When I was 13 years old my best friend was as smart as a doorhandle. Her name was Debbie and she was very pretty. All the boys liked her. I hung out with her because - she was a pretty dorky stupid girl and I could easily make her laugh. And I got to hang with the boys.
She had a party one night - her parents were out and we played Styx over and over and over again.
"Babe I'm leaving, must be on my way...."
It was at that party that Debbie made out with THE most gorgeous guy I'd ever seen - at the time anyway - Rick. Ohhh he had dark thick wavy hair that was just a bit too long. He wore braces -which was V sexy for the time and he had a tall lanky swimmers body. So cute. So nice. So into Debbie. So what? I just sat on the couch ate chips and talked to his friend Mike. Mike was uglier, fatter, shorter and just seemed annoyed by Rick.
Soon after this party, they stopped being friends. Stuff like that happens easily when you are 13. Soon after that party Debbie dumped Rick too. She found an older boy - 17 - who filled her make-out needs more completely. And soon after, Rick and I became friends, and I dumped Debbie. She was way too slow on the uptake for me. Even then I had an intollerance for those who are slow of wit.
So Rick and I started to hang out. First I used the family pool to invite him over to my house. Then he and I would hang out in his family's attic. We did 13 year old stuff - wrote poetry, shared it - listened to music - read parts of novels out loud to one another. What do you mean that's not what 13 year old girls do with their 13 year old male best friends? It was normal to us.
Rick was gay. Obviously. But he was my first gay best friend. He was sarcastic and funny and mean. He was fashionable and critical and girly. Upon reflection 25 years later, it was as if he read the manual on "gay 101" and followed the rules right from the get go.
We finished grade 8 together like siamese twins. And when we started grade 9 we were in the same class and always together...until *insert ominous dandandunnnnnn here* the twins came along!
Mark and Mike were twins. Adorable fraternal twins. Kind of awkward. Kind of goofy. The kind of guys that everyone liked. They wanted to hang with Rick and I. At first it was both. Then Mark. Then Mike. It didn't bother me, because personality wise they were just like Rick. And they liked the same things that we did. And hey.....maybe they were gay too? Of course they were.
Now, by that time I was 14 and I knew what gay was. It was boys who liked boys. Gheesh - everyone knew that. And Rick was, well, gay - like on Three's Company when Jack pretended to be gay. I was a woman of the world and accepting of all others. I was liberalism personified at an exceptionally young age. I had a gay best friend.
Until I saw it. I saw Rick and Mark making out. Kissing and groping and hands down each others pants. They stopped. Looked at me. And laughed. And then they went right back at it.
I wasn't fine. I was far from fine. What the flaming Jesis was that? I mean sure I knew - I mean I thought I knew - I'm sure I knew that boys made out with boys - and If there were no girl parts to deal with of course they would deal with boy parts - oh of course they would. Shit. Shit Shit shit shit shit.
I left the attic and sat on the front porch. Mike said - did you catch them at it again? And, having recovered my senses by that point I said "sheesh - again!" and acted like nothing happened. Cause I was a woman of the world with a gay best friend and this was just something that wasn't going to freak me out. Nope. Not me.
Then Rick and Mike started seeing each other behind Mark's back. And I had to play interloper and the whole threesome took on a life of its own. I enjoyed the intrigue - the theatre and the mayhem that ensued! Nothing is quite so fun as a bunch of boys having hissy fit girl fights about who loves who more!
And each time I saw them kissing or making out it got a little easier. Acceptance doesn't come without thought - its something that you have to work at sometimes. I saw a lot. I'm to a point now where NOTHING shocks or bothers me. I think at this point, I've seen it all.
So, Rick was my first. My first gay best friend. My first boy on boy kiss. But he wasn't the best best friend by a long shot. As a matter of fact, he turned out to be quite an asshole. He and his boyfriend told me that my first real boyfriend was gay. They insisted that he couldn't possibly be with me - big homo queer that he was. And the fuckers were right - he was. I hate that.
His boyfriend (that same one) died of AIDS in the late 90s - the two of them were together for almost 20 years. It was terribly sad. When he and I met up many years later, he hypothesized that an entire generation of people had lost their soul mates to a disease. And I was very sad for him.
We tried hanging out again - like old times - but then I discovered something. He's not very nice and I don't like him. You live you learn.
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Saturday, May 19, 2007
No body puts baby in the corner
Okay so this isn't really about Dirty Dancing. I just love that line. Dirty Dancing was one of my Mom's favourite movies and the only movie I inherited from her - thank god it was good QUALITY cinema!
I haven't watched it in years - its VHS so that explains a lot. I keep it tucked away in a special place with all my tresures, my bathing suits and my sweater shaver that I used once.
But, having suddenly remembered it, I should watch it today. Its the perfect day for one of three things: cleaning your house, watching old movies or sitting around eating corn chips and masturbating. We have a strick no junk food policy in our house. And, since I have not now nor never had even the slightest bit of interest in cleaning anything, I opt always for the movies.
Back in the day, when the movie theatres had $2 tuesdays, I always asked for Tuesday to be my day off - since I was working in the glorious retail clothing industry at that time this was an option. I would head out to a movie in the afternoon by myself then meet up with my friend in the evening and see more. Two $2 movies in combination with buck a marguerita and free appetizers night at ChiChi's mexican food made for the perfect evening. Its no wonder I find movies, no matter how good or how bad, a soothing thing.
For me: movies = relaxation = happiness + love
I'm going to go with Dirty Dancing today, for old time's sake - cause really, nobody puts this baby in a corner!
Friday, May 18, 2007
Raised by Wolves
I don't know where my head is at lately. I swear I'm teetering on the precipise of manic depression. My highs are unreal and my lows are heartbreaking. And my blogging is like homework. I want to do it because I know I'm learning stuff - about me - about being a better writer - and about the people who read my blog and share their feedback (which by the way I so totally love - gobble it up like keg-a-beer as it were). But I just can't seem to find the balance to make the stuff I'm writing not sound like crap.
So lets see how this goes - lets choose a topic for the day. Hmmm. Let's choose family.
You know I have parents, who are dead. So needless to say I haven't seen a lot of them lately. I have a brother. He's an interesting one. But we are "estranged" - I just like that word because it sounds cool and kind of like we are in a french detective novel. How did that happen? That's a good story.
About 6 years ago my Dad got sick. His leg was so sore he could hardly walk. Turns out he had end stage lung cancer that had metasticized into his bones. At the time when the doctors gave him 6 months to live, he was living in Goderich, about a 3 hour drive from where I live. Since he couldn't drive, and needed to be closer to civilization, hospitals, etc. I convinced him to move to Stratford, into a ground floor apartment.
At this point, I had been driving from Ajax to Stratford (just 2 hours each way!) once or twice a week. I drove Dad to all his doctors appointments, did the banking, bought the groceries and took him for lunch every week - even to the nasty Chinese Buffet in Mitchell that had all you can eat liver and onions and Chinese food! I also ran all those pesky get drugs and oxygen errands! Little things. I couldn't handle the other bits and peices so I arranged for meals on wheels 3 times a week and set him up with someone to come and clean.
Dad didn't much like meals on wheels. He said everything was tasteless and white. He was right - it totally was. So, I would make him his faves - chilli or lasagne and freeze them in margarine containers (cause the man had a million - he never threw anything away). I would haul these to Stratford on that wendesday too - take the empties and refill the freezer. He ate those at night and on the other days. Lots of people who visited brought him food too - I had SO SO SO much support from my great extended family!
Meanwhile, back at the trailer park, my brother and his family had moved in to my Dad's house. Good that it wasn't sitting empty. And since they only had one car and my Dad's van couldn't be driven (oxyconton and driving don't mix my friends!) why wouldn't they use Dad's van too? It just made sense.
So, on we go with the illness - and my brother did visit Dad - I'll give him that much. Once every couple of weeks he'd try to haul dad out of the apartment in his wheelchair to church. Now, my Dad was NOT a churchgoing guy. He used to say that he went to the round church - so the devil couldn't corner him. Oh no, not when people asked him about church - he just used to say that all the time!!! But, my brother was really involved in the church - he was a lay minister at the correctional centre and big into the Dutch Christian Reform Church. Or was it the Baptist church that week? Maybe it was the Pentacostals. He was an equal opportunity religious freak.
Dad didn't like going to church. It made him angry for the whole week. But, since my Dad did think until the day he died that the sun shone out of my brother's ass and lit up the world, he went because it was his son!
Long story shorter - on the night my Dad is dying (which by the way was 6 months and 2 days after the doctors told him!) - we show up at the hospital and so do my brother and his wife. Sit up all night waiting for Dad to stop breathing. Seriously. Just the 4 of us sitting there in the most surreal horrific firghtening circumstance, waiting for my father to stop breathing. It was one of those awful awful things that you never would wish on your worst enemy. I literally sat there making deals with God - saying "please let this be the last one" and "no don't" "yes please just put him out of his misery - please just let it stop".
Morning rolls around and my Dad is still breathing when his fuckwit of a doctor shows up. Is there anything we can do I ask to help him go, well, frankly, faster - he seems to be suffering so much? Yes, the doctor says - you could just take away the oxygen mask. Take it off and he will die in minutes not hours. Will he be in pain? Will he suffer? No - he has medication for the pain and we won't stop it. So the four of us talk and basically the three of them say - whatever you want to do - like we are picking a restaurant for dinner or something. So, its my decision. My decision when Dad dies. And let me tell you, just because you can make decisions doesn't make you a bitch - it makes you decisive.
So yes. Lets do it. Lets help him go. I took off the mask. The nurse shut the ozygen off. And the room was silent with the exception of Dad's laboured breaths. My brother and sister in law said "okay well this could take a while, we're going to get some breakfast" and they left. They left us there. And it took about 3 minutes. My husband held my hand as I watched him stop breathing. There was no dramatic death rattle or last big gasp. He just stopped like the timer had literally ran out. And Wayne left me with him alone for 10 minutes while he went to find a nurse in the cursed understaffed hospital. And I sat with my dead father and screamed that silent scream in my head that you are sure that people can actually hear but they can't. I sat and just let the tears fall down my face without wiping them away. I couldn't function.
But, when everyone was back, I was okay. I made the calls. I made the arrangements. No funeral. Immediate cremation. He and I had talked about it many many times and even met with the funeral home. If people hadn't come to visit him when he was alive, he sure as hell didn't want them showing up when he was dead. Funny old fart.
We had a party at his apartment. And everyone ate my aunt's dainties (since it was days before Christmas) and laughed and, I hope, had a good time.
On Christmas day we always have a dinner with my big extended family. My brother didn't show or call. We waited for over an hour for him before eating. The next week we cleaned out the apartment. I kept the photos and let my brother and family and friends have everything else. I kept telling myself it was just stuff. Funny, now I think I should have fought for some of the stuff.
My brother got the house. And the van. Although my Dad did ask my brother to pay me $2000 for the van - he never did. I was the executor of the will. I got the bills and the debt. And an annuity of $4000 - so really - totally split down the middle......or not. Its just stuff, right?
I called them a few times during the year and always spoke to my sister in law - he never wanted to speak to me. But, in one loud horrible telephone fight my brother said I was a pushy domineering bitch who had to run everyones life and I ruined Dad's. Apparently I always have been. I forced Dad to move to a place that he hated. I treated him horribly. I hung up first.
When the ground thawed it was time to bury the cremains. I had the funeral home dig up my Mom's ashes and mix in my Dad's so that they would always be together. Sweet but also very financially practical (you know, if you are making plans of that nature...). My sisterinlaw wanted to know if there would be anyone speaking graveside. I said I didn't want to (frankly I just couldn't) but she and my brother could feel free - they brought a minister from their church.
We arrived on the day just close family - Dad's brother, his wife and his sister, close cousins, my Aunt, my husband and I - and no kids (hello - its a cemetary and my kids were 1 and 4). The minister spoke - can't remember what he said... My sister in law read 4 full pages of typed bible verse. We were all a little stunned by that and no one knew just what to say. She asked if anyone else would like to say anything and one of my Aunt Jean's (I have 4) spoke a few sentences about when they were kids.
Then it was my bother's turn. He talked of all the times that they had spent together driving back and forth to the doctor... and of how Dad had accepted his illness. He talked of the difficulty of providing him with his groceries and how hard it was for he and my sister in law to take care of Dad. He talked of how near the end of his life Dad had found Jesus Christ as his personal saviour and accepted that he would be with him in heaven.
I tell you what - I was gobsmacked. None of those things happened. Not once. My cousins and Aunts and Uncle all stood with their mouthes open. Afterwards at Tim Hortons (because where the hell else would we go after - really? Seriously?) they all said that they knew it had been me and not Craig. My response was this - we all need to believe what we need to believe to get ourselves by. My brother needs to believe that I am a bitch and that he is the great saviour son so that he can cope with his Dad being dead. I'm going to give him that one.
In the 6 years since I have tried to keep in touch - cards, emails, calls, never forgot a birthday.... And now that he and my sister in law are divorcing, I have heard from her that he truly hates me and never wants to see me again. Why? I don't know and I don't care. I have a relationship with the SIL and my neice and nephews and its all I am going to get I guess. My Dad would be super mad (and lets not even think how angry my Mom would be!) if he knew that we are "estranged" but hey, I did my best - I truly believe I did. And you have to believe what you have to believe to get you through stuff - right?
So lets see how this goes - lets choose a topic for the day. Hmmm. Let's choose family.
You know I have parents, who are dead. So needless to say I haven't seen a lot of them lately. I have a brother. He's an interesting one. But we are "estranged" - I just like that word because it sounds cool and kind of like we are in a french detective novel. How did that happen? That's a good story.
About 6 years ago my Dad got sick. His leg was so sore he could hardly walk. Turns out he had end stage lung cancer that had metasticized into his bones. At the time when the doctors gave him 6 months to live, he was living in Goderich, about a 3 hour drive from where I live. Since he couldn't drive, and needed to be closer to civilization, hospitals, etc. I convinced him to move to Stratford, into a ground floor apartment.
At this point, I had been driving from Ajax to Stratford (just 2 hours each way!) once or twice a week. I drove Dad to all his doctors appointments, did the banking, bought the groceries and took him for lunch every week - even to the nasty Chinese Buffet in Mitchell that had all you can eat liver and onions and Chinese food! I also ran all those pesky get drugs and oxygen errands! Little things. I couldn't handle the other bits and peices so I arranged for meals on wheels 3 times a week and set him up with someone to come and clean.
Dad didn't much like meals on wheels. He said everything was tasteless and white. He was right - it totally was. So, I would make him his faves - chilli or lasagne and freeze them in margarine containers (cause the man had a million - he never threw anything away). I would haul these to Stratford on that wendesday too - take the empties and refill the freezer. He ate those at night and on the other days. Lots of people who visited brought him food too - I had SO SO SO much support from my great extended family!
Meanwhile, back at the trailer park, my brother and his family had moved in to my Dad's house. Good that it wasn't sitting empty. And since they only had one car and my Dad's van couldn't be driven (oxyconton and driving don't mix my friends!) why wouldn't they use Dad's van too? It just made sense.
So, on we go with the illness - and my brother did visit Dad - I'll give him that much. Once every couple of weeks he'd try to haul dad out of the apartment in his wheelchair to church. Now, my Dad was NOT a churchgoing guy. He used to say that he went to the round church - so the devil couldn't corner him. Oh no, not when people asked him about church - he just used to say that all the time!!! But, my brother was really involved in the church - he was a lay minister at the correctional centre and big into the Dutch Christian Reform Church. Or was it the Baptist church that week? Maybe it was the Pentacostals. He was an equal opportunity religious freak.
Dad didn't like going to church. It made him angry for the whole week. But, since my Dad did think until the day he died that the sun shone out of my brother's ass and lit up the world, he went because it was his son!
Long story shorter - on the night my Dad is dying (which by the way was 6 months and 2 days after the doctors told him!) - we show up at the hospital and so do my brother and his wife. Sit up all night waiting for Dad to stop breathing. Seriously. Just the 4 of us sitting there in the most surreal horrific firghtening circumstance, waiting for my father to stop breathing. It was one of those awful awful things that you never would wish on your worst enemy. I literally sat there making deals with God - saying "please let this be the last one" and "no don't" "yes please just put him out of his misery - please just let it stop".
Morning rolls around and my Dad is still breathing when his fuckwit of a doctor shows up. Is there anything we can do I ask to help him go, well, frankly, faster - he seems to be suffering so much? Yes, the doctor says - you could just take away the oxygen mask. Take it off and he will die in minutes not hours. Will he be in pain? Will he suffer? No - he has medication for the pain and we won't stop it. So the four of us talk and basically the three of them say - whatever you want to do - like we are picking a restaurant for dinner or something. So, its my decision. My decision when Dad dies. And let me tell you, just because you can make decisions doesn't make you a bitch - it makes you decisive.
So yes. Lets do it. Lets help him go. I took off the mask. The nurse shut the ozygen off. And the room was silent with the exception of Dad's laboured breaths. My brother and sister in law said "okay well this could take a while, we're going to get some breakfast" and they left. They left us there. And it took about 3 minutes. My husband held my hand as I watched him stop breathing. There was no dramatic death rattle or last big gasp. He just stopped like the timer had literally ran out. And Wayne left me with him alone for 10 minutes while he went to find a nurse in the cursed understaffed hospital. And I sat with my dead father and screamed that silent scream in my head that you are sure that people can actually hear but they can't. I sat and just let the tears fall down my face without wiping them away. I couldn't function.
But, when everyone was back, I was okay. I made the calls. I made the arrangements. No funeral. Immediate cremation. He and I had talked about it many many times and even met with the funeral home. If people hadn't come to visit him when he was alive, he sure as hell didn't want them showing up when he was dead. Funny old fart.
We had a party at his apartment. And everyone ate my aunt's dainties (since it was days before Christmas) and laughed and, I hope, had a good time.
On Christmas day we always have a dinner with my big extended family. My brother didn't show or call. We waited for over an hour for him before eating. The next week we cleaned out the apartment. I kept the photos and let my brother and family and friends have everything else. I kept telling myself it was just stuff. Funny, now I think I should have fought for some of the stuff.
My brother got the house. And the van. Although my Dad did ask my brother to pay me $2000 for the van - he never did. I was the executor of the will. I got the bills and the debt. And an annuity of $4000 - so really - totally split down the middle......or not. Its just stuff, right?
I called them a few times during the year and always spoke to my sister in law - he never wanted to speak to me. But, in one loud horrible telephone fight my brother said I was a pushy domineering bitch who had to run everyones life and I ruined Dad's. Apparently I always have been. I forced Dad to move to a place that he hated. I treated him horribly. I hung up first.
When the ground thawed it was time to bury the cremains. I had the funeral home dig up my Mom's ashes and mix in my Dad's so that they would always be together. Sweet but also very financially practical (you know, if you are making plans of that nature...). My sisterinlaw wanted to know if there would be anyone speaking graveside. I said I didn't want to (frankly I just couldn't) but she and my brother could feel free - they brought a minister from their church.
We arrived on the day just close family - Dad's brother, his wife and his sister, close cousins, my Aunt, my husband and I - and no kids (hello - its a cemetary and my kids were 1 and 4). The minister spoke - can't remember what he said... My sister in law read 4 full pages of typed bible verse. We were all a little stunned by that and no one knew just what to say. She asked if anyone else would like to say anything and one of my Aunt Jean's (I have 4) spoke a few sentences about when they were kids.
Then it was my bother's turn. He talked of all the times that they had spent together driving back and forth to the doctor... and of how Dad had accepted his illness. He talked of the difficulty of providing him with his groceries and how hard it was for he and my sister in law to take care of Dad. He talked of how near the end of his life Dad had found Jesus Christ as his personal saviour and accepted that he would be with him in heaven.
I tell you what - I was gobsmacked. None of those things happened. Not once. My cousins and Aunts and Uncle all stood with their mouthes open. Afterwards at Tim Hortons (because where the hell else would we go after - really? Seriously?) they all said that they knew it had been me and not Craig. My response was this - we all need to believe what we need to believe to get ourselves by. My brother needs to believe that I am a bitch and that he is the great saviour son so that he can cope with his Dad being dead. I'm going to give him that one.
In the 6 years since I have tried to keep in touch - cards, emails, calls, never forgot a birthday.... And now that he and my sister in law are divorcing, I have heard from her that he truly hates me and never wants to see me again. Why? I don't know and I don't care. I have a relationship with the SIL and my neice and nephews and its all I am going to get I guess. My Dad would be super mad (and lets not even think how angry my Mom would be!) if he knew that we are "estranged" but hey, I did my best - I truly believe I did. And you have to believe what you have to believe to get you through stuff - right?
Friday, May 11, 2007
Funeral Pickles
About 17 years ago my Grandmother died. It wasn't any huge shock or great tragic event. She had been sick and old since I was born and it just seemed like she wasn't really "there" anyway.
Her name was Mary. When she was 16 she married my Grandfather Alvin. The two of them lived in a farmhouse in Embro, population 60. Six of those 60 people were her kids. Each and every one of them born in the stone farmhouse, just down the road from the volunteer firestation.
The first time my Mother met my father's parents (who were by any definition of the word "hicks") my Dad brought her to dinner in that farmhouse. Everything took place in the kitchen - the woodstove heated the whole house and cooked all the meals. Later, when they had tv, that would be in the kitchen as well. My mother met them in that kitchen.
My Dad, knowing my Mom was really nervous asked her what she though they were having for dinner - what could she smell? Well, my mother had no idea. Dad said, open the woodstove and check. No way was my mother brought up to open other people's ovens - but with Dad's family watching her - she really had no choice.
So as my mother told the story, she walked to the woodstove with everyone staring at her, opened it up and SCREAMED! Inside a wooden box lined with a towel were half a dozen live piglets! The sow had given birth that morning and they were keeping them in the woodstove because it was winter and no one wanted them to freeze. Of course they were. And dinner was sandwiches. It scared her to death. Actually, thinking about it now, its a wonder she ever at pork again!
Back to Grandma's funeral. My boyfriend, now my husband, and I drove to Stratford then followed my parents to Embro along the snowy back roads. This place is the bermuda triangle of the snowbelt and has some really wicked winter weather. Really bad. And, as we were driving our mustang to the funeral, we drove off of the road and into a ditch.
Because my parents were up ahead, of course they didn't see us get ditched. The just drove along on their merry way.
I suppose that I could have pushed the car, if I really wanted to, in my funeral suit and sensible pumps. But I didn't want to. So Wayne, in his funeral suit and dress shoes, got out and pushed us out of the ditch. We made the funeral in the nick of time although its not like she was going anywhere.
Six months later, at my Auntie Anna's funeral in Embro (my Dad's sister) we had more car troubles. At the burial at the cemetary in town (I know you are thinking 60 people? how could they need a cemetary? but they did!) my parent's locked their keys in their van. Of course everyone had already left by the time they figured it out and this was well before the time of cell phones. Eventually someone missed them and went back to help them out.
The point I'm trying to make is that in my family - the funeral itself is never the event. Its the coming and going that are the things you remember. The bright greenish blue sweet funeral pickles that the ladies of the legion make and serve at funerals. That's the memory maker!
A couple of years ago in a drunken diatribe I said to my friends - "when I go, you will all remember what a good person I was - what a great mom and an excellent friend. You're not going to sit around saying she kept the messiest house ever!" And shockingly one said - "Oh yes we will! We say that now!" I just hope that when my time does come someone goes into the ditch, locks their keys in the car and the guy that thinks I'm a terrible housekeeper chokes on a funeral pickle!
Her name was Mary. When she was 16 she married my Grandfather Alvin. The two of them lived in a farmhouse in Embro, population 60. Six of those 60 people were her kids. Each and every one of them born in the stone farmhouse, just down the road from the volunteer firestation.
The first time my Mother met my father's parents (who were by any definition of the word "hicks") my Dad brought her to dinner in that farmhouse. Everything took place in the kitchen - the woodstove heated the whole house and cooked all the meals. Later, when they had tv, that would be in the kitchen as well. My mother met them in that kitchen.
My Dad, knowing my Mom was really nervous asked her what she though they were having for dinner - what could she smell? Well, my mother had no idea. Dad said, open the woodstove and check. No way was my mother brought up to open other people's ovens - but with Dad's family watching her - she really had no choice.
So as my mother told the story, she walked to the woodstove with everyone staring at her, opened it up and SCREAMED! Inside a wooden box lined with a towel were half a dozen live piglets! The sow had given birth that morning and they were keeping them in the woodstove because it was winter and no one wanted them to freeze. Of course they were. And dinner was sandwiches. It scared her to death. Actually, thinking about it now, its a wonder she ever at pork again!
Back to Grandma's funeral. My boyfriend, now my husband, and I drove to Stratford then followed my parents to Embro along the snowy back roads. This place is the bermuda triangle of the snowbelt and has some really wicked winter weather. Really bad. And, as we were driving our mustang to the funeral, we drove off of the road and into a ditch.
Because my parents were up ahead, of course they didn't see us get ditched. The just drove along on their merry way.
I suppose that I could have pushed the car, if I really wanted to, in my funeral suit and sensible pumps. But I didn't want to. So Wayne, in his funeral suit and dress shoes, got out and pushed us out of the ditch. We made the funeral in the nick of time although its not like she was going anywhere.
Six months later, at my Auntie Anna's funeral in Embro (my Dad's sister) we had more car troubles. At the burial at the cemetary in town (I know you are thinking 60 people? how could they need a cemetary? but they did!) my parent's locked their keys in their van. Of course everyone had already left by the time they figured it out and this was well before the time of cell phones. Eventually someone missed them and went back to help them out.
The point I'm trying to make is that in my family - the funeral itself is never the event. Its the coming and going that are the things you remember. The bright greenish blue sweet funeral pickles that the ladies of the legion make and serve at funerals. That's the memory maker!
A couple of years ago in a drunken diatribe I said to my friends - "when I go, you will all remember what a good person I was - what a great mom and an excellent friend. You're not going to sit around saying she kept the messiest house ever!" And shockingly one said - "Oh yes we will! We say that now!" I just hope that when my time does come someone goes into the ditch, locks their keys in the car and the guy that thinks I'm a terrible housekeeper chokes on a funeral pickle!
Tuesday, May 1, 2007
Big Pig Party
There comes a time in every fag hags career that you get the opportunity to choose to take one road or another with your friends. For those of you who don't know, let me explain how this works. Each hag is allotted one or more faggots. Sometimes a lot - sometimes a little - sometimes it depends on the season or the location. Faggots tend to be tempremental so, they tend to come and go.
I have been blessed with the greatest set of friends. And yes, they have come and gone through the years. Its only natural really.
Out of the group you are given, you may be truly blessed and have a very best friend. Sometimes its a bff (best friend forever) or a best girlfriend - depends on the guy really. I have been the luckiest bitch alive and have the best bff ever. But like I said, every trip has that road that gives you the opportunity to make a choice.
Many many years ago my family had what would go down in history as our worst family reunion ever. We had it at my cousin's cottage on Lake Huron - a beautiful place - right on the lake. My family brought our trailer (yes we had a trailer - why?) and I brought my best friend Rick. We took the train from Toronto to Stratford and drove with my parents the rest of the way - neither of us could drive then. I must have been about 24.
Rick and I always tell people that we met at a party: I buzzed the door and he answered it, made me laugh and I've never left his side since. For all intents and purposes, that's right. But it was more intense than than really. At that very first party, I got to the apartment - demanded to know who had answered the buzzer and didn't let him out of my sight that whole night. He made me laugh. I made him laugh. And at the end of those 2 or 3 hours I'd found the other half of my brain!
My mother adored Rick. He could do no wrong in her eyes and as a matter of fact, I think she is the only person that has ever ever said to me, "too bad he's gay". She always made sure to make him is favourite meal (these really disgusting super sweet spare ribs) whenever he came to town and treated him like the sun shone out of his ass and lit up the world. Sometimes I still think it does.
Anyway, we went to the cottage on Saturday. There was no room in the family trailer for Rick and I so we were sleeping in my cousins old tent trailer. As a matter of fact, my Uncle Chub had made the tent trailer himself so it was a homemade tent trailer - nothing classier than a home made trailer! And Uncle Chub is a whole other story.
Saturday was a fun play day at the lake. We swam out forever over the sandbars that go on forever out into the lake. We played in the inner tubes. We sat on the beach. We played volley ball. We did everything that we could wedge in. Dinner was bbqed something - but the best part was actually sitting around the fire later. We sat with my whole extended family - joking around, laughing at nothing and of course eating marshmallows and weiners on a stick.
When we finally stumbled to bed, we decided to put the sleeping bags together and sleep on the one bed, mattresses stacked in the name of comfort.
We talked until we fell asleep - mostly about nothing. This was something we did all the time - and still do. We get on the phone and talk about everything, nothing, people, places and things until one of us falls asleep and the other one has the good sense to hang up or fall asleep too.
I remember so clearly being just happy. Happy-happy-happy that night.
In the morning I awoke to Rick's horrific snoring. We were laying there face to face. At that point, he had long hair - beautiful naturally blondish and curly. I stared at his face, and even with those beautiful blue eyes closed, he was quite the most gorgeous man I'd ever seen.
And he loves me and I love him. And it wasn't of course in the traditional way that I always imagined someone would love me. There were no trumpets blaring and butterflies in my stomach. He didn't kiss me with a burning white hot passion. And of course there would never be sex.
He wasn't tall dark and handsome and riding on a white horse. He wasn't going to shower me with gifts. He was a vain, slutty, man-whore with an intollerance for people who ask questions. He lived life with no apology for who or what he is and who or what he does. He was hysterically funny and kind of mean. But then, as now, he is all I needed and in a totally untraditional way, he completed me - so sappy but true.
He was laying there beside me and I watched him sleep. I felt such overwhelming love. That very minute - that very day - that was when I decided that person who made me so very happy - that person was the love of my life. I would never let that go - no matter what.
During the day my family showed up in droves. Cousins, Uncles and Aunts from all over southwestern Ontario. My Mom and my cousins started to roast the WHOLE PIG over a fire. People brought the traditional Southwestern Ontario summer buffet foods: devilled eggs, jellied salads, many things with mayonaise and baked beans. All went nicely with the pig - right?
Rick and I did the same things we had done the day before and it was so fun.
Rick is a great person to introduce to any family. I have seriously in the 20+ years I've known him never heard anyone say that they don't like him. He makes a great first impression and I really admire that about him. Sometimes what I do is just watch him be him. As sad as that is it can be enough fun for me!
Supper came and we, of course were the first person to get to that big pig. Of course we were because my mother idolized Rick and whatever she could do to please him - like feed him - she would! We got our plate filled - loved it and....... hey - what was wrong with the pig? Well, apparently you need to cook a pig a hell of a lot longer than my family did! We and about 6 other people got the only edible cooked pork. The rest was a jellified jiggly salmonella filled mess. It ended up being mostly a vegetarian reunion. This in my family qualified as an unmitigated DISASTER!
We got back in the car, back on the train and home again - that part I know happened but don't really remember well. The thing about that weekend that makes it one of those times that I never forget is the sheer joy of being just who I was with just who I was with. My family and my very best friend.
That road you are given and the opportunity to make the choices - it is well worth travelling. Do we ever find love often enough that we should ever turn it way? Whatever form it takes whatever its length or its intesity, it is always worth taking that risk.
I have been blessed with the greatest set of friends. And yes, they have come and gone through the years. Its only natural really.
Out of the group you are given, you may be truly blessed and have a very best friend. Sometimes its a bff (best friend forever) or a best girlfriend - depends on the guy really. I have been the luckiest bitch alive and have the best bff ever. But like I said, every trip has that road that gives you the opportunity to make a choice.
Many many years ago my family had what would go down in history as our worst family reunion ever. We had it at my cousin's cottage on Lake Huron - a beautiful place - right on the lake. My family brought our trailer (yes we had a trailer - why?) and I brought my best friend Rick. We took the train from Toronto to Stratford and drove with my parents the rest of the way - neither of us could drive then. I must have been about 24.
Rick and I always tell people that we met at a party: I buzzed the door and he answered it, made me laugh and I've never left his side since. For all intents and purposes, that's right. But it was more intense than than really. At that very first party, I got to the apartment - demanded to know who had answered the buzzer and didn't let him out of my sight that whole night. He made me laugh. I made him laugh. And at the end of those 2 or 3 hours I'd found the other half of my brain!
My mother adored Rick. He could do no wrong in her eyes and as a matter of fact, I think she is the only person that has ever ever said to me, "too bad he's gay". She always made sure to make him is favourite meal (these really disgusting super sweet spare ribs) whenever he came to town and treated him like the sun shone out of his ass and lit up the world. Sometimes I still think it does.
Anyway, we went to the cottage on Saturday. There was no room in the family trailer for Rick and I so we were sleeping in my cousins old tent trailer. As a matter of fact, my Uncle Chub had made the tent trailer himself so it was a homemade tent trailer - nothing classier than a home made trailer! And Uncle Chub is a whole other story.
Saturday was a fun play day at the lake. We swam out forever over the sandbars that go on forever out into the lake. We played in the inner tubes. We sat on the beach. We played volley ball. We did everything that we could wedge in. Dinner was bbqed something - but the best part was actually sitting around the fire later. We sat with my whole extended family - joking around, laughing at nothing and of course eating marshmallows and weiners on a stick.
When we finally stumbled to bed, we decided to put the sleeping bags together and sleep on the one bed, mattresses stacked in the name of comfort.
We talked until we fell asleep - mostly about nothing. This was something we did all the time - and still do. We get on the phone and talk about everything, nothing, people, places and things until one of us falls asleep and the other one has the good sense to hang up or fall asleep too.
I remember so clearly being just happy. Happy-happy-happy that night.
In the morning I awoke to Rick's horrific snoring. We were laying there face to face. At that point, he had long hair - beautiful naturally blondish and curly. I stared at his face, and even with those beautiful blue eyes closed, he was quite the most gorgeous man I'd ever seen.
And he loves me and I love him. And it wasn't of course in the traditional way that I always imagined someone would love me. There were no trumpets blaring and butterflies in my stomach. He didn't kiss me with a burning white hot passion. And of course there would never be sex.
He wasn't tall dark and handsome and riding on a white horse. He wasn't going to shower me with gifts. He was a vain, slutty, man-whore with an intollerance for people who ask questions. He lived life with no apology for who or what he is and who or what he does. He was hysterically funny and kind of mean. But then, as now, he is all I needed and in a totally untraditional way, he completed me - so sappy but true.
He was laying there beside me and I watched him sleep. I felt such overwhelming love. That very minute - that very day - that was when I decided that person who made me so very happy - that person was the love of my life. I would never let that go - no matter what.
During the day my family showed up in droves. Cousins, Uncles and Aunts from all over southwestern Ontario. My Mom and my cousins started to roast the WHOLE PIG over a fire. People brought the traditional Southwestern Ontario summer buffet foods: devilled eggs, jellied salads, many things with mayonaise and baked beans. All went nicely with the pig - right?
Rick and I did the same things we had done the day before and it was so fun.
Rick is a great person to introduce to any family. I have seriously in the 20+ years I've known him never heard anyone say that they don't like him. He makes a great first impression and I really admire that about him. Sometimes what I do is just watch him be him. As sad as that is it can be enough fun for me!
Supper came and we, of course were the first person to get to that big pig. Of course we were because my mother idolized Rick and whatever she could do to please him - like feed him - she would! We got our plate filled - loved it and....... hey - what was wrong with the pig? Well, apparently you need to cook a pig a hell of a lot longer than my family did! We and about 6 other people got the only edible cooked pork. The rest was a jellified jiggly salmonella filled mess. It ended up being mostly a vegetarian reunion. This in my family qualified as an unmitigated DISASTER!
We got back in the car, back on the train and home again - that part I know happened but don't really remember well. The thing about that weekend that makes it one of those times that I never forget is the sheer joy of being just who I was with just who I was with. My family and my very best friend.
That road you are given and the opportunity to make the choices - it is well worth travelling. Do we ever find love often enough that we should ever turn it way? Whatever form it takes whatever its length or its intesity, it is always worth taking that risk.
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