The Crazy Animal Lady of the Westside
“Mira la loca.” Yeah, lady, I know what you’re saying. I speak enough Spanish to know when someone is calling me a crazy loon.
But the crows are my friends. They LOVE dog treats. Can I help it if they love treats so much that now they wait for me every morning and caw if I don’t come out to feed them?
And can I help it if they told two friends, and those crows told two friends, and dang, crows are large birds, so a few crows looks like A WHOLE BUNCH of crows.
They are so smart and funny though, hopping around the driveway, looking down at things with one eye, head cocked. I have to love them.
Then there are the dogs. Yes, I know all the dogs in the neighborhood, but I don’t always recognize their owners. What can I say? The dogs are cuter.
This morning, Abbie Lynn took me on a different walk. We crossed a parking lot where two dogs were YELLING, just barking their fool heads off at anyone who passed. Then they saw me and began to wag. Their ears went down in that happy way. Their eyes squinted with anticipation. They were my friends, Lobo and Bobo, from up the street. They usually get treats from me every day in their yard. Today they were going to work with their dad, and here I was to give them treats in their pickup truck bed!
Lucky dogs. Treats appear like magic when dogs are good.
Mira la loca. There she goes again.
Lobo is the big one. Bobo is the little guy.
My (Family’s) New Kentucky Home
Enough ranting. Back to travellng.
Leaving Atlanta, I headed north to visit my brother and his wife, their daughter, her husband and five kids in Kentucky. My family, all Californians for generations, packed up and moved to the hills!
I knew I was heading toward a different way of life when I stopped at McDonald’s in Jellico, Tennessee, and the young woman behind the counter called me “Sweetie.” That doesn’t really happen here. And the terrain changed. Just north of Knoxville, it started to look like this:
I looked at that thin layer of soil on top of those slabs of rock and knew, despite the abundant forests all around me, that the people who survived here had to be some kind of tough.
I left the interstate in southeastern Kentucky and bombed along country roads, looking in vain for a spot to pull over and let the FedEx truck off my tail. No luck. This is the road to my brother’s house:
Ok, that’s the short way. There’s a longer way, with a leeetle wider road.
My brother and his wife live on 35 acres. My niece and her family got 85, including part of a mountain.
with a pond
They took me on an ATV up to the top of the mountain. It’s steep and I felt my age as I prayed that I wasn’t killed doing some foolishness on a Kentucky mountainside, but seeing how pretty it was made it all worthwhile.
No close-ups of the family, even though they are darling – I try not to social media-ize my people too much, because some of them are shy. They do exist and they are just the finest kind of people. I’m so glad I got to go see where they live and hang out with them.
I found out a favorite Kentucky pastime – sitting on the porch. It turns out that I might be good at this.
We made lasagna and my brother baked bread and my SIL made no-bake cheesecakes and spice muffins and we talked and laughed and it was far too short. I’m already dreaming of going back.
Just A Minute, Buddy
One of the hazards of being a longtime blogger is that sometimes you write posts in your head that never make it to pixels, so you can’t remember what you have actually written and what you have just imagined you have written.
This is a post I apparently have imagined writing, but I can’t find it in my archives, so here goes.
It kills me when a friend posts a photo on Facebook, a female friend, of herself wearing a new pretty necklace or a new shirt she wants to show off. Her female friends say normal things like “Ooh, I love it” or “That looks great on you.”
Then a guy pitches in “Necklace, I can’t see a necklace.” Because, of course, there is cleavage showing and he is so blinded by the sight of a woman’s chest that he not only can’t compliment the necklace, he feels compelled to talk about her breasts (albeit in an oblique way).
Yesterday’s example was when my 21-year-old friend posted a photo of herself in a new t-shirt, which had a kitty on it. Three or four nice comments, then Matt: “Why do you have two watermelons in your shi…never mind.”
I got ANGRY. I turned into Mama Aunty Bear. I asked back “Matt – why do you have crap in your brains?”
Because come on, Matts of the world.
Women are more than a collection of parts for your enjoyment. Women want to be seen, yes, but they want to be seen as whole people – intelligent, emotional, spiritual and yes, physical beings.
There are many reasons you shouldn’t comment on a person’s body parts unless they are explicitly asking for comments, but among them are:
- It is rude. As adults, we don’t do that
- It makes you sound like a jerk
- It turns a whole person into body parts, which isn’t very nice
- It makes the person trust you less, because they know to be wary if you seem like you will use them as an object
- It turns a fun exchange about a necklace or t-shirt into something unnecessarily about sexual attraction, which is probably an unwelcome turn of events (if you are 100 percent CERTAIN someone is ok with you objectivizing them, go ahead. But I wouldn’t be so certain).
- It turns a safe space into one that feels unsafe and weird
- People already have enough issues around their bodies. They don’t need your help feeling insecure.
“But but but women want us to look at them. That’s why they spend so much time on fashion, hair and makeup.”
Sure, women want to be attractive – most people do. They want to be admired for the way they look and to attract a suitable mate. The elaborate performance of femininity is time-consuming and expensive partly to convey that a woman is willing to put a lot of effort into looking good for her partner, which is something partners generally value, especially at the beginning of a relationship.
But just because a woman puts on a great display of femininity doesn’t mean she is doing it for you. And just because she has a body type that you find attractive doesn’t mean it is for you. It is not about YOU, unless it is, and in that case, you’ll know about it relatively quickly, I assure you.
Can you appreciate? Yes. Can you look? Yes, but don’t stare, because that is creepy. Can you comment? I’d stick to general statements like “You look lovely in that dress,” or “That color looks great on you.” You know, normal adult-type comments. And depending on your power relationship – if you’re the boss, for instance – it’s best to not mention looks, unless you know an attorney who will give you a good rate on your harassment suit.
Especially stay away from picking out body parts or making statements that make it sound like you want to do sexual things to the person. That’s just icky.
Women want to be seen as beautiful, sexy creatures – but first, they want to be seen as people. It’s ok to tell a woman what you love about her body AFTER you have had enough time together that you have gotten consensually naked. Then you can say every complimentary thing you want. So Matt? Just save it. Someday, someone will appreciate your comments. If you’re lucky. At this point, I have my doubts.
Johnny Cash Lived Here
One word or name or phrase can send you straight down the slippery funnel of personal history, sliding instantly to a time in the forgotten past, feeling every lost feeling, remembering every breath.
Today I was reading an article in the local paper about how Johnny Cash’s first wife, Vivien, is having her autobiography published posthumously (sorry if it is behind a paywall. The local paper is jerky like that). Yes, Johnny Cash lived here. If I drive just a few miles north, I see a sign proclaiming just that. It does not mention that his time in Casitas Springs was his most desperate, drug-addled period of life, but I don’t really blame the town officials for omitting that little fact.
After Johnny left, Vivien stayed behind and raised her four girls here, and did a fantastic job if Rosanne Cash is any indication. Vivien was deeply beloved in the community and it’s impossible to find anyone to say a bad word about her. She passed away a few years back.
Despite all appearances to the contrary, this is not a post about Johnny Cash or even Vivien. It’s about one little name in the article. As soon as I saw it, I was hurtled back in time to an early summer afternoon, standing silently and miserably in a large, rather ill-fitting camel coat.
Scott’s Apparel. It was the fancy store in the mall, back when the mall was an open-air affair, not the enclosed monstrosity of Cinnabon and Disney store it is now.
Fancy is, of course, relative. It was no Bergdorf Goodman. Not even Nordstrom. It was a relic of a simpler time, where the upper-middle class ladies in our town could go and shop for nice things.
But we weren’t upper-middle class people. I was used to nice ladies’ clothing, thanks to my Grandmother’s dress store, Janies in Morgan Hill, California, but my grandmother loved me because I was hers.
I knew just from the window displays at Scott’s, that it wasn’t our kind of store. JC Penney was our kind of store. Montgomery Ward was our kind of store. Scott’s Apparel was for other people. The salesladies there were tall and slim and stern women in their 40s and older, impeccably dressed and made up.
I have no idea what kind of bee my mother had in her bonnet that day. The reason we were out shopping was that she had decided I needed a proper young lady coat to go to on our 9th grade graduation trip to an amusement park. Never mind that it was a trip to an amusement park. Never mind that the average evening temperature in the area where the amusement park is located is about 85 degrees.
Looking back on it, I think my mom was suffering a bit of last child angst and panic. Here I was, 14 years old, headed off for a long afternoon and evening away from the family, something that almost never happened. I think she was determined to wield her Mom Sword to make sure I was going out Good and Proper.
So a coat. The woman at Scott’s narrowed her eyes as she saw us come in. I was dressed in my grubby jeans and polyester t-shirt, as I always was in those days. My fashion sense never really developed and has remained in its embryonic state to this day. Some things just don’t change.
Things never really got better between us and Mrs. Snooty, the saleslady. She treated us like we smelled bad. I might have, given my teenage hygiene routine.
Mom saw some camel-colored pea coats and made me try one on. Thick, luxurious wool. The jacket was a little too large, but my clothing was often purchased a little large, with “room to grow.” It was warm in the store and the gaze of Mrs. Snooty was making me even warmer. I was a sensitive kid and I could always tell when I wasn’t wanted somewhere.
We looked at the price tag. $65. I still remember, 40 years later. A fortune in those days. Would probably be more like $500 today.
“So,” said Mrs. Snooty. “You won’t be taking it, then?”
My mom’s eyes blazed at the presumption. “We WILL be taking it!” she said, triumphantly.
We could see Mrs. Snooty jerk back a little. This was Mom’s Pretty Woman moment.
This explains how I ended up walking around at Magic Mountain on June 12 one year, clutching a very large, heavy, camel-colored pea coat. It never did look good on me or fit right, but we showed Mrs. Snooty, and, at that moment, that was all that mattered.
Five Random Things About Me
I’m meme-ing it old style, kicking it like it’s 2005 (complete with 2005 slang!) thanks to Schmutzie. She tagged me to do a 5 Random Things Post when I was traveling and I’m finally getting around to doing it. Also, NaBloPoMo. Away we go.
Thing Number One
I am more superstitious than one might think. Just yesterday, I wanted it to rain, so I hung laundry out on the line and washed my car. I also left the dog bed outside and the lawn furniture cushions. Guess what? RAIN!
Some of my odder superstitions:
- Green cars and motorcycles are bad luck
- Driving on a bridge over a train crossing below? BAD LUCK
- You can anger the Traffic Gods by saying stupid things like “Hey, not much traffic today!” The ExMrStapler will never live down the time he said this near the Getty Center on the 405 and then we spent the next hour and a half trying to get to Pico Boulevard (about 6 miles).
Hm. All of my superstitions seem to involve cars.
Thing Number Two
Yes, my dog really is walking me. A couple times a week, people say “Who is walking who?” because I guess people say that to dog walkers all the time. But for the most part, I let Abbie choose her own direction. Why shouldn’t I? It’s her walk.
Thing Number Three
Even as a vegetable-loving vegetarian, there are some vegetables and vegetablish things I cannot stand: baby bok choy (how does one eat it, between the limp leaves and the crunchy base? It’s just nasty); shiitake mushrooms and those dried Chinese black mushrooms (they taste like meaty dirt to me) and, in most cases, okra.
Thing Number Four
I almost always have an earworm, a song playing over and over in my head. The worst was Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, which lasted six solid months and almost had me in tears. Delta Dawn also had a good long run, as Laurie can relate to, because she was equally afflicted. And Man in the Mirror has had repeat appearances.
Lately, sadly, it is this, because it is a horrible song. Pray for me.
Thing Number Five
The question that panics me most is “What are you passionate about?” My mind always goes blank. As a dilettante, I have trouble thinking of anything I do rising to the level of passion. None of it seems important enough. My question for people I have just met, when I want to get to know them, is “What do you REALLY like to do?” I love seeing their eyes light up as they think of things they enjoy doing. You can get people talking that way 95 percent of the time. I don’t know about that other 5 percent.
Bonus Thing:
I just learned you can change text color in the WordPress editor. Someone hold me back.
The Problem with Travel
My problem with travel is the same problem I have with life: I want to do everything.
Sometimes I drive around and realize I am stressed out because of all the places I want to go and all the things I want to do. I will be thinking “Oh, that restaurant is so good – I haven’t been there in years. There’s that bookstore. I should stop in there soon. And the library! How long has it been since I have been to the library? Look, the museum has a new exhibit!” It is all calling out to me – “Come, do, experience, taste!” Before I know what is happening, my mind is exhausted by the possibilities.
As my friend Jeff the Mad Dog would say “I have never been bored.”
As soon as I found out I was going to Atlanta, I started looking for things to do. I thought I might have a free evening and a half day in the city, so I looked up restaurants and museums. I decided I definitely wanted to see the High Museum of Art. The aquarium was there on my list, too. Did you know Atlanta has a PAPER museum? Oh, man, right up my alley. Can you imagine if they have a gift store there? [Faints].
Here’s what actually happened, though: I got to Atlanta about 5 pm, sick and tired. I ordered some middle eastern food delivered from a local place because I was feeling too punk to venture into the hotel restaurants, where I knew about 100 of my colleagues would be dining. I received the delivery downstairs in the parking garage like a drug deal and shuffled up to my room to shovel into my maw as I sat on the balcony, watching the CNN screen. The best-laid plans.
For the next day and a half, I was in meetings, then I decided I had better get a start on the drive to my brother’s house in Kentucky, because it was much, much further than I had anticipated, and I was feeling so sick I wanted to stop along the way and not try to push driving far into the night.
So no museum, no fancy restaurants, no aquarium. It just gives me an excuse to go back to Atlanta some day soon.
Welcome to Atlanta
I took two trips by airplane this year. The first was to Cincinnati in February and the second to Atlanta last week.
I’m always looking out the window as I land, trying to feel the city below me. In February, I was captivated by the colorlessness of the Cincinnati landscape in winter – from the plane, there was only white and black below me, nothing else. Atlanta, by contrast, was a solid wall of green. I had expected autumn, but it was like going to a dense rainforest of trees and lianas.
The hotel held a surprise. I was going to a company conference at the Omni Atlanta – a fancy schmancy downtown hotel. Shiny floors, rich wood, giant floral arrangements. The usual for a place like this, right? But then I walked into my room on the ninth floor, opened the drapes, and saw this:
My room opened onto an atrium and my balcony overlooked CNN world headquarters.
I should have brought my binoculars, because try as I might, I could not catch a glimpse of Anderson Cooper. I went down to the Starbucks kiosk in the lobby and tried to see famous people, but I came to the conclusion that they have minions to fetch coffee for them. Conveniently, they have a dry cleaners down there in the lobby, which must come in handy for pressing Anderson’s black t-shirts when he’s out visiting a war-torn country.
There’s a giant CNN gift store, too, but if I were going to buy gifts for my news junkie friends, I think they would come from the NPR shop, not CNN. I’m snobby that way. Sorry, Wolf Blitzer.
That glowing spot is a giant – it must be 30 feet across – TV screen that blares CNN – what else?- 24 hours a day. It’s a little annoying – like having a motel room next to an annoying guy who never shuts the TV off. So much for the fancy-schmancy – I have had quieter stays at the Best Western by the interstate.
At least the room rates are pretty good – I just checked – $129 a night and up. It’s certainly centrally located, especially if you have an interview at CNN. I just hope for your sake that it is with Anderson Cooper and not Nancy Grace.
In Which I Become Part of the Problem
I’m no Howard Hughes, but I have a germophobic streak that makes me rant about people who go to church sick, go to the gym with the flu, or especially who go onto a packed airplane while they are coughing and sneezing.
Cut to me last Tuesday morning, with a suspiciously sore throat and non-refundable tickets on Delta to the most important business meeting of the year. I tried to dismiss the sore throat. With my allergies, I often feel like I am coming down with a cold for weeks at a time – sore throat, headachy, runny eyes.
“I’m not getting sick, I’m not getting sick, I’m not getting sick” I chanted as I sat in the 10 mph traffic on my way to the airport, between panic attacks at missing my flight. Still, I stopped and stocked up on Hall’s Mentho-Lyptus drops, generic cough syrup and purse-sized tissues just in case.
I made the flight (“Cutting it pretty close,” commented the helpful skycap) even though I had to valet park my car, an action that I am sure will cause me endless grief when I submit my expenses for this trip. By somewhere over Texas, I was certain that my throat wasn’t just allergies. I was officially someone I had spent much time railing against, and there was nothing I could do about it. That’s ironic, isn’t is, Miss Germaphobe?
The one day I get sick is also the one day I have to fly across the country. THE GODS ARE MESSING WITH ME, AREN’T THEY? You can tell me.
To my fellow travelers who ended up with my cold: mea culpa. My deepest apologies. I hate myself a little, if that helps.
Life seems to be deeply invested in humbling me and teaching me compassion. Maybe that’s the meaning of this all. I don’t know. All I can say is: thank God for those mentho-lyptus. Those things are like magic.
Why I Hate People, part 3012
Abbie Lynn had some quirks when I got her. A waving flag overhead would send her into a crouch-run that lasted for six blocks or more. Other things that freaked her out:
- School buses
- Nail guns
- Compressor noises
- Tennis racquets
- White work trucks
- Trash trucks
- The vacuum
- Teenage guys
We have slowly worked our way through most of these. She’s fine with school buses (she sits so cutely and politely as soon as she sees one, waiting for her treat) and the compressor behind the local qwik-mart. White work trucks still make her lunge in fury about 20 percent of the time. I wouldn’t trust her with a teenage boy – she seems to want to challenge them and will leap up aggressively toward their faces – not attempting to bite, but more to knock them over.
The vacuum, I believe, is forever an enemy. Her brain completely short-circuits when it is on, to the point that I put her outside so I can clean the floors. Even then, when I open the door and let her in, she will come in and attack the now-silent vacuum cleaner.
The one thing I did not anticipate having to socialize her about, though, is a bicycle with a toy squeaker as a horn. What? Yep, we encountered this yesterday – an old dude on a bike who had hooked a squeaker, like the kind found in dog toys, to his handlebars like a horn, and was repeatedly squeaking it at every dog he saw.
I don’t think he meant malice – I think he thought it was funny. Abbie, fortunately, just gave him a good hard look, being a not-particularly-squeaker-focused dog. I can imagine other dogs completely losing their composure, though.
I didn’t walk over and talk to him, but I was seething with fury, something I believe he saw in my face as I gave him the death glare. I could ask “What is wrong with people?” but I don’t know if anyone could properly explain that behavior.
Giant Sweaty Yoga Horse
So it has been hot. I know those of you from Houston or anywhere south of the Mason-Dixon line or pretty much anywhere that isn’t here are yelling “SHUT UP” at me right now, but have some sympathy, will ya?
It’s not even so much the heat (it has been about 95 degrees, which isn’t bad unless you live in a tiny uninsulated box that traps heat and you work at home), it’s OCTOBER. Everyone else is talking about pumpkin spice lattes and casseroles and boots and making fallen-leaf crafts. Meanwhile, I’m sitting in front of the fan, drinking iced Pellegrino and mopping my menopausal brow.
I hear other menopausal women have hot flashes that last a minute or two. Not me – of course I’m special. Every day, starting about 5 pm, I have a 90 minute hot flash. This timeframe coincides with the evening dog walk, so I imagine my neighbors think of me as terribly out of shape, as they see me red-faced and sweating while ambling along with Abbie Lynn, who proceeds at a sub-1 mph pace, smelling every blade of grass and eating every wayward cat poop (I TRY to stop her!)
If I don’t walk the dog, I go to yoga, where the hot flash is great for making my brow rain sweat all over the inside of my glasses when we do forward folds. I see these Lululemon ladies, with their tiny little butts and their perfect messy ponytails and I feel like the GIANT SWEATY HORSE YOGA LADY. Beware or I will tip over on you. No, I’m not joking. I could break your ribs. Please step back.
That’s all the news I’m willing to type right now. I gotta go buy more Pellegrino. Did I mention that it is hot?
Here’s my favorite picture of Abbie lately. No, I have no idea what was going on in her head.
Suebob's Red Stapler 