value of the other for who they are rather than what they can provide or perform, and as such has little expectation but to love and appreciate the other person no matter what their finances or how they look when they get up in the morning. It is love for the sake of the other instead of love for the benefit of the self, and that's what makes it virtuous.

And I'm rambling now, so on to the next topic :-)

Can selfish people ever really be happy? Are people who love themselves more happy and generous than those who don't love themselves?

I think that selfish people, with their inevitable focus on wealth, status, and self promotion, are by nature competitive and jealous and therefore cannot genuinely love themselves or others in a true sense. Their lack of concern for other people, as evidenced by striving to satisfy their own needs and desires above all else (and often in direct disregard to the needs of others) supports these observations. I have never met a selfish person who was really happy or who loved (or even liked) themselves. They're always busy looking for some additional conquest to justify their very existence.

A truly happy person, though, who does love themselves, is able to be generous towards others by merit of the wealth of love and kindness in their hearts. Being self content and having a strong sense of their own personal value, they are able to see the good (if not outright divinity) in others, which easily translates into wanting to help people and give back some of richness of spirit that they have within. Rather than striving to compete with others or forcibly take what they hope will somehow make them happy, the generous, kind, virtuous person already has what they need in their hearts, they are instead able to give without expectation, understanding that all the good things that come back to them in return are a gift, too.

And that's what happiness is. A gift.

My High Speed Police Chase

2009-10-12T15:53:00.001-05:00

Who needs to watch an episode of Cops when I'm around?

My son was going to be late for school again, as usual. Mornings at my house are generally a cause celebre for a nuclear war, complete with rampant shrieking, spilled coffee, trod upon cat tails, and redundant recriminations that We Should Have Gone to Sleep Earlier Last Night Now Shouldn't We....and sometimes I even say that right back at Dan, too.

Because I am often compelled to leave abruptly and without thought to appropriate street attire, I often take it upon myself to drive my son to school wearing nothing more than a short nightgown, leather jacket, and gym shoes, causing me to look like I just crawled out the back door of a tavern, shielding my eyes from the light of day. Wearing this attire is, of course, a well known time saving secret, practiced by Everymom, Everywhere (just get the kid out the door and the hell with the bra), the operative word being secret. No one is supposed to know you're only partially clothed, including the extended staff of the Chicago Police Department.

Racing down the street in a futile attempt to deliver my son to school a mere 10 minutes late as opposed to the usual 15, I drove across lawns, cut through parking lots, and flew past stop signs that might as well have read Go Faster You Psycho Wearing Undergarments In Public.

As luck would have it, with tires squealing as I transversed a residential neighborhood cruising at a mere 435 mph, I was happened upon by a squad car one morning. This is, of course, an uninvited happening, for all intents and purposes.

Daniel (nonchalantly because this is a common occurrence): Mom, you just ran a stop sign, and I think a cop is following you.

Me (surprised and bewildered, as I am in fact Just Driving): What stop sign?! Who's following me?!

Daniel (pointing to the rearview mirror in which squad cars can be viewed when following from behind): They're right there. I think they want you to pull over.

Me ( determined not to get a ticket or be seen in my La Cage Aux Folles attire): Pull over?! Oh hell no!

Taking complete leave of my senses, breaking every law known to man or cop, I determined that I was going to extricate myself from this dilemma by instigating a High Speed Police Chase.

My 15 year old grasping frantically at his seat belt, I gunned the engine and jet propelled myself towards my future as an inmate at San Quentin.

Now, lest you feel compelled to report me to Child Protective Services, let me explain that even as this was happening, I was well aware that what I was doing was wrong, insane, and ill begotten. I had watched Cops and FOX News often enough to know that those who instigate OJ like getaways are usually caught, and when this occurs, they are sent off to The Big House with nary an opportunity to try and reason with the powers that be. That's because high speed chases aggravate the powers that be. They would rather be eating donuts.

I found it ironic, as I toppled fire hydrants and sped across sidewalks, that I was behaving in such a manner. Hadn't I always been inclined to talk back to the TV when a hapless criminal took the low road at the speed of light in trying to avoid arrest? Hadn't I always snickered and said "whaddaya nuts?!" while shaking my head and thinking smugly "I would never do that."

Yeah right, Kim. You have the right to remain silent...and you really should try that every once in a while.

All of this pondering was well and good, of course, as I broke the sound barrier, but when a high speed police chase has been implemented, it's difficult to back down. You have taken your stand, and the chase must continue until that time when you will be called to the stand, in a last ditch effort to tell it to the judge.

In the midst of all the excitement, turning onto a one way street after a clever police evasion tactic that had me careening down the alley in an effort to head him off at the pass, I was instead met head on by the lights and sirens of the wily Officer Friendly, who was obviously on to this sort of evasion tactic.

Daniel(matter of fact):Mom, I think you're going to get arrested now.

Me (sighing): Not in this nightgown I'm not.

The police officer did not look happy as he approached my vehicle in cautious anger. Brandishing a flashlight with which he was prepared to hit me like Rodney King with just one false move, I opted for the light and cheerful approach in navigating my early morning unsolicited policeman encounter.

Me (smiling brightly): Good morning officer! What seems to be the problem?

Officer Friendly (flashlight over head and baring his teeth): The problem?! How about running a stop sign and then fleeing and evading a police officer?!

Me (confused and looking ever heavenward): What stop sign?

Officer Friendly (shaking violently and weighing his options of saying he hit me in self defense): License and insurance PLEASE!

Me thinks the officer is perhaps a bit piqued. Uh oh. Giving him my ID, I make it a point of shrugging my shoulders, palms upturned, as I look to Daniel in mock amazement. In full support of his jailbird mom, Dan responds with carefully execute teenage eyerolling, adding authoratively and within earshot of the irate Officer Friendly "I told you to pull over mom, but you wouldn't listen!"

I know I would get 10 to 20 if I reacted, so I just let that one slide.

Pondering my predicament, and the magnitude of my faulty decision making skills, I watched the officer write what I was sure would be 23 tickets as well as a warrant for my arrest.

Daniel (passively interested because at least he wasn't in school): Do you think they'll send a SWAT team to come get you?

Me (looking at my wardrobe): I hope not. I'll get arrested all over again when they see this get up.

20 minutes later, he returned to my car, apparently after having checked for outstanding warrants or confirmation of my status as one of FBI's 10 Most Wanted to try and make sense of my decision to make like Bonnie and Clyde over a stop sign violation. I was given two tickets, advised strongly to Never Do That Again Mam , an sent on my way.

Thank God for small favors! There would be no jail cell, no arraignment, no need to reveal my secret early morning mom attire.

I got lucky this time. Next time we're late, I'm definitely going to wear the more socially acceptable footy pajamas and take to the expressway when plotting my escape.

Cooked Socks

2009-09-14T19:36:00.000-05:00

As a cook, I am right up there with Englishmen and my mother...who happens to be an Englishman.

I do not cook. I have not been in my kitchen since 1993, and do not know what a Cuisinart does (although I suspect it cuises.)I received a crock pot for Christmas many years ago, which I liked because it had pretty flowers on it. It has been permanently ensconced in the nether regions of my dusty, spooky kitchen cabinets ever since, the remnants of wrapping paper still attached. I did find, however, that it makes a good storage bin for other, smaller kitchen appliances.

I blame this cooking retardation on my mother, who spent virtually all of my childhood years saying with exasperation "it's easier if I just do it myself!" while forcing my sister and I out of the mysterious kitchen. In retrospect, I think she must have been in some kind of witness protection program, and didn't want us to report to our father that dinner was on fire again, and that she was in the process of trying to put it out with a broom and a can of hairspray.

My father, a long suffering Irishman, cooked many of the family meals out of sheer desperation. Unfortunately, his idea of fine dining involved mostly the creation of Black Cows, ice cream sundae's, and the occasional corned beef and cabbage. Although there was not a lot of good food, there was plenty of okay food. When my sister and I began to look like Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum, things had gone too far.

My mom, at my dad's insistence, began to strive valiantly to cook real food for us. Out with the cake and in with the carrots, damn it! We had lumpy mashed potatoes, meat encased in string, and bowls of Vegetable Surprise. It was usually only somewhat palatable, but my sister and I were brave little soldiers and only cried a little as we were forced to eat it. While pushing peas around listlessly on our plates, we secretly plotted our after dinner trip to the candy store, where we could partake of our preferred menu of Pixie Stix, Zagnut bars, and orange pop.

In these younger days, my mother even attempted to cook other, more exotic fare than mere food. Ever the innovator, for instance, on the afternoon of my 8th birthday, she decided that to dry my knee high nylon dress socks quickly, she would simply put them in our oven at 450 degrees and bread lightly.

By the time my friends arrived for the gala after school event we had painstakingly planned, my fancy dress socks were hanging pitifully from the oven rack, smoking and charred, like so many demented snakes. The peculiar aroma of these cooked socks hung in the air throughout the party, although my mom tried heroically to cover the scent with lit candles as she dashed around in her mini skirt and leopard print top.

"What's that smell?" I was asked by Barbie toting party goers who were all wearing socks that were not well done. "Oh, it's nothing," I said nonchalantly as I marched them into the kitchen to look in the oven. "My mom just cooked my socks."

In a strange twist of fate, I followed in my mom's culinary challenged footsteps when I too cooked a pair of my own socks in the microwave while my then 1 year old son looked on in amazement. Unbeknownst to me, socks will ignite in a microwave, and I hastily grasped them with tongs as I threw them, ablaze, out of our first floor apartment window. As luck would have it, the fiery socks landed on the highly flammable paper grocery bags my ex-husband was carrying through the gangway at that very moment. Although his shouts of shock and surprise could be heard as far as Guam, his burns healed quickly, although those socks were not long for this world. I quickly lost my cooking privleges in that marriage, where my ex cooked meatloaf's in the shape of the Liberty Bell and cookies from scratch, all while I sat sniffing and waiting in the living room. It was just safer that way.

What can I say? It runs in the family, and I am therefore no threat to Martha Stewart.

We were breakfast victims of my mother too. It wasn't just Sunday dinner or flammable legwear that was suspect. She would make pancakes that completely filled the diameter of a 12 inch skillet, and was unduly pleased with her creation until it was pointed out that the center was the consistency of clam chowder, while the edges were mostly burned. When I laughingly went out on the front porch one day to confirm the address and ensure that I was in fact in the right house after she cooked something actually edible, my mothers lack of appreciation for our ungrateful teasing led her to increasingly place us on enforced hunger strikes for vengenance. Or perhaps it was mercy.

Suddenly, the soupy pancakes were withdrawn, and her familiar refrain of "hey, your legs aren't broken" in response to any request for service from that point forward escalated, in an evil scheme to make us self sufficient and capable of finding the refrigerator without a map and compass.

The culmination of my mothers final exodus from food preparation occurred one morning in the mid 1980's. I still recall this day as if it were yesterday, the way one might recall the sinking of the Titanic, or the aftermath of the Hindenburg explosion. The music playing softly on the radio, the sun dancing through open windows, and the balmy summer breeze gave no warning of what was to come.

My dad, a self styled connoisseur of good eatin', was served his cursory breakfast of burned toast, runny eggs, and warm orange juice. Never one to take food errors in stride, he decided to speak out, and just say no to mom's cooking. Picture a mushroom cloud.

Dad: What the hell is this?!
Mom: It's breakfast, what the hell do you think it is?!
Dad: Not edible!
Mom: Not funny!

In the twinkle of an eye, the fight was on, and would rival any activities you may have witnessed on the Jerry Springer show. My sister and I quickly donned our crash helmets, as plates whizzed by like frisbee's at a Doberman convention, orange juice flowed freely like the River Nile, and the last I saw of our toaster, it was poised for retirement on the roof of the garage.

There's one thing I'll say for my parents. They sure know how to have a donnybrook.

When my dad finally removed the eggs from the top of his head, where my mom had lovingly placed them, and our dog Tiger gave a commemorative speech of gratitude for all of the leftovers he was enabled to glean from the floors, walls, and ceiling, it was quiet once again in paradise. My father was forced to endlessly review his fateful actions that day as he sat lonely and bereft in local Denny's restaurants for many years, my mother steadfastly refusing to cook ever again.

Unless, of course, we're talking about the scandalous bra and underwear fiasco of 1994......

The Colloquialism Collection

2009-08-30T19:25:00.002-05:00

I have a fascination with words, speech patterns, dialects, mimicry, and music. I am very much attuned to sound, accents, tonality, and expression. I really listen when people talk, and it's a habit of mine both to relay their speech back to them in the form of imitation as well as to note repetitive means of communication that they are often not aware of themselves until I point it out to them...whether they like it or not! This propensity for mockery landed me in the principal's office on more than one occassion as a kid, of course. Riley!!! I know, I know, I'm going....

A persons voice, vocabulary, enunciations, articulations, and vocal variety are their most attractive quality, or conversely, that which detracts from them the most, in my opinion. I have befriended people based on speech patterns alone( I love to collect friends with foreign accents) and thought with exasperation that I could never even consider involvement with others based on the fact that their voice was unattractive or annoyed me in some way. You sound very Mickey Moustonian. Be gone with you!

I really am a poindexter on this topic! I have 100's of sound wav's that I collect, and if I ever find any knowledgeable IT support, eventually I'll add them to this site. If I can figure out how....

Although I can't relay vocal patterns in a written forum, the following people have proven to use very distinct colloquialisms that are easily identifiable. Except to themselves, of course. I don't say that! I don't do that! Nah. Of course you don't.

The Dad Collection

You talk like a goddamn idiot!
What the hell is wrong with you?!
Whaddaya goofy?!
Whaddaya nuts?!
Whaddaya dense?!
Want some pop?
Want some cookies?
Want some bread dipped in Crisco and deep fried in butter?!
Jesus Christ, ain't ya even gonna try and lose weight?!

The Mom Collection

Blast it!
Damn it!
Oh shoot!
Oh my word!
Can you reach those canned goods for me?!
Turn on a ceiling fan?!
Put a phone book on the car seat so I can see to drive?!
Buy me some high heels?!
Tell me why I ever had you damn kids anyway?!

My Sister's Collection

Don't you dare!
Don't be ridiculous!
Don't be such a drama queen!
Don't even think about it!
Don't you ever know when to quit?!
Oh brother!
Oh gimme a break!
Oh God!

The Daniel Collection

The school called.
The police called.
The fire department called.
I need bail.
I need a ride.
I need a haircut.
New T-shirts.
A leather jacket.
Money to spend on girls.
Money to spend on junk food.
Money to squander aimlessly on anything.
I needs lots of money.
No I do not need a job.
Mom, you are so annoying.

The Ex-Husband Collection

What's up?
Question for ya.
Can't do it.
Oh well.
The check is in the mail.
I sent it.
I really did.
I'll ask my boss what happened to it.
I know you're planning on having me killed for insurance money.
For sport.
For laughs.
For entertainment purposes only.
Yeah, Kim?
So are we in agreeance, or what?

The Kathy Collection

Hmmm.
I see.
Well.
That's interesting.
How long have you felt this way?
Have you tried counseling?
Medication?
Considered interment in an asylum?
You're crazy!
You're my friend.

The Maria Collection

Oh what the fuck.
Oh yeah right!
You and your damn messages!
See?! I told you!
You better do something!
I'm telling you!
You better think positive!
Pray!
Pray some more!
Better call a priest.

Meeting Dave Barry

2009-08-11T12:35:00.000-05:00

Who would think that a famous Pulitzer Prize winning author would be just as warm and friendly in person as he appears to be in print?

Dave Barry is the quintessential Family Guy (sans Stewie), and it shows. I drove out several weeks ago to meet him at a book signing at Anderson's Bookstore in Naperville, risking life and limb on an expressway comparable to that of a luge ride in Switzerland or Germany's high speed Autobahn chase, but it turned out to be worth the harrowing trip to see him.

Dave Barry, quite simply, is funny. Not only in writing, where he has time to consider his responses and has spent entire days trying to decide whether to use the word "squirrel" or "weasel" in one of his articles (by his own humorous admission), but he's witty and fast on his feet in person, too. With no script provided, he was still able to send the considerable crowd gathered into uproarious laughter with his rapid fire comebacks, which was impressive. And let that be a lesson to us all.

When I first got to Anderson's, I was overwhelmed by the surge of the crowd and could only follow the sound of his voice and the resounding laughter of the audience to try and find him. It was standing room only, the coveted front row seat folding chairs being occupied by those who obviously know how to plan ahead and stick to a schedule already having been taken. Standing in a jam packed aisle compressed between a 7 Ft tall man and three rotund women carrying multiple shopping bags, it was all I could do to remain conscious and avoid needing sudden CPR interventions by hopping up and down in an effort to see the top of his head each time I came up for air. This was effectual until the 7 Ft tall man began to forcibly hold me down by leaning on the top if my head while the rotund woman exchanged knowing winks, and from that point I was forced to experience his commentary as a straight audio presentation. Humor by proxy in stereo.

When Dave finished talking about his book, Dave Barry's Money Secrets, the serious business of actually getting the books signed began, the line being 200 people long at least as half as deep. Grasping the book signing ticket that indicated I was number 147, I opted to take a seat in one of the coveted metal folding chairs positioned three feet away from where he was meeting and greeting everyone rather than go to the back of the line. With a number that distant, I thought about worse case scenario's involving waiting at deli counters where there where no chairs conveniently provided. So I decided to sit and stare at Dave Barry while I waited my turn instead, which was far more entertaining than staring at potato salad or roast beef, I might add.

Stalker fan in aisle two! Security! Security!

Finding myself thisclose, I watched him with admiration. He was wearing casual Everyguy clothes, comprised of a basic pullover sweater and slip on loafers. Looking at his shoes with a curiously bemused smile, it was obvious that internationally known authors don't come any more casual or sincere than Dave Barry, and they may even shop at Payless.

His genuine interest in his fans was readily evident in the way he responded to people, too. He met each and every person in that line with a warm open smile, a hearty handshake, and a personable greeting. At no point did Dave Barry pull a gun on anyone or try to talk their wallet, either, so he is obviously really is a very nice guy.

Watching him intently, lost in hopeful thoughts of speaking to him personally and presenting him with copies of my stories when the line diminished, I put on increasing layers of lip gloss while intermittently eating an entire tin of Altoids Curiously Strong Mints. Although it didn't occur to me at the time, I wonder if Dave mistakenly thought that I was planning to lunge across the table towards him at a strategic moment, wrestling him to the ground and breathing on him in a friendly manner. C'mere, Dave, and give us a big kiss! I've just eaten 43 Curiously Strong Mints and my lips are now a blindingly glossy pink, and I'm ready for you!

Security?!

I took pictures of him while I waited with my camera phone , and lamented the fact that I had forgotten my digital camera. I nervously arranged the articles I had chosen to bring to him in the hopes of Somehow Getting Published, which I had carefully chosen and painstakingly spell checked before I left the house that night before getting on the luge to Naperville. Having placed them in a large manila envelope on which I had written "Dave Barry: Somewhere in Miami" in the address field, I was beside myself with excitement. Only 40 more people to go in line, and 7 more Altoids, and it will finally be my turn! I was actually going to meet Dave Barry!

I had read many of his books over the years, and deeply admired the sheer magnitude of his efforts. Few writers were so consistently productive and effortlessly funny than Dave Barry! And, I thought nervously, if I could just get him to read just one thing I had written, just one story....well, maybe.

As the line dwindled, I allowed number 147 to come and go as I continued to wait. I wanted to be the very last person in line, so I would have an opportunity to actually talk to him for a minute without worrying that people behind me were being inconvenienced by my incessant blathering and large manila folder. Anderson Bookstore employees were most likely eyeing me with suspicion by this time, though, as I clutched my envelope in one hand and Dave Barry's book in the other while sitting tenatively on the edge of the metal folding chair. Was she poised to pounce? Was there Anthrax involved? We close at 9:00pm, so put the camera phone away and get in line, already!

At 8:50pm, it was finally my turn. The store, now empty of those who had gone before me in line, was now a wide open space littered with book sale receipts and the occasional abandoned coffee cup, and there I was. Face to face with Dave Barry.

To my complete horror, while bookstore employees looked on with a confused blend of disapproval and dismay, I launched into a rapid fire speech that was entirely unlike what I had planned to say earlier. Frenetic and veritably incomprehensible, I was likened unto Peter Billingsley in A Christmas Story, sitting on Santa's lap and asking vacuously in my fearful awe for a football when what I really wanted was a Red Rider BB Gun.

Kim (breathless and exuding the scent of Altoids Curiously Strong Mints): Hi Dave! I've read so many of your books and I really like them!

Dave (bewildered and extending his hand as an afterthought): Thank you-

Kim (shaking his hand and dropping my coveted manila envelope full of dreams): I brought some articles I wrote, and I would appreciate it so much of you would read them!

Dave (confused and frightened as security advances slowly towards me): Well, I...I'm not able to publish anyone-

Kim (making a sweeping gesture that knocks over Dave Barry's coffee and clips an Anderson's Bookstore employee in the nose): That's okay! I would just really love if you would read the stories and give me your opinion! I know you're really busy, but I had to borrow money to replace the ink in my printer so I could print these stories, and it's very important to me!

Dave (speechless): ?!

Kim (pushing the envelope across the table towards a wary and apprehensive Dave): If you ignore me, I'll just know you didn't like my stories, but could you try and read them? You can call me, Dave! Look, I gave you two phone numbers and an email address! I'll wait to hear from you!

Dave (swallowing deeply and regarding me with a wide eyed stare): Thank you, yes, I can take a look. Did you, uh, did you want me to sign your book?

Kim (fumbling for my camera phone to ensure a flash blinds him as he prepares to sign): Oh yes! Please say "To Kim, A Great Writer."

And that's what Dave Barry wrote in my book, which will serve as both a keepsake as well as an enforced review, even before he had an opportunity to read my stories. He was kind to me even though I acted like an idiot, and politely refrained from putting his casual shoe against my forehead and pushing me away with a resounding "ho ho ho" although I had come to him as a literary Santa with as much awe and wonder as Peter Billingsley ever did when longing for a Red Rider BB Gun.

The gift that I had asked for was to be acknowledged by someone like Dave Barry, who's talent, wit, and friendliness made him approachable to an aspiring someone like me.

Thank you, Dave, for your time. I'll continue to wait with hopeful expectation to open my presents someday.

Confessions of a Bookstore Groupie

2009-07-29T21:13:00.001-05:00

Alright, I confess. I'm a Bookstore Groupie.

As a groupie, I'm devoted to the concept of enhancing my knowledge base and intermingling with others of like mind by loitering in bookstores. This is also a clever means of reading as many books as possible while still inside the store without having to actually pay for them. In that sense, I'm a bookstore thief as well.

A mind is a terrible thing to waste, and so is 19.50 if you're able to read fast and just get the hell out of there without having bought more than a latte and some Lindor Truffles<, a confectionery bargain at 3 for a 1.00. It's what all the starving artists are eating I hear, although I appear to be anything but starving.

Now, it's not that I'm cheap, mind you, it's that I'm destitute. And being destitute, all I can embrace in my starkly defined, bare essentials little world are borrowed ideas and embezzled thoughts, and dreams that cost less than 9.50.

Seeing as most books cost at least 10.95, I bring a stack of books to the cafe area, throw down my backpack, and plan to stay awhile.

Being a recently identified groupie, I'm also intent on meeting as many authors as possible during book signings even though I can't afford to buy the actual books. Attending authors lectures and presentations free of charge, I've discovered that I can listen to all of the key points covered in their book, take notes, and nurse a 1.65 large coffee for three hours while I wait to talk to them personally although I have no book to sign!

This seems strange to me only in retrospect, when certain friends of mine pointed out that it was strange, and not to mention mildly outrageous. Who goes to a book signing and takes notes?! Um, poor, wierd college students, I think. I know I do.

Utilizing this strategy in the past several weeks, I have met Linda Bushnell and Carolyn Myss, and in the coming weeks I'm planning on catching up with Po Bronson, and Dave Barry. Yes, Dave Barry. I just love that guy, even though I won't be able to actually leave the premises with his book. I think I'll ask him to sign my notes, instead.

When attending promotional lectures by authors whose books you can't afford to buy, it's always good form to plan ahead by bringing paper and pens for taking notes. At Linda Bushnell's recent book signing, for example, I was fortunate enough to get a seat at the cafe table directly adjacent to the small platform stage that she was speaking on (and this was after only a small amount of pushing and shoving.) Looking up at her with admiration, I pulled out a stack of hot pink fluorescent construction paper and began furiously recording every word she said. I only noticed her regarding me strangely every few minutes, with increasingly alarm evident on her face with each subsequent glance. What is she doing? Was I a crazed reporter? A naysayer? A wandering plagiarist? A homeless person with a lot of hot pink paper to spare? (Well, maybe.)

No.

I was just an interested member of the literate public, copying down your thoughts at a discounted rate because I couldn't afford to buy them for cash! Isn't that what free speech is all about, anyway? Speak up, and could you repeat that please?! I think I missed chapter three.

If this continues, and baring a sudden windfall or the death of wealthy relatives that aren't even related to me, I'll soon have an entire collection of brightly colored construction paper notes to add to my library! And there, in my destitute readers solitude, I can pour over the hastily scribbled thoughts of various authors and wonder what else they might have said if only I could have bought the book.

Someday Kim, someday. But for now, I remain, a poor bookstore groupie.

Gums Afire!

2009-06-25T12:26:00.005-05:00

In my neverending quest for physical perfection, which will never occur this side of reality, I have decided to pursue a whiter, brighter, Pepsodent smile.

I want teeth that look like Chiclets. I want to smile in a dark room and have unsuspecting bystanders think that they are in the presence of Nosferatu. I want to be the Chesire Cat that ate the canary and brushed carefully afterwards.

In seeking this look, I was put in contact with my friend Maria's dentist, in a secretive exchange of phone numbers that one might witness in a dark alley on the West side.

"Listen, here's the number, okay?" she whispered to me as she passed me the business card. "They can fix you up. Just tell 'em I sent you."

Maria's Italian, so a lot of her conversations sound like that, though. It's the Italian Way.

I picked up my trays, an exact replica of my own human teeth, yesterday. I must have appeared as much a geek as a 12 year old fan of the Bill Nuy the Science Guy show when I saw them. Hey! It looks just like my teeth! I queried the patient hygenist, a perky young Jennifer type, about whether or not the way my Plastic Replica Teeth were made was the same way they would make them if, say, I was wanted by the FBI.

She regarded me strangely for a moment, and said "um, no?" She did, however, politely refrain from asking if I was in fact wanted by the FBI. Jennifer is a nice dental hygenist.

At home with my new toy, I tried on my plastic teeth for the first time this morning. This reminded me of the plastic vampire teeth I was so fond of wearing when terrorizing my younger sister as a kid (see Nosferatu above) only better. Because with these plastic teeth, I would go from teeth that were designated as "B" on the tooth color chart, to "A's." Kinda like what I am trying to do at school all the time.

Placing the (what was later to be revealed as) Caustic Gum Removal Formula in the trays, I popped my plastic teeth in with a flourish. Ah. I was gonna be stylin' , and in only 2 short weeks at 60 minutes per day!

This initial session lasted 2.5 seconds.

With flames emitting from my screaming mouth, I ran to pull the medieval torture device from my teeth. My gums, upon inspection, were a stark raving white, which made an unattractive contrast to my teeth, which were nowhere near as white in comparison. Gums afire, I rushed to wash the hydrochloric acid out of my mouth and call the dentists office.

Me: Thennifer! My mott hurts, and my gumths are on fire!

Jennifer: Who is this?

Me: Thennifer, ith Thim Liley!

Jennifer(sounding annoyingly perky and unalarmed at my dilemma): Oh, it sounds like you may have just used a little bit too much solution. You'll be fine.

Me(about to succumb to a Grand Mal Seizure from the shock of it all): My gumth are thwite!

Jennifer (thinking, oh, that pesky Thim Liley): Just measure out the Caustic Gum Removal Solution in the size of a pin for each tooth, instead of a pea. Relax! Everyone's experience is different!

Me(waiting for the paramedics to arrive): Thith was thomething I needed to know thesterday, Thennifer!

Jennifer(sighing): Well, if you want, you can come in, and we can look at your gums for you.

Me: Will that helpth me?!

Jennifer: No. But it would be fun to see your stark white gums, to break up the monotony here in our office. We like to watch car accidents out on Cumberland from the front window, too.

Later, after recovering from the shock of my tooth bleaching fiasco, now eyeing the trays fearfully as I developed yet another new phobia to entertain my already overwhelmed neurological circuitry, I placed an Offical Gum Disaster Alert phone call to Maria, who has yet to use her trays in what was supposed to have a been a tooth bleaching contest between us.

Her response? The usual. Oh yeah, right!

No, theally!

Etiquette of a Gentleman

2009-06-20T23:53:00.000-05:00

Does anyone know this man? Where is this guy?!

These are the essentials, everyone. Etiquette 101. I don't know why I am so preoccupied with social behaviors such as these, but I think the expectation that men treat women in such a manner, and the occasional observation that they sometimes do, may be enough to give me pause for apologetic thought. Hey, maybe most men are not as low on the food chain as I previously thought! Maybe some of them are gentlemen!

I know that walking around in a suit of armor is difficult to navigate while trying to make your way to the dinner table or otherwise overcoming obstacles or conquering the world, but c'mon guys, at least make the effort.

The Basics of Chivalry

Chivalry may be on life support, but it is not dead yet. Let's give good manners some CPR and then call me in the morning.

Always open Doors

This is perhaps the most basic rule of etiquette out there. It is also one of the easiest to follow so you have no reason to forget it. Whether she is about to enter your car, restaurant, club, or anyplace with a door, you should always hold it open. If there are many doors, then hold them open one after the other.

Like Don Adams in Get Smart.

Note: This is not the same as being a Back Door Man, and it is most likely not as fun, but if you want to get your foot in the front door at least, mind your manners! And try not to allow any of the doors you may be swinging open wildly to make contact with her face at any time.

Put on Her Coat

Always help a lady put on her coat or overgarment. This is a simple but powerful action.

Note: And never put on her undergarments when she's not looking. Women frown on such mischievousness. Well, we might laugh initially, but we will frown if you won't ultimately give our undergarments back.

Help with Her Seat

If an unaccompanied lady is sitting next to you, it is important that you help her be seated by pulling her chair out for her and gently pushing it back into place, with the lady seated of course.

Note: And for the love of God, resist the urge to abruptly pull the seat back and away just as she is lowering her derriere towards its intended target. Although watching a lady fall to the floor as a result of such malarkey may make for rambunctious laughter, she may later try and stab you with a salad fork (it's more polite to use than a steak knife.) Also, if you allow a women to actually sit without the aforementioned happening, please resist the urge to make loud sound effects that indicate that pushing her chair in towards the table with her on it is a tremendous effort. Do not mention the words "water buffalo" at any time, or feign a heart attack for dramatic effort. Funny is one thing, endangering your life is another. Remember, there may be a steak knife around, and the lady might know how to use it.

Give up Your Seat

If a lady arrives at the table and there are no available seats, you should stand up and offer yours to her.

Note: If you're not feeling quite that generous, as an alternative you can always offer to let her sit on your lap while you sing ribald songs and try to fondle her in yonder places, but this is not considered as polite a gesture.

Stand at Attention

Always stand when a lady enters or exits the room. This rule has been somewhat relaxed, so you can stand upon entrance but remain seated upon exit. Nonetheless, if you can do both, you should.

Note: A salute, a spirited high five, a french kiss with a flourish, and being accompanied by a marching band or wandering minstrels heralding her praises are also nice gestures.

Give her Your Arm

When escorting a lady to and from social events, you should offer her your arm. This is a little more intimate, but serves well when walking on uneven ground, especially if she's wearing high heels.

Note: If you are convinced that said lady is merely an accident waiting to happen as she totters along unsteadily, and you are unduly concerned that she will fall and take you down with her, allow her instead to hang onto the belt loops of your pants instead of your arm. This way, when you enter the social event in question, she will be supported while you will be enabled to extend your arms, waving and rotating them by turns while you yell "whoa!" and try to remain upright. This is always a polite and self sacrificing manner in which to properly escort someone, and your date will greatly appreciate it.

Ask if She Needs Anything

This is one that most guys already do, but helps complete the gentleman in all of us nevertheless. When at social events, make sure to ask the lady if you can get her something to drink or eat, depending on the event. Show her that you care about her comfort and needs.

Note: If she intent on eating small, bird like portions to impress you that she is in fact, a petite flower, and declines all mention of edible sustenance, just hand her your wallet and call it a night.

Retrieve dropped Items

When someone drops something, pick it up and hand it back, whether it's a glove, a file folder or a twenty-dollar bill. Make sure you bend at the knees, not from the waist.

Note: And if it is a twenty dollar bill that the lady drops, it is poor etiquette to laugh and say "see ya bi-atch!" as you run off into the night with your spoils.

Walk beside a Lady On The Stairs

Never walk behind a woman on the stairway, especially if she's wearing a miniskirt. Walk beside her or slightly ahead of her on the stairs. The same principle applies if you are walking on the streets; don't follow any woman you don't know too closely.

Note: Never goose a lady in a crowded stairwell. Never cop a feel on an escalator. Never ask someone of the fairer sex to wear a chiffon dress during high winds. Never sneak up behind a woman and lift up her petticoat. Always avert your eyes from all unknown thighs, guys. My grandmother used to say that.

Carry a Handkerchief

Plan ahead. Have a clean handkerchief in your pocket, especially if you attend a funeral. It's also a great idea to have a hanky handy for a lady friend to dry raindrops or tears.

Note: If no one has died recently, or if your ladyfriend is not otherwise inclined to cry copious tears on short notice or does not feel the need to blot raindrops from her weary brow, you can always use your handy hanky friend to do impromptu magic tricks or surrender to passing enemies. Ladies are often amused by such gestures.

Walk on the Outside Of A Sidewalk

This allows your lady to be farther from the traffic. This way, if someone is going to be splashed, it will be you, not her. I know, I know... but that's the price to pay if you want to be a gentleman.

Note: It also greatly increases the risk that you, as a gentleman, will be killed by any reckless motorists that may come your way, thereby allowing your lady to gasp and weep and ensure that you are forever remembered as gallant and noble in her eyes. Which is the most important thing of all, really.

Gentlemen, if I may call you that, these are the rules of etiquette you should observe in everyday life. Elevate yourself above the rabble and display the mannerisms of a true gentleman. The world will appreciate such a rarity and your career will most definitely benefit from your good manners and savoir-faire.

Note: And remember guys, to the French, savior-faire carries the same meaning as Larry the Cable Guy saying "Git Er Done!"

So be a hero, guys. Git er done. And then git the check. And the door. And my coat. Thanks.

The Little Blog of Virtues: Kim's Inferno

2009-06-18T23:22:00.000-05:00

The ethics classes I've taken to acquire an appropriate number of Humanities credits for my innumerable degrees really rocked my world.

As a religious, formally Catholic type person, I have always been inclined to seek out the truth, to the best of my abilities, when encountering every day incidents wherein we are compelled to make choices between right and wrong. In fact, one of my favorite sayings as a kid, adopted in an effort to hold myself to accountability, was simply to "do what is right, and let the consequences follow." Obviously this lofty concept failed me on more than one occasion when I instead did what was easy and got hauled off to the principals office, but my heart was in the right place, and I sincerely did want to do the right thing (whatever that was deemed to be) in any given situation.

My ethics class, having provided a means to investigate my life long obsession with the concept of virtue, has since compelled me to want to get a degree in philosophy. What could possibly be more important than trying to decipher right from wrong, anyway? Isn't that the foundation of life itself? For me, I just love it.

Studying Ethics, which has encouraged me to apply a distinctly philosophical overview to virtually everything, enables me to clearly focus on the outcome of the choices we make that directly impact our lives and the lives of others. So here we go, everyone. Let's be better people.

In the interest of contemplating what it means to be truly ethical, then, one of the assignments given to us in class was to send two people, living or historical, to a realm of Dante's Inferno. This exercise, which encouraged us to consider the ethics of behavior was, to me, a very interesting assignment. I had fun writing it, although in all fairness I could end up in hell myself if I'm not careful!

So, at the risk of offending all of the Diana's or Tina's or clandestine lovers out there who habitually set out to destroy peoples lives to suit their own agendas: this ones for you.

Kim's Inferno

First and foremost, I wanted to note that this assignment has caused me to vacillate between extremes of self righteous indignation and humble introspection. I find myself wondering if I don't deserve to be banished to hell myself, and in various locations at the same time at that!

Time to go back to church.

In the spirit of true humility, I think that if it weren't for the hope that I would succeed, for example, on yet one more planned diet, I wonder fearfully if I wouldn't be a prime candidate for the realm of the gluttonous, and with that in mind I pray I never die with a donut in my hand.

Because sin, and ultimately hell, implies conscious choice wherein personal hope has been eternally surrendered, I may survive it but the following people won't. Abandon all hope, ye who are mentioned in this article!

First Person: Diana
Dante's Realm: The Discordant

Diana is a stunningly attractive neighbor of mine who has become my neighbor as a result of foul play.

Having been raised by a dismissive, alcoholic mother, she has been taught to embrace the lifestyle and ethics of someone who lives only to please herself. This early atmosphere of selfishness and hopelessness was internalized by Diana, who now behaves in a manner very unbecoming of a woman. Untrustworthy and manipulative in the extreme, she is perpetually intent on having her needs met by whatever means possible. As the very essence of greed and self indulgence, she is sadly willing to do whatever is necessary to ensure her personal view of success.

Having been involved with a man whom she subsequently divorced years earlier, she was left with no visible means of financial support. Motivated by this financial loss to seek a secondary source of income which would not necessarily involve working herself, she was determined to find yet another husband to support her.

Attending a summer festival several years back, she saw a man standing nearby whom she decided she wanted to meet. When she realized in the course of their conversation that he was married man whose wife was expecting their first child, she was unfazed. Determined that she wanted to get to know him better, she pursued him relentlessly that afternoon, after which he consented to a second encounter which quickly led to an affair.

This married man’s wife, Mary, was nothing more than an afterthought to Diana, as she strategically seduced him, catered to him, and flattered him shamelessly with the direct intention to cause a divorce.

After months of vicious behavior on her behalf, Diana succeeded in driving this woman, with her infant daughter in tow, not only out of her marriage but her house as well. Diana moved in quickly, and has basically commandeered not only Mary's husband, but her daughter and dog, too. She was cruel and heartless in her efforts, and regards the dejected ex-wife with disdain and contempt to this day.

Because Diana’s modus operandi was to create division and strife to secure a home and a paycheck for herself , I would assign her to the level of the Discordant. By misrepresenting herself, deliberately causing a once loving couple to turn against one another, Diana might be considered a candidate for this realm.

As someone cast into hell with the Discordant, Diana might be subjected to having her heart cut away (as illustrated by Gustave Dore), just as she cut away the heart of another. The man involved is not entirely innocent of course, but because Diana spent long months strategizing her every move to effect the ultimate outcome noted here, she more deservedly belongs amongst the Discordant, while her new husband perhaps deserves to be with the Lustful.

Finally, as someone who stole from another, and subsequently created a false (or graven) image of herself to seduce him, Diana is well suited to spend her eternity housed between Thieves and Forgers as well.

Second Person: Tina
Dante's Realm: The Lustful

Tina is a woman I know who lusts after her husbands friend.

Claiming to have been "in love" with him for years, she has for reasons of guilt or propriety remained with her husband in spite of her feelings for this other man. Because she is primarily motivated by financial constraints to stay with her husband, she is unwilling or unable to forgo the emotionalism and adultery that continually drives her into the arms and consciousness of the other man. Her reasoning is simply that by having stayed with her husband in a literal sense, she is absolved from ethical wrongdoing, and to refuse either herself or his friend their exchange would be the true sin.

"We love each other," she said without apology. "It is not wrong."

As a result of this romanticized perspective, she has never taken the initiative to disclose her true feelings to her husband and thereby alleviate the emotional confusion and suffering created by her increasingly cold demeanor, but instead spends long hours pining over his friend while she fantasizes about their next longed for rendezvous.

Because Tina views her intimacy with her husbands friend a matter of physical and emotional necessity, I would assign her to the realm of the Lustful. Proclaiming that their love transcends the concept of wrongdoing, it is an inherently hopeless situation for all concerned, leading them from one emotionally charged whirlwind encounter to another, without end, without control.

Seeing as there is a distinctly theatrical overlay to their dishonest relationship, with both parties exchanging secret phone calls while endlessly speculating as to the greater "meaning" of their involvement, I think it's appropriate that they would find themselves neighbors to poets, although their adultery betrays the greed and selfishness of the gluttons to their right.

I think it would be poetic justice, in a sense, that they would find themselves caught up in the whirlwind of lust for all eternity, rushing towards nothing and yet still not quite entwined. It's what they've chosen in this life so far, and as such it's a fitting punishment for their actions.

So there :-)

Blueball the Sex Pirate

2009-06-18T21:50:00.002-05:00

May God forgive me, but this is just too funny! I couldn't resist! I know. I'm bad.

I had dated someone once who was a sex pirate.

Swashbuckling onto the scene with a glint in his eye and an idea in his pants (although sans the parrot), he was determined to get the booty after making the call.

Or at least after sending the email.

Several weeks ago, with a sudden dire need for some top secret information stored on the hard drive of my old Gateway computer, I decided to go on a search and rescue mission.

Hauling the monstrous tower out of the recesses of the closet, where it lay hidden and unused beneath some gym clothes that had fallen into the same fated disuse, I was determined to hook up somehow.

Laying on the floor of my office, Bill Nye the Science Guy at Work, I struggled with a mountainous blend of wires and cables and things that go crash in the night (hence the need for a new computer.) With a truly Frankenstienian glee, I was delighted when the old data sprang to life on my new monitor screen when I flipped the switch with hope and some flair (or engaged a lightning bolt as the case may be.)

It's alive! And what the heck is in here, anyway?

And that's when I came across the emailed archives, or buried treasure if you will, of a relationship long since submerged in the watery grave of past tears. Only now, some of the emails made me laugh! Which was a good thing.

One in particular caught my eye, written in the same vernacular (and at least as half as long) as Tolstoy's War and Peace. It detailed, with great angst and much pleading, why men must never be deprived of immediate sexual gratification because it will hurt them and otherwise make them pout.

Men, I was advised loftily in this archived byte of wisdom, are a complicated species. They must, of course, be extended basic provisions such as food and warmth and shelter, but most importantly they must be serviced. The pirate is winking at me here, you know, in that way. You know what I mean, babe.

In case I didn't know, he was going to go out on a plank and take a daring stance in explaining his quandary further.

Women could be, of course, by nature, wily and cunning and intent on destroying both a mans ego as well as his right to maintain muted beige balls. If said women (that would be me) would not therefore comply with cheering a man on towards orgasmic victory, was that not, the sex pirate postulated, a veritable crime against humanity?!

Didn't I realize (*gasp*) that lack of sexual attention would cause him to be stricken with florid, tumultuous, desperately painful blue balls?! Didn't I realize that his balls, for lack of concern, would dangerously expand to the size of the great domed sphere that drops from the sky during Dick Clarks Rockin' New Years Eve, and that he would be unhappy as a result of these developments?!

My God, modest-woman-determined-not-to-fondle-or-caress-my-nether-regions- without-promise-of-commitment, didn't I care about him or his balls at all?!

How could I be so selfish! Did I want him to perish, the last vestiges of his masculinity swept away amidst an image of technicolor testicles that had long since imploded upon themselves, future generations now deprived of his very seed?!

Kim! You are but a monster dressed up in women's clothing! Oh no! Could I ever be forgiven? What was I to do?!

As it turns out, Blueball had some recommendations along those lines. In a valiant attempt to help me assuage his pain and recover the crown jewels from certain destruction, there were certain steps I could take to ensure a complete remedy for his recovery.

Now the email, on page 412, assumed a sudden studious tone. He was going to ensure a successful close of the sales presentation by wrapping this up as a truly educational experience.

Standing before a fictitious dry erase board in cyberspace, in full pirate regalia, one can envision him pointing to overhead graphics, complete with treasure maps, bottles of rum, fiery torches, and the pirates triumphant woody that was in no way related to his leg. This was informative, and I had better appreciate it! I was being led into the deepest hulls of a mans ship (the Ship of Fools, I think it was called) and this was highly confidential information! This was no shameful instance of Sexual Manipulation on the High Seas you know! He had studied, as Blueball the Sex Professor, for years about this! He knew the ways of men with women and women with swashbucklers and the excitement of daring conquests! He knew how to convince me to pity his poor blue balls! He had even talked to a doctor about it! This was serious, Kim. Sex is no laughing matter.

Oh no! Where do I sign! What do I do?!

With handouts provided at break time during the emailed lecture, ensuring now that I was truly concerned and cared about his balls and understood his plight, I sat wide eyed for the remainder of the presentation, sex toys in one hand and a tube of KY Jelly in the other. We were on page 465 of the email now, so please pay attention.

Men, I was informed gallantly in an excerpt that led me to believe he had copied and pasted a letter out of Penthouse Forum, need sex constantly.They must have ready access to compliant women! Women who, while on their knees, would never ask questions and most certainly would never demand something so silly as a ring. Women who must consent to do their sexual bidding at least 24 hours a day! Okay. 25 hours, but we'll sometimes let you rest inbetween if you promise to empty the ashtray and bring us another glass of wine in the meantime. Men are, after all, equal opportunity employers.

Men must be stroked, I was told emphatically. They required frequent licking. The must be allowed to rape and pillage until they go mad! They must masturbate until they go blind! They must be allowed to have their way with you whenever and however they please, and the winner gets the spoils while the devil takes the hindmost! Wait. Maybe the devil doesn't get the hindmost. That was the ex-boyfriends favorite part.

And also, he whispered to me in a smallish font that in no way reflected his grandiose manhood or playful schemes, there were other things I could do too, if I were really nice.

What?! I thought beseechingly, loving and ready to lick on command. What else might I do to help you?!

Welllllll.....you could wear a thong for me, he offered generously. You could write me a song. You could sing a song while wearing the thong. You could wear no underwear at all under a skirt as short as a top while you let me tie you to the mast (or maybe to the bed posts), in which case I wouldn't give a damn if you never spoke at all ever again. You could kiss me long and hard while we're driving really far after drinking in a bar and feed me cherries from a jar. Would you could you in a car? Yes babe, uh huh, there you are. Shhh. I know hon. I know it's risque. So how about this?

Wear high heels. No. Really high heels. I don't want you to be able to walk in them, just entertain me. Like a man on stilts, or a drunken monkey on a unicycle. I want you to wear heels so high that you must be transported to the mysteriously romantic bedroom on a dolly. I want you to tower in your precarious shoes like a dominatrix amazon with nothing but whip crackin sex on your mind. Be careful, though. We don't want to have to interrupt anything with a little trip to the ER when you fall down, sweetheart.

Is that all?! Is there anything else that I might do to return your cyanotic boys to a more reasonable (if dusky) hue my love?!

Hmmm. Well, if you insist, there is just one more thing. Oh! It is too much to ask! I dare not say it!

The sex pirate pauses before the keyboard, and takes a hearty swig of rum. A parrot squawks in the distance. The mystery lingers in the salty air.

Oh say it, say it, I cry. Will I marry you?! Oh yes, yes!

No. Not that. I want you to have really long fingernails.

Fingernails?!

Yes. Fingernails.

They should be dangerously exciting, red and inviting! You should wear them proudly, like Daggers of Love, and flash them beneath my watchful and appreciative gaze! It matters not if you can dial a telephone or tie your shoes, you must have long clawlike nails with which to delight me!

Oh! Okay. And then...then will you be alright my beloved?! Will you and your member survive the torture I have subjected you to?!

Leading me towards the end of the plank at the final closing, he assured me that all of this, if not life and sanity saving, would most certainly help. There's nothing quite as satisfying as licking a salty pirate on a sinking ship my dear! Trust me, he said emphatically, I know.

And off into the watery depths of the relationship I went, with no map and no compass. The parrot laughed. The pirates blue balls then shone triumphant in the sun one last time, never to be seen again by merit of my compassion and divers lusts.

Thus ends this tale of bawdy adventure. Next time, I think it's best to leave old computers in the closet, and let sleeping pirates lie. Because God knows he lied to me.

Devilish little cyber pirate.

Diets Of The Poor And Anonymous

2009-06-11T00:19:00.001-05:00

Unfortunately, in spite of my current perimeters, I cannot afford to hire a personal trainer, PBS chef, or Jenny Craig Peppy Helper to induce a much needed weight loss miracle.

I am on my own in this, and it is definitely a long, wide road to reduced radial measurements, trust me. And pass me a damn cookie already.

In my weight loss experimentations, I have adapted versions of the Diets of the Rich and Famous to suit my status of chubby poor unknown person, as well as having created some diet plans of my own when all else was lost. Except my weight, that is.

The Atkins Butter Churn Express

No time or money for well prepared steaks and vegetables low in complex carbohydrates? Enjoy easily accessible "free items" on the Atkins Butter Churn Express by ingesting sticks of butter and balls of processed cheese food, and you'll most certainly become thin just weeks before your massive coronary. Guaranteed.

Note: Margarine is even less expensive than genuine butter, and may be substituted with melted plastic products in a pinch.

The Poverty Diet

Do you crave M & M's? Krispy Kreme's? Pure granulated cane sugar by the pound? Simply ensure that you have no money whatsoever, not even a dollar, and you will be unable to support your habit. Deprive yourself of dollars for a enough days, and you will eventually become thin. Not even the vending machines will support your habit without a dollar to your name.

Note: Begging friends or coworkers for loose change or crawling underneath the vending machine hoping to get rich quick is cheating.

The Break Up Diet

Begin dating someone whom you genuinely like and who makes you happy. Do something mysterious to provoke them to unceremoniously relieve you of your Girlfriend Duties when you least expect it while in a heavily populated public place. This will make you lapse into a state of perplexed shock, the outcome of which will cause you to stop eating, therefore inducing weight loss.

Note: This is only for the courageous and determined dieter, and should not be tried by most, at home or otherwise.

The Black Makes You Look Smaller Diet

Begin hanging around with Oprah Winfrey and Al Roker. No matter what color clothes you wear, you will appear amazingly thin simply by merit of the company you keep. Word up, P Diddy.

Note: I challenge you to try it! Wear lemon yellow, horizontal stripes, and spandex, and revel in your new found freedom! Be advised, however, that hanging out with Michael Jackson doesn't count, and any of the above fashion choices worn at Neverland will never cut it.

The Bright Fluorescent Light Diet

Observe your scantily clothed body in any well lit dressing room
in a public place. The trauma you experience as a result of this will create a sudden craving to be thin. If a store employee opens the door unexpectedly and shrieks at the sight of you, you may increase your weight loss significantly as well.

Note: Facing the mirror in a baggy sweatsuit with chocolate smudged on your face is cheating. You must be as close to nekkid as possible to reap the full shock value of your fluorescent viewing.

The Screw It I'm Joining The NFL Diet

Just think! If you were a linebacker for the Chicago Bears, you wouldn't need to lose weight. Your robust zaftig self would suffice, and you would be welcomed into the open arms and bludgeoning shoulders of the opposing team players without judgment. You could, basically, say "screw it!" once and for all.

Note: The sports application will not work if you are aspiring to be a jockey or or featured skater for Disney on Ice.

The Inverted Dimensions Diet

Instead of striving to become narrower, you should instead make it your goal to become taller. If you were 7'5 as opposed to 5'7, for example, you could easily carry the weight you are accustomed to, with additional inches available for the occasional pizza party or clandestine eclair.

Note: High heel shoes do not count.

The Son Of The Inverted Dimensions Diet

To make your body appear smaller, simply make your cranium appear bigger. This can be accomplished by banging your head repeatedly on the machines at the gym until it swells to monstrous proportions, thereby making your body appear smaller by contrast.

Note: This may cause headaches, but wearing a helmet is definitely counter effective and is most certainly cheating.

I make no claims whatsoever as to the efficiency or value of these diets, and if you saw me now, you would definitely believe me.

Broadcasting to you live from a well stocked pantry,
Kim

The Weekly World News

2009-06-10T13:56:00.001-05:00

From the "I really should be studying right now desk" comes another one!

I was once a huge fan of the tabloids. That's because I once thought they were bringing us All The News We Needed To Know, and that all of it was Troo.

The Pope Walks On The Moon! The Virgin Mary Seen At All Night Diner In Kalamazoo With Elvis! Michael Jackson Is Really A Black Man!

Reading items such as these I would think, well, I heard it here first! Excited by these revelations, I promptly brought these truths to the attention of anyone who would listen while they looked at me with great concern and whispered amongst themselves.

Fortunately for me and everyone else, this only went on for many, many years.

In my young married life, while with my "starter" husband Mike, my favorite pastime was eating bowls of Edy's Grand Rocky Road ice cream that were bigger than my head while reading the serious journalism of The Weekly World News.

Now, being somewhat daft at that point in my life, as evidenced by my having married Mike in the first place, I honestly believed that virtually everything in The Weekly World News was the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God.

"If it wasn't true," I remember telling Mike on many occasions, "then they couldn't print it, now could they!"

God, Mike! Duh!

I was not a 12 year old teenage bride from West Virginia when I embraced these theories, either, which is frightening. I was, in fact, in my mid 20's, and obviously in need of professional help. My ex-husband was only two years older than I am (and still is), and yet these conversations in retrospect were reminiscent of what you might hear between a teacher and a student. Or an orderly and an inpatient.

"Mike," I would tell him breathlessly as I followed him around the house waving my copy of the Weekly World News, "it says here that alien vampire babies invaded the White House!"

"Wow," he would say with careful sarcasm as he walked away quickly, "that's scary. Now go eat your ice cream."

Not willing to let him off of the hook that easy, I quickly trailed behind to discuss another news item.

"This article says that some guys in Siberia dug a hole in the ground and they could hear people screaming in hell!" I added excitedly, wanting to enlighten him to the Truth. "That means that the entrance to hell is in Siberia! It says it right here!"

"I would think" he said flatly as he tried to push my foot out of the door jam and thereby close it completely in my face, "that the entrance to hell would have been somewhere in Cleveland."

There was just no educating this person! In spite of my ex-husbands apparent lack of appreciation for fine journalism, I continued on in my devotion to this weekly hot bed of interesting and strange phenomena, and occasionally even received guidance and personal insight because of it.

You see, in addition to all of the fascinating revelations about vampires, misplaced clergyman in space, and Elvis, the Weekly World News also offered useful items such as quizzes on various topics, to provide insight about other areas of life, too.

They were so helpful at the Weekly World News.

One quiz of note promised to reveal the type of sense of humor a person might have, as evidenced by the type of joke you preferred. This was definitely information I thought might come in handy.

Embracing my bowl of Edy's, Mike rolling his eyes from a safe distance, I embarked on my journey of truth in quizzing.

I still recall this particular article years later, as one of the jokes featured struck me as so ridiculously funny that I still tell it now, to this day, over and over, often to the same people. Which of course leads these Same People to sigh and comment with exasperation "here she goes again, telling that same damn joke from the Weekly World News."

For entertainment purposes only, here it is:

A blind man goes into a store with his seeing eye dog. Walking up and down the aisles carefully, he suddenly grabs the dog by his tail, spinning him in a wide circle over his head. Whomp whomp whomp. Startled, the manager of the store runs over to him and asks with alarm while trying to duck below the spinning dog, "Sir, may I help you?!" "No thank you," the man replies calmly. "I'm just looking."

I think that's fuckin' hilarious!

As a result of having a strong preference for this particular joke, the Weekly World News determined that I had a "black" sense of humor. That newspaper sho do know mo' bout me dan I never knowed! They were right.

If it's taboo, obnoxious, politically incorrect, subversive, irreverent, rude, or potentially dangerous, trust me, I will find it funny! I'm just like that sometimes. And thank God that the Weekly World News was around to point this serious character flaw out to me!

Not that I would ever endeavor to change my black sense of humor, mind you, but at least the tabloid quiz clarified that I have certain issues.

Which just goes to prove that even in tabloid journalism, there is always truth to be found if you search deeply enough!