City Wendy

Apparently 31 is the new 8

Things my mother said to me on the phone the other day that make me wonder if she thinks I'm still 8:

Her: It's Mother's Day today so it'll be too crowded to go out to brunch. You'll want to cook something at home. Do you have anything to cook at home?

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Me: Allison called the other day — she wanted to know how to boil an egg.
Her: You know how to boil an egg?

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Me: Drew and I have pretty much decided on our China itinerary.
Her: You know they don't speak English there.

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Her: Have you gotten your visa for China yet?
Me: No, I told you — I called the Chinese embassy and they said that regular travel visas are only good for three months, so I have to wait until my trip is closer.
Her: You probably just misunderstood them.

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Naked Finger and Aging Ovaries

I made a Christmas call to my grandmother today in lieu of visiting her for the holidays since my blog of all things landed me right smack in the middle of family drama last year and as a result, I have been passive-aggressively disinvited to Christmas With the Relatives this year. Anyway, it's not my grandma's fault and I'll definitely miss seeing her, so I called her up today to tell her so.

I used to talk to her more frequently than I do now, but in recent years my always-gabby grandmother has increased her typical length of phone calls from 2 hours to 5 1/2 and it's just hard to find that chunk of time in my schedule, especially now since I joined Facebook. But today I did and I was rewarded with a conversation that has become as common now as seeing Britney without panties.

"You're no spring chicken anymore," my grandmother said immediately after we exchanged 'hellos,' cuing me for the marriage and great-grandbaby talk that's marked all of our phone calls since I turned 18.
"Hm-mm," I replied, noting the new and impressive record of 31 seconds.
"If you wait much longer, you won't even be able to have children!" she exclaimed.
"Hmmm," I said again.
"I guess it looks like I'll never have great-grandbabies. I guess I'll just have to settle for great grandogs and grandcats instead. And your cats are so far away, I don't even get to see them. Except in pictures."
"Hm-mm." I said, hoping my non-word reply tactic would disarm her.
"Well, your mother tells me you and Drew bought some rugs recently," she said.
"Yeah, we did," I replied, surprised but happy to be changing the subject so quickly.
"So, will there be a marriage soon?" she asked, apparently convinced that rug-shopping is now the precursor to nuptials.
"Oh!" I said, "Well, you know, we're very happy right now and if that's something we decide we want, then we'll figure it out from there."
"I already have it figured out," she said. "You'll have a rabbi marry you in New York since that's important to Drew and his father. Your parents will want to be there. And you can tell your friends in Chicago and it's up to them if they want to come or not. I'm too old to make the trip, but your aunt will have an Open House with the family here for you and Drew and we'll want to see pictures. Make sure you take pictures. And wear a pretty dress. It doesn't have to be a gown, but you'll want a pretty dress. I mean, it'll be your wedding day!"
"Well now, let's not get ahead of ourselves," I said, alarmed at how much she'd already thought out.
I could practically see her pursing her lips through the phone lines.
"You'll never do better than Drew," she replied after a beat. "He's a kind man. And you're getting older. You won't be able to have children for too much longer. ...Just make it legal already and give me great grandbabies!"

Desperate to change the subject, I asked the question I knew was guaranteed to get my grandmother talking about anything other than my naked ring finger, aging ovaries and wasted space of a womb.

"What was it like growing up dirt poor during the Great Depression, Grandma?" I asked.

Four hours later I finally hung up the phone and crossed one more thing off my Holiday to-do list. 'Tis the season!!

Connected

Last night I had one of those heart-thumping, blood-pumping, pulse-quickening dreams that only come about once a year or so. It was so vivid and realistic, that I awoke with a start in the middle of it and made sure my doors were locked and my cats were ok. I didn't think to call anyone--to check on anyone--it didn't occur to me that I might be dreaming someone else's experience.

I dreamed that I heard a loud ruckus in my hallway and going to the peephole, I spotted someone standing outside my door. I heard a tap at the door and I ran to my bedroom and barricaded myself inside and called the cops. I gave my address and was told there was a “bad guy” inside my building and that I should stay barricaded inside my bedroom until the cops arrived. A few minutes later, I heard another knock at the door. Thinking it could be the cops this time, I went back to the peephole where I saw someone in a police uniform. I was insistent that he show me a badge before I let him in. When he finally produced a badge, I let him inside my apartment and he searched all my rooms for the suspect.

At this point in the dream, I awoke with a start. My heart was racing—it seemed so real. Was there really someone in my building? I ran to my door and looked out the peephole. I double-checked the locks on both my doors and attached the chain locks, too, just to be safe. I checked on the cats and made sure they were ok. Then I went back to bed for a fitful night sleep.

In the morning I saw I had a text message from my sister. It’d been sent in the middle of the night and said she’d been evacuated from her building because a murderer was on the loose inside. I called her and got the full story, which was almost identical to my dream, and which was even scarier and more anxiety-provoking because she’d been robbed at gunpoint less than a year ago in her old apartment when she answered a knock at the door late one evening.

What’s even more peculiar is that before I went to bed last night, I had a sudden feeling that I should call my sister and check on her. I got her voicemail and left a cheerful message. She told me this morning that she was vacuuming last night when I called and didn’t hear the phone ring, but that she got the message a little later, shortly after she heard a random knock at her door and retreated to her bedroom for safety. Still shaky from her encounter with a gunman at her door last year, she said my message came at just the right time to calm her nerves.

It turns out the knock at her door this time was a cop who was checking each apartment in the complex for a man who’d just murdered his ex-wife in a domestic dispute. The swat team came back a few hours later and my sister insisted they produce badges before she let them in--just like I did in my dream. She was evacuated from the building, along with all her neighbors, and needless to say, it was a long and dramatic night for her.

The cops did find the murderer eventually. His dead body was discovered this morning in a bedroom in the building my sister lives in. So he won’t be hurting anyone else again, thank God.

…I know it’s strange, but in a weird way, it’s sort of comforting that I had that dream—like in an odd way I was connected with my sister—somehow in-tune with her fear and felt the need to reach out somehow. I wonder if other people have experience with this kind of thing? If so, what are your stories?

After the Introductions

The big "meet the folks" trip was a success! NYMan got in on the morning of the 4th with no trouble at all--even managing to catch two early flights, getting him to St. Louis over an hour ahead of schedule. The first stop after his arrival was a traditional diner in good ol' St. Chuck where I introduced my city-boy beau to his first plate of biscuits and gravy, which was a huge hit. Another first for him was dining in a room full of WASPs.

"Everyone looks the same here, ' he said, eyeing all the suburban middle-class white people.

"Welcome to St. Charles," I replied.

Later, NYMan was fully initiated into the family dynamic at the traditional 4th of July BBQ where my uncle asked to borrow $100 from him, my hypochondriac sister regaled everyone with stories of her many, many health issues, my mother announced she had bronchitis, and my grandmother insisted NYMan call her "grandma." And I'll stop there with the family dynamics since every single time I took out my camera, everyone warned me that if I posted any family photos on "that blog of mine," there'd be hell to pay, and since a big blow-up at Christmas time when a family member got her panties in a bunch over the airing of all the family drama--you know, like saying I wouldn't have access to coffee or internet at my grandparents' place, I have learned my lesson. They don't want me to write about them--MESSAGE CLEAR!!

That's okay--I have plenty of other stuff to write about...like how NYM got to see the arch for the first time, and how we went to a typical Missouri bar where the vending machines were full of cigarettes and chocolate, and we took a ferry across the Missouri river onto a little island where we could buy apple butter on the side of the road, and we ate lunch at a state park where two little hummingbirds fluttered about right outside our window, and NYM and I paddled around a pond for an hour in stifling hot heat just to have a break from our backseat car tour of the city and to cuss openly and to make out under a bridge for 5 minutes, and we traded our usual Gin and Toics for Airborne-soaked water at every meal to ward off my mom's bronchitis, my dad's "bad cold," and whatever else we might've been exposed to in that fierce Northeastern Missouri wilderness.

And much to my relief, the question of marriage only came  up one time in front of NYM and that was over a sushi dinner with an old college friend of mine who, I'm guessing, must have been on drugs because THERE IS NO OTHER EXCUSE FOR SUCH TALK!! Even my grandmother refrained from pressing NYM about marriage plans, which I am sure took every ounce of self-control she could muster in her tired old age. And just as soon as NYM was out of earshot, you better believe she was up in my grill about it. I told her we were waiting to have a baby first before making any big commitment to each other and that seemed to quiet her pretty quickly.

Despite a relatively smooth week of local sight-seeing, family bonding, and generous amounts of midwestern fare, the best moment of the trip came at the airport when we said good-bye to NYM. Both he and my mother, unsure how to appropriately say good-bye and equally dreading any full frontal body contact, fretted about a bit until my mother, taking the proverbial bulls by the horn, held out her hand and said, "You know, I'm not the huggy type like Wendy's grandmother--I don't like all that hugging...I'm just going to shake your hand if that's okay, " and NYM, so overcome with relief and gratitude and filled with such a strong adoration for my mother, resisted the urge to reach out and hug her and in that magical moment of soul kinship, held out his hand instead, gave her a big smile, and said, "It was reallty nice to meet you." And that, I really believe, was the very best way the week could have ended.

Meeting the Folks

I'm leaving for a 5-day trip to Missouri bright and early tomorrow morning. My parents flew to St. Louis over the weekend and will be in the states for about a month, so I'm using this opportunity to introduce them to NYMan. After I get settled in, he'll join me on Wednesday just in time for a 4th of July BBQ with the whole extended family (no pressure!). It's tradition for my family to eat bbq porksteak sandwiches on the 4th of July, and since I announced that NYM would be joining us, there's been a big to-do over what he'll eat in leiu of the pork since he's Jewish and all.

Countless phone calls, emails, and text messages have been exchaged among my grandmother, my mom, my sister and me to clarify what, exactly, Jewish people can and can't eat. "Basically, everything but pork is fine," somehow got lost in translation through all the channels until it finally reached my Grandmother as, "If everything on the buffet table has not been blessed by a rabbi, NYMan will be so utterly disgusted and offended, he will break up with wendy on the spot and we will never get her married off, I mean she's almost thirty-one for Christ's sake, let's not fuck this up!!"

"Is it a problem that I'm Jewish?" NYMan asked after I finished a food-related phone call with my mother a few weeks ago.
"No, not at all." I answered, "In my family it's ALL about the food and it's of the utmost importance that everyone stuffs himself to extreme proportions or the hosts melt under the weight and burden of unbearable guilt."
"Oh," he replied, "that sounds familiar."

NYMan and I will be staying at a motel that we booked on priceline. We should have just gone the safe route and booked reservations at a Sheraton or some such thing, but we're both on a budget right now--me saving to move to NY and NYM paying off his baseball habit and ridiculous 46-inch HDTV--that we decided to be frugal and get a deal. Unfortunately, our "deal" turned out to be a $45-a-night flop-house that reviewers have led us to believe might have mold in the bathtub and pubic hairs on the pillow cases. We're bringing our own sheets just to be safe. Extended family, hearing about our "deal," have kindly offered up spare bedrooms, which I suppose might just end up being our safe refuge.

My mother has our whole itinerary planned for us, which includes joining her  at her hair appointment on Thursday in the neighborhood where she grew up, so I can show NYMan my mother's childhood home and where I spent every summer growing up and which is, I guess, the closest thing I have to a hometown. Let me repeat that: we will be joining my mother at her hair appointment on Thursday. This is, I imagine, exactly how NYMan hoped to spend his summer vacation. And, frankly, it's the quickest way I can think of to initiate him into the reality of my upbringing.

The hair and the food--it's all about the hair and the food, and if NYMan didn't know that about me before, he sure as hell will by the end of the week. Wish us luck!!!

Names and Traits

Yesterday on the Today Show Willard Scott wished a happy 105th birthday to a woman with the same last name as me, except where I have an 'er,' she has an 'ae,' which, funny enough, doesn't change the sound of the name at all.

My oldest living relative--my Great-Aunt Velda--turns 95 on Sunday. She and I share the same last name, too, though she changed hers decades ago when she got married. We also share the same name as the town where she was born and raised, and the same name as her elementary school, and maybe even her high school, too, but don't quote me on that.

Aunt Velda's older brother, my grandfather, would have celebrated his 100th birthday a few months ago. He died the summer I turned 13. The evening he died I was in the basement of my other grandparents' house watching Valerie's Family on TV, a show that was also called The Hogan's and The Hogan Family, but I'm pretty sure the evening my grandfather died it was just called Valerie's Family. I only watched it because I had such a big crush on Jason Bateman, who, incidently, did nothing for me in his more recent role on Arrested Development, though I thought the show was pretty funny.

Anyway, about midway through Valerie's Family--or The Hogan's, or The Hogan Family, or that show Jason Bateman was on before he got all old and puffy looking--I suddenly had a feeling that there was a spirit in the room with me. I wasn't scared, but I definitely understood there was something sort of supernatural happening, and in a matter of a few moments a sense of peace and calm washed over me and I knew my grandfather had just died and was saying good-bye. He hadn't been sick and there was no reason to believe he should be dead other than the fact he was old and everyone has to go some time. I didn't see anything, I didn't hear any voices, there was nothing tangible about the experience at all, but I knew--like how you might know you've just met the person you're going to marry--that my grandfather had just died and he was saying good-bye to me and that everything was going to be okay. He was the first person I ever loved who died.

A few minutes after the sense of peace and calm, the phone rang. I heard my grandmother answer it in the kitchen upstairs, and then a wail. She'd always been fond of my grandfather, her oldest daughter's father-in-law. She told me years later that he was the kindest man she'd ever met and it was a shame I didn't get to know him longer.

At the funeral a couple days later my other grandmother draped herself over the coffin during the eulogy and sobbed. I have this memory of my father carrying her out into the lobby area, but now I wonder if he just braced her as they both stepped out for a few minutes while she cried some more. After the funeral, back at my grandparents' place, we all sat around and ate casserole dishes that friends and family had brought by earlier. It was right around what would have been my grandparents' wedding anniversary--the day before or the day after, I can't remember for sure, and every framed photo of my grandfather had been turned faced down on the dressers and coffee tables and walls.

I was reminded of something my grandfather had told me years before. I must have been 8 or 9 and I was spending a few days with him and my grandmother in Illinois during summer break.

"Every night before I go to sleep," he said to me, "I look at your picture and wish you good-night."

"Which picture?" I asked.

"This one," he said, pointing to a framed photo hanging in the hallway taken of me on Christmas morning a few years before.

I lived in Japan at the time and only saw him and my grandmother for a few days every June and July. Before Japan, I'd lived in Korea with my parents, and before that, Okinawa, where I was born. Having their only grandkids so far away was one of my grandparents' biggest disappointments and on the rare occasions we all got to see each other, they showered my sister and me with affection.

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My grandfather loved birds--he could name every single kind of bird that visited the huge oak tree in his backyard, and during summer afternoons on the back porch, he'd name them off to me one by one--sometimes there'd be dozens. He loved flowers, too, and he had a great big garden with roses and marigolds and peonies, and all kinds of other flowers I didn't learn the names of until I became a floral designer years and years later. And right in the middle of it all my grandfather had a flagpole and every morning at sunrise, he'd raise the American flag, and every evening at sunset, he'd lower it and fold it in a special triangular fold--the same one my father used when I was in kindergarten and he was my principal and he'd raise and lower the school's flag everyday like his dad used to do.

My other grandfather--my mother's father--he writes and he has red hair, but I'm not sure what traits I got from my dad's dad. I guess I know the names of lots of flowers now--and even some birds--and I drink coffee every morning like he used to, and we share the same last name. He'd be 100 years old if he were alive now and I bet Willard Scott would have wished him a happy birthday on the Today Show. Maybe someone would have commented on the spelling of his last name or the fact that he was such a bird lover or that he did the crossword puzzle everyday.

My grandfather had a heat stroke while gardening in his yard one summer evening 18 years ago.

On the day of his funeral, I turned over one of his photos face-up and said good-bye.

He was the first person I ever loved who died.

Rocking: A Love Story

So, I picked up this book the other day called "Drinking: A Love Story," a memoir about this writer with a booze problem, and I'm reading along and it's going as expected: writer writes a lot, thinks a lot, is neurotic about a lot of things, drinks a lot to escape, tries to hide her problem from everyone, including herself, you know, the usual.  But then, then I get to this part, that quite literally made be gasp, made me wonder, how does she know this??  Is she in my fucking head??

"When I was a child," the author writes, "my parents had to put a mattress against the wall in my bedroom because I'd sit against the wall during nap time and rock back and forth and bang my head into it.  Later, I developed a more elaborate system: I'd get on my knees and elbows and curl up in a ball on the bed, facedown like a turtle in its shell, and rock away, for hours sometimes."

My mother says she first discovered my own bizarre behavior when I was a baby and she heard a thumping sound coming from my bedroom.  She peeked inside and found me in my crib, banging my head against the wall.  Like the alcoholic writer, I soon graduated to a more elaborate method as well, pretty much exactly like she describes -- on knees and elbows, my forhead resting in the crack between the pillow and the wall.  I'd rock rhythmically like that for hours, humming to myself until I fell asleep. For years and years, the hair in the front of my head was broken and brittle, my knees cracked when I bent them, and the wall behind my bed was permanently dented.  This went on until college.  COLLEGE!

Do you have any idea what it's like to start college as a chronic fucking head-banger? It's terrible!!  One morning during my first semester of school, my roommate, who slept in the bottom bunk, said to me, "So, umm, when, like, you know, you're, you know, in bed and all?  And, um?  You know, the bed's, like, you know, rocking back and forth really hard, and um?  You know...are you..I mean, you know?"
Me: "Oh my god!  No! I mean, no!"
My roommate: "Okay.  I didn't think so.  I mean, I hoped not, cause, you know.  But, so, um, like, what are you doing?"
Me: "I'm a compulsive head-banger!  You know...a rocker!!"
My roommate: "Uh....right."

It's not that I didn't try to quit.  I did!!  I wanted so badly to be normal.  I'd watch tv and movies and see people just lie down and go to sleep and I'd feel so jealous. I want to be them, I'd think, look, their lives are so easy!!  At night, I'd lie in bed and will myself not to bang against the wall, I'd make deals with myself -- "just one night of normal sleeping and then tomorrow I can maybe sneak in a few rocks after the roommate leaves."  Or, "just a week without the rocking, and I'll buy myself a new outfit or something."   Night became my enemy, sleep: the elusive lover, rocking: the fix I craved. That was the year I became an insomniac.

Last year I confessed my old addiction to my then-boyfriend.  I think we'd been talking about our awkward, ugly-duckling childhoods, or our first broken hearts, or some other similar topic about vulnerabilities that makes you feel all close and shit.  At any rate, I was caught up in the moment, not thinking clearly, consumed with being accepted for all my quirks and idiosyncracies.

"I used to not be able to sleep without banging my head against the wall," I said, the words hanging between us like a gas leak you can't quite place.
"You what?" he asked.
"You know," I said, unable to stop myself, "I'd bang my head against the wall, rhythmically, like in a rhythm, and I'd rock back and forth on my knees and elbows...for hours...and I'd hum to myself, or sing...until I fell asleep.  But then I made myself quit in college because my roommate thought I was diddling myself, but I wasn't, I was head-banging, so I made myself quit, only then I got insomnia.  And now I can't sleep!  I can't ever sleep!!"
Silence.
I searched his face for some reassurance that I hadn't completely outed myself as a total fucking nutcase, that at the very least he still found me sort of cute.

And then, he stroked my cheek gently and looked deep in my eyes.  He still likes me, I thought, breathing a sigh of relief, he still likes me and he accepts me and maybe I'm not such a mess after all!!
"Ahhh, Wends," he said, still stroking my cheek,"...You're so fucked up."