Popcorn for breakfast. That's our catch-phrase for "Wanna go see a movie?" We go seldom, and always to the early weekend matinee---we can go WAY up to the back row against the wall, pick the three aisle seats (one each, and one for his hat and any other items).
And I HATE purses. Haven't carried one since about 1986. I just stick a lipstick in my left pocket, money and ID in the right (in a handy little plastic Ziploc), hang my reading glasses in the neck of my shirt, and I'm good to go.
And we almost always get what the kids call "nine-dollar popcorn." But occasionally I'll pocket a baggie of M&M's from home---heavenly sprinkled into the bag, then unearthed warm and melty with a handful of buttery corn. We've even been known to hit the McDonald's drive-through for a double-cheese and try to waft them past the ticket-folks before the scent gives us away.
My best smuggle was a couple of years ago. We had stopped at a fast-food place for a bite of lunch, then headed off to the movie. We always hit the drink dispenser for a little topoff before leaving those places, and so we had two nice medium Dr. Peppers in the cupholder in the car. As we got out of the car to go buy our tickets, I said to heck with it---why buy their pricey sugarwater when these perfectly good drinks will be melted and practically boiling when we come back to this hot car.
So I stood between the car and a van and carefully inserted one drink into each side pocket. The chilly cups alongst my thighsides felt kind of nice on the hot trip to the door, as I walked casually past ticket-stand, ticket ripper and concession.
Then, came a wee problem. How to extract those two flimsy cups from my pants without catching the straws, popping off the tops, or anointing myself embarrassingly from hip to toe in sticky drink. I walked carefully into the ladies' room, past the big wall of mirrors, catching sight of my streetcar-wide hips and thinking that I could have taken my place in Marie Antoinette's entourage with those huge side-panniers I was sporting---all I needed was the birdnest in the big hair.
I closed myself into a stall, reached to the right, painfully extracted one cup with my fingertips. Then, where to set it, cause I needed both hands. The little metal box on the wall had a sloping top, so I had to set it there, sort of back my bottom up to it and hold it in place whilst I tried to get that other cup (now chillingly becoming painful) off my left hip. I reached gingerly into the pocket, and felt the "pop" of the lid as it disengaged from the cup.
Now trying to play a bizarre game of Twister in a stall too small to turn around successfully, I managed to get top and straw out, stick the straw between my teeth, and waiting every moment for that chill flood of Pepper down my leg, I stood in a sidewise Mummenschantz posture, gently held the rim of the cup, and pulled upward with the care of a member of the bomb squad watching that blue-number countdown.
It slid free, I managed to snap lid on cup, rotate myself toward the hip-held drink, retrieve it, and exit the stall. To the fascinated stares of two elderly ladies who were obviously in great wonderment of how I managed to tend to the order of bathroom things whilst holding two full cups.
Or the chilling thought of what might be in them.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
NAMING NAMES
Sis is here---she’s showering, after a breakfast of brought-in pastries and donut holes, with a little pink smoked porkchop apiece, sizzled in a dry skillet for just long enough to make them warm and soft. Their salty porkiness was perfect with the sweet yeasty pastries.
There’s a slow Summer rain, it’s just us ladies for the day, and our BabyGirl is mesmerized with Elmo’s great agility in counting-to-ten. She’s confident, herself, up to one-two-three-four-five, then falters a little and mouths the rest along with the bright red tutor-of-all-things-toddler.
We’re just cocooning for today, looking through musty old boxes of famiy pictures. Sis did the genealogy several years ago, and thus, by her hard work and dedication (she spent a week in Salt Lake City, in those archives which seem to keep track of every single person ever to be born or come settle on American soil)---I have a lot of names to go with the family tales and memories handed down by the older women of the family, especially our Mammaw.
And we’re determined to write some NAMES on the backs of these pictures. There were so few photographed moments in the lives of all these forebear faces captured in black-and-white, some whispering away in places like dissolving smoke, and quite a few faded into sepia. It makes me sad that looking through the dusty boxes leaves me with puzzlement and a gentle pang of regret that so many faces are now unnameable and forgotten.
Perhaps we can link Second Cousin Thelma’s resemblance to her Mama’s face, and name Aunt Laverne by the eyebrows of “The Murdock Side.” I wish, I wish for the foresight to have done this when those who knew them and loved them and grew up as sisters and cousins with them were still able to pick up a photo, give a little whuff of vapor onto bifocals, wipe the lenses on a skirt-hem, and smile a smile of recognition of a face long lost to time.
But we’ve missed that. The window has closed, as have all the eyes which would have brightened in the remembering. With them went the connection of names and faces, and those of us who know them only by family lore and the spidery scribing in the withered Bible---we look at the women who were young and slim and full of life, and wish we’d known them. And more, we wish we knew them now---who they are, and how we're related to them.
So we’re visiting with a lot of people, both kin and friend, with a scatter of funeral flowers, my mother in her cap and gown, the small square tin likeness, framed in frivolous green vines and bearing the grim visage of Great-Grand Roma---her skimpy skinned-back bun and her downturned mouth reflecting the fashion of the times for old-lady garb and demeanor. And I’ll bet she was WAY on the young side of Fifty.
Sis just jubilantly commented that this is the picture that finally persuaded Mother to let her get her ears pierced, at sixteen. Sis had long wanted to take that next step, as had all her friends, but not until she unearthed the stiff little tintype with the unlikely garnish of little gold hoops flanking the solemn face, and went running to Mother saying “OOOO!! OOOO!! See thissss!” did Mother relent and take her to get the earrings installed.
No history being made today, but a lot remembered and savored, from this far remove in time and recognition. We’ll put names to the ones we can and look regretfully at the rest, and that will have to be enough.
There’s a slow Summer rain, it’s just us ladies for the day, and our BabyGirl is mesmerized with Elmo’s great agility in counting-to-ten. She’s confident, herself, up to one-two-three-four-five, then falters a little and mouths the rest along with the bright red tutor-of-all-things-toddler.
We’re just cocooning for today, looking through musty old boxes of famiy pictures. Sis did the genealogy several years ago, and thus, by her hard work and dedication (she spent a week in Salt Lake City, in those archives which seem to keep track of every single person ever to be born or come settle on American soil)---I have a lot of names to go with the family tales and memories handed down by the older women of the family, especially our Mammaw.
And we’re determined to write some NAMES on the backs of these pictures. There were so few photographed moments in the lives of all these forebear faces captured in black-and-white, some whispering away in places like dissolving smoke, and quite a few faded into sepia. It makes me sad that looking through the dusty boxes leaves me with puzzlement and a gentle pang of regret that so many faces are now unnameable and forgotten.
Perhaps we can link Second Cousin Thelma’s resemblance to her Mama’s face, and name Aunt Laverne by the eyebrows of “The Murdock Side.” I wish, I wish for the foresight to have done this when those who knew them and loved them and grew up as sisters and cousins with them were still able to pick up a photo, give a little whuff of vapor onto bifocals, wipe the lenses on a skirt-hem, and smile a smile of recognition of a face long lost to time.
But we’ve missed that. The window has closed, as have all the eyes which would have brightened in the remembering. With them went the connection of names and faces, and those of us who know them only by family lore and the spidery scribing in the withered Bible---we look at the women who were young and slim and full of life, and wish we’d known them. And more, we wish we knew them now---who they are, and how we're related to them.
So we’re visiting with a lot of people, both kin and friend, with a scatter of funeral flowers, my mother in her cap and gown, the small square tin likeness, framed in frivolous green vines and bearing the grim visage of Great-Grand Roma---her skimpy skinned-back bun and her downturned mouth reflecting the fashion of the times for old-lady garb and demeanor. And I’ll bet she was WAY on the young side of Fifty.
Sis just jubilantly commented that this is the picture that finally persuaded Mother to let her get her ears pierced, at sixteen. Sis had long wanted to take that next step, as had all her friends, but not until she unearthed the stiff little tintype with the unlikely garnish of little gold hoops flanking the solemn face, and went running to Mother saying “OOOO!! OOOO!! See thissss!” did Mother relent and take her to get the earrings installed.
No history being made today, but a lot remembered and savored, from this far remove in time and recognition. We’ll put names to the ones we can and look regretfully at the rest, and that will have to be enough.
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
FIREFLY AND SERENITY
A friend came in the door one day not long ago and presented us with his little treasure trove of DVD's---the entire series, plus the movie, all unexpected and more delicious for the surprise.
He simply said, "You'll LOVE this," and left it at that. We had spoken of "Firefly" a visit or two ago, and I had mentioned that brides on a wedding site had planned whole ceremonies, attire, receptions, honeymoons around the theme, from dustymud costumes to dialogue incorporated into the vows.
And we DID. We loved it. Chris and I spent five mesmerizing evenings aloft in that battlescarred old freighter made of tinkertoys and bolts, when not plummeting to ground in evasive maneuvers and actual crashings. The travels were adventurous, the people fun and mysterious and crabby and poignant and heroic by turns, the clothing and the language of another time far ago in our own world.
We were just carried away into the skies of the THEN and the THERE, friend to these remarkable people, enjoying their banter and their quirks, their dependence on each other and their fierce defense of their own territories and of each other. The battles and flights and odd worlds and villains and heroes were all exciting, but still peripheral to the moments around the communal table, the togetherness, the talk and the nourishment of bodies and souls in that one spot of illumination midst all the dark surrounds. They sat and ate, laughed and teased, toasted and remembered, insulated from all the cold dark in that one warm golden place lit by primitive means, holding all they could call their own.
They were a family, with branches so oddly different and yet so kin, tasting the hard-gained food, gaining strength from each other. The little decorations round the walls, the rough-hewn table, the dim recesses of the room blocked out by the lamplight---that was home for a time, and was warmth and light and kinship.
The acceptance of companions, of the make-do of the food, of the circumstances--those are the origins and the reinforcements of the unity and the loyalty which our NOW-world could stand to emulate. Shelter and food and companions---those have been the Grail sought by countless generations since we huddled over cave-fires. Clothing those blessings in elegance and luxury, in exotic tastes and savors, in boundless travels and abundance--that's available today.
Seeing the same necessities projected far into a future we won't inhabit, one that's still filled with so much seeking for the Good and the Right and the Beautiful---that's a wonderful thing to imagine and a bright legacy to hope for.
He simply said, "You'll LOVE this," and left it at that. We had spoken of "Firefly" a visit or two ago, and I had mentioned that brides on a wedding site had planned whole ceremonies, attire, receptions, honeymoons around the theme, from dustymud costumes to dialogue incorporated into the vows.
And we DID. We loved it. Chris and I spent five mesmerizing evenings aloft in that battlescarred old freighter made of tinkertoys and bolts, when not plummeting to ground in evasive maneuvers and actual crashings. The travels were adventurous, the people fun and mysterious and crabby and poignant and heroic by turns, the clothing and the language of another time far ago in our own world.
We were just carried away into the skies of the THEN and the THERE, friend to these remarkable people, enjoying their banter and their quirks, their dependence on each other and their fierce defense of their own territories and of each other. The battles and flights and odd worlds and villains and heroes were all exciting, but still peripheral to the moments around the communal table, the togetherness, the talk and the nourishment of bodies and souls in that one spot of illumination midst all the dark surrounds. They sat and ate, laughed and teased, toasted and remembered, insulated from all the cold dark in that one warm golden place lit by primitive means, holding all they could call their own.
They were a family, with branches so oddly different and yet so kin, tasting the hard-gained food, gaining strength from each other. The little decorations round the walls, the rough-hewn table, the dim recesses of the room blocked out by the lamplight---that was home for a time, and was warmth and light and kinship.
The acceptance of companions, of the make-do of the food, of the circumstances--those are the origins and the reinforcements of the unity and the loyalty which our NOW-world could stand to emulate. Shelter and food and companions---those have been the Grail sought by countless generations since we huddled over cave-fires. Clothing those blessings in elegance and luxury, in exotic tastes and savors, in boundless travels and abundance--that's available today.
Seeing the same necessities projected far into a future we won't inhabit, one that's still filled with so much seeking for the Good and the Right and the Beautiful---that's a wonderful thing to imagine and a bright legacy to hope for.
Monday, July 13, 2009
PASSAGES
I don't know how many of you follow in the "Comments" section, but one reader is often checking in, adding her sweet Southern voice to the conversations.
Tonja, whom I met when I also chose the name "GATHERINGS" for the name of my blog, lost her Mother yesterday, very suddenly and unexpectedly. My heart goes out to her family, and I send her my deepest sympathy and prayers for all of them in this time of sorrow and of celebration of a wonderful, well-lived life.
The love and respect for her Mother came through in all Tonja's writing, and her words showed the true depths of their loving relationship. I wish her comfort and peace. and know the memories are full and wonderful.
One of her many loving tributes is here:
http://tonjasgatherings.blogspot.com/
Tonja, whom I met when I also chose the name "GATHERINGS" for the name of my blog, lost her Mother yesterday, very suddenly and unexpectedly. My heart goes out to her family, and I send her my deepest sympathy and prayers for all of them in this time of sorrow and of celebration of a wonderful, well-lived life.
The love and respect for her Mother came through in all Tonja's writing, and her words showed the true depths of their loving relationship. I wish her comfort and peace. and know the memories are full and wonderful.
One of her many loving tributes is here:
http://tonjasgatherings.blogspot.com/
Sunday, July 12, 2009
SUNDAY
We've got COMPANY COMIN'!! Little Sis will be here tomorrow. . .
And so began the great long post that I sent sometime around noon. Nothing came up but the title, and I hope this little snip will at least let you know I tried, and will try to make time this week to post during her visit. I hope she'll get me all in gear to post pictures easily and find some other places, and generally get acquainted with all the bells and whistles that this space affords.
I look at all the beautiful blogs, with effortless pictures and three screens and "click here" taking me to magical places, and I just blush with ignorance.
Anyway, I'll try.
Until----moire non,
And so began the great long post that I sent sometime around noon. Nothing came up but the title, and I hope this little snip will at least let you know I tried, and will try to make time this week to post during her visit. I hope she'll get me all in gear to post pictures easily and find some other places, and generally get acquainted with all the bells and whistles that this space affords.
I look at all the beautiful blogs, with effortless pictures and three screens and "click here" taking me to magical places, and I just blush with ignorance.
Anyway, I'll try.
Until----moire non,
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