Car Talk

Before graduation, the morning commute was difficult enough, what with the intricacies of locating a suitable project for show and tell that wouldn't shine a humbling light on my housekeeping skills, and deciding who gets the cottage cheese sandwich, and finding out just who fed the rest of the ham to the fish anyway. Well, that and locating lost shoes in the trash compactor.

Throw into the mix the fact that to avoid being late we had to take the route through the well-to-do wildlife-infested subdivision across the street, and the whole adventure was unsettling. Sure, there are smiley Katie Couric types who think chipmunks are always making ball gowns for aspiring cartoon princesses, but in my experience the wretched woodland creatures while away their time making great sport of playing “keep away” with my car. More than once, I hung the blame for my tardiness on a hearty game of Squirrel Tag.

This year, both boys will attend Community College, which seems carefree enough. But between the three of us, we have two cars. Finding a way to work in the morning will be like playing musical chairs at sixty miles per hour. Sit down at the wrong time and you could block the passing lane for three hours and get national exposure on the six o’clock news. I’m willing to make sacrifices for my children’s education, but I don’t want to deal with the physical distress that kind of road rage could cause.

So I’m left playing Merry Go Round the family Kia with Click and Clack, the car stalkers. I figure my best chance for reliable transportation this fall will be hijacking a grocery cart from the Piggly Wiggly and riding it skateboard style down the Interstate. It may not be the most efficient method, but every Prius on the road will be mad with envy at my gas mileage.

On the other hand, I could hang out on the corner every morning waiting for the Magic School Bus to give me a lift, but I don’t think Miss Frizzle’s driveway goes all the way to the bus stop.

I try to comfort myself with the idea that in a few short years, both boys will be self-sufficient and independent with good jobs and cars of their own. In the meantime, I’ll have to careful when taking the shortcut through Squirrel Ville. One wrong turn and Cinderella's furry little dressmakers will be out of commission. Which is okay with me. She's already got a dress to wear and I'm not even invited to the party.

But I wonder if she'll let me borrow her pumpkin to get to work on Monday.

*Please note that no woodland creatures were harmed during the writing of this essay.

Teenage Heroes

I got tagged by Erika, my favorite editor, and hardworking and talented developer of The Wham Magazine, for a meme that's thought provoking enough to make me set down my jelly doughnut and think for several seconds at a time. Why do I like to work at home?

I have a part-time job away from home. So why do I worry and work and stay up so late that people think the racoon rings around my eyes are permanetly etched on, laboring to get my at-home writing base up to speed?

Just now there are four teenaged boys in my living room. Their names are Twinkie, Fatt, Mini, and Seth. I’m not sure why they don’t call Seth by a nickname unless it’s because A) he has one, but I’m too old and parently-impaired to be allowed to hear it, or B) there’s not one awesome enough for a boy who can play the guitar with more ease than the rest of us strain spaghetti.

At present these guys are profoundly affected by the actions of several multi-colored creatures cavorting in cartoon-like battle rage on the television screen. Although they will all be eligible to vote come November, right now the actions of a round pink fellow with large, engaging eyes is more important to them than the actions of any of the candidates engaged in the brawl that is this year’s race for President of the United States. If any of the candidates ran on the Wii platform, they would secure the vote of teenagers all across the nation, and probably a few write-ins from outlying territories.

Following is a conversation taken from these actual teenaged boys. (Teenaged girls take note—these are authentic sounds used for communication in the wild. Not once did the subject of hair, nails, or what to wear to the mall enter into the conversation.)

Psychologists might make much of the fact that these guys seem preoccupied with death. But it’s nothing that a Care Package consisting of sodas and pizza can’t cure. Toss a bag of bite-size candy bars in the mix and they’ll swarm like yellow jackets in a State Park picnic zone. And there’s at least one of them that I know is partial to peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with the crusts cut off.

“We’re all gonna die!”

“Stop shooting me!”

“Ow! Stop killing me!”

"Dude!"

Silence broken only by the bip boop bang of electronic battle noises backed by cartoon music.

“Run in fear!”

“Where am I? I found me! I lost me!”

“I killed myself off by accident!”

“I’m not dead yet!”

“We’re all gonna die!”

“Am I dead?”

“Run!” (Various colored creatures dash in different directions like a box of Crayolas kicked across the playroom floor. Think Pac Man on speed.)

Eventually, these young men grow weary and tired of the trauma of death by colored laser blasts. Then they switch to a challenge that involves a miniature guitar and more colored notes onscreen than sprinkles on a sugar cookie. One of them wields the guitar like a superwizard wields a magic wand, and the powers of good and evil hang in the balance. The others watch in awe and I stop in the middle of my essay on grieving hearts to see this kid play a toy guitar like Clapton performing Cocaine. The song ends in onscreen applause and real life respectful silence broken only by a hushed, "Dude!"

So why do I like to work at home? Because I get interrupted mid-project by gangland activity fueled by carbonated beverages that I just brought home from the grocery store. Because food disappears from the refrigerator like I have an automatic Hoover installation in the door. Because it won’t be long before these young men have families and responsible jobs and haircuts that don’t touch the collar of their pinstriped suits.

So for now, I’ll plan to do a little extra work later on tonight so I can stop to cheer for a fifty note run in a song that was famous when I was in high school.

And maybe I’ll make a peanut butter sandwich and cut the crusts off.

Cart Wheeling

Not long ago, I had a near-death experience in the grocery store. I was bending over to check out Mrs. Fields’ fat grams when a woman wielding a grocery cart like it was a runaway bumper car rounded the corner on two wheels. If it weren’t for quick thinking on my part, I might have required a trip to the Crisco aisle to disengage that buggy from my body. For a second I thought I saw a bright light, but it turned out to be Register Six calling for assistance. Later, when I got lapped in frozen foods by a gray-haired granny with a number 5 pasted on the side of her grocery cart, I could see the need for a list of safety rules posted in a conspicuous place, perhaps tattooed on Little Debbie’s left cheek. With that thought in mind, I offer 8 Simple Rules for a Successful Supermarket Experience.
Show proper care for your vehicle. For the safety of everyone on the floor, do not select a buggy with uncooperative steering that can be guided only by a team of Iditarod sled dogs. Also, be on the lookout for features that may interrupt the aerodynamics of the cart such as toddlers left over from a previous shopper.
When perusing different item choices on the supermarket floor, please be sure to park only in traditionally acceptable parking areas. Nobody cares if you set up camp in front of internal organs in the meat department, but if you pause to check the fat content in the cookie aisle, we will forcibly transport you to the dairy case and secure you to the yogurt section with string cheese.
Please observe crowd-friendly speed limits. I know you’re in a hurry to rush home and get those tacos on the table, but don’t careen around the corners so fast that you initiate a forceful meeting between Betty Crocker and Orville Redenbacher.
Practice defensive shopping. Try to remember that there are people with immediate dietary concerns that may require them to effect a sudden stop in front of you to compare chocolate chip content on the cookie aisle. Likewise, you must understand that if you stop in the middle of the aisle while trying to decide between creamy and crunchy, you are likely to become a temporary member of the fresh fruit display. Take heart in the fact that kumquats should not do any permanent damage to your complexion.
Please show concern for the safety of other shoppers. Do not execute a sudden lane change without at least warning the gentleman who is presently rolling his cart over the heels of your Reeboks that he may suddenly find himself neck deep in summer squash. Likewise, don’t speed up suddenly, causing the six-year-old boy who is riding below the cart in front of you like a mudflap on an tractor-trailer to wrap around your front wheel like freshly chewed bubblegum.
Do not accelerate like Richard Petty on the straightaway at Talledega to beat me to the Express Lane, especially if your buggy is loaded like a Conastoga and you’re counting all 24 cans of Little Friskies as one item to make the 10-item limit, and all I’m carrying is a gallon of milk, two packs of Ho Ho’s, and a box of Ben & Jerry’s that has created a layer of freezer burn up to my elbow. I have killed for less than that.
Remember to return your buggy to the cart corral after you load your car. You may feel justified in aiming it toward the gate and assuming it will roll downhill to the target by itself, but let me assure you that grocery carts are not domesticated animals and will take every opportunity to separate from the pack and make a break for freedom. Lassie is not available to pull the buggy from quicksand, a well, or the tailpipe of a new Jaguar that happens to be in its path. The aftermath of the ensuing chaos will involve your insurance, and this is one case when the term “deductible” might be unsetttling.
Most importantly, steer clear of the lady dressed in a New York Yankees T-Shirt, stretch pants, and flip flops, who is wringing her hands and doing laps with a cart that contains two boxes of Ding Dongs and a frozen pizza. It’s me and I can’t decide what to have for supper.

Global Warming

When you’re four years old and heading off on important candy-gathering venture at Halloween, global warming seems like a pretty good idea. Global warming means you don’t have to wear an undershirt, six sweaters, and an overcoat with your costume. Outerwear is notoriously rough on angel’s wings and dampens the effect of a howling demon on passers by. Let’s face it. The Author of Death clad in a blue snowsuit and lambie mittens is just not as unsettling as initially intended.

So I never really had a problem with global warming until I reached a Responsible Age. Now I realize I probably caused the whole trouble myself. I produced two boys, gummily attractive in a no-teeth, drooly kind of way, who as babies seemed harmless enough sucking cereal from a spoon and wearing little diapers with cartoon characters printed in blue on the front. (How much trouble could a size zero hiney be, anyway? Of course now we have Paris Hilton, Allegra Versace, and pre-baby Nicole Ritchie to serve as benchmarks, but back then we just didn’t know.)

Anyway, I’ve read about the amount of methane produced by all the cows in the world, except the ones in India that are sacred, and I think my guys can beat that number without straining. The three teenaged boys in the backseat (we threw in an extra cousin just to make it interesting) on the way to the Fair this weekend cheekily counted the number of times the term “excuse me” came into play. We were nearing triple digits, which even allowing for exaggeration and downright bragging, is a pretty impressive number. I’ve decided I’m going to give up raising children and buy stock in a dairy farm. It’s easier on the environment.