Are We Acclimated Yet?

Adventures / Motorcycles & me

I hear tell that it takes a human two years to become acclimated to a new environment. If that’s true then in two more months Jim should be all settled into the various climates of Central New York State. The cold should not bother him so much, or the lack of sun, or the over generous amounts of rain we get compared to his native state of Texas. Oh, we have our warm moments up here in the Northeast, don’t get me wrong, but not like they do down there. I’ve had the pleasure of being in Texas for three of the four seasons, or what passes as seasons anyway.

In the middle of January it was in the mid-80s with clear blue skies.

In early July it was in the mid-90s with clear blue skies.

In mid-October it was in the low 80s with clear blue skies. It did rain once while we were there this last time and I immediately thought as I stepped out and saw the overcast sky, “Ah, just like home.” Of course, the very next day we were right back to those blue skies and in the 80s.

I’m pretty sure I could get acclimated to that sort of thing in two years, but I think you need more than that when going the other way. Hell, I’ve lived in these parts for almost fifty years and I can’t say as I am all that tolerant of the cold, at least not anymore. Maybe it’s just old age. I can’t stand to be cold anymore and I complain about it from September to May, at least. Once upon a time temperatures in the 80s-90s would have sent me running to the sanctuary of A/C. Now I think on them with an ever-growing fondness. While visiting Texas, as the others would all be inside, I’d find a glorious spot in the shade, the warm, warm beautifully warm and comfy cozy shade, to read and relax and wallow in the heat like I can so seldom do in New York.

But, what of Jim and his battle to acclimate the other way around? Will he ever be warm again? Will he ever employ the dressing in layers method? Will he ever forgive me for being the reason he can no longer ride his motorcycle twelve months out of the year? It tugs at certain guilt strings every time I see him sitting at the computer or on the sofa watching television wearing his winter coat over a hoodie sweatshirt over a t-shirt. I’m miserable when I’m cold and yet, I fear I am not as cold as he must be all the time in these Northern climes we call home.

He’d surely jump at the chance to move back to Texas to be toasty warm again. And yet, as much as I’d love to be warm more times than cold, I cannot find it in me to move. I love the changing of the seasons. I love to see the snowdrops, crocus and daffodils push their way up through the molding leaves and melting layers of snow. I love how the silence of winter is one morning suddenly broken by the sweet, beautiful chirping of returning birds. I love when the smell of lilacs drenches the air and when the sun finally returns. I appreciate every single amazingly cloudless and wonderfully blue sky. And in the fall, the hillsides are ablaze with the most brilliant of colors and the air smells of fallen leaves, ripened fields of corn, and pumpkins. And yes, oh, it is beautiful when we get just the right amount and type of snow that clings in tiny white lines along the leafless branches and all is quiet. At night, the blankets of white sparkle under a full moon, reflecting the twinkling stars above; breathtaking. I find myself humbled in those moments. Even as I may long to be warm and cozy, I can’t yet give those wondrous, child-like times up just yet.

I don’t think two years is long enough to learn to love a place so different than what you are used to. I have to admire the man for even trying and I count myself amongst one of the very lucky to have found a person willing to put up with it all in the name of love. As we enter our second winter today – the third if you count when he moved up here in the middle of January – I sure don’t look forward to shoveling snow, scraping ice and those Oh-So-Mighty heat bills. I do look forward to snuggling on the sofa and sipping hot cocoa though. And it’s been mentioned that someone wants to actually trudge out into the cold and snow very soon to get a real Christmas tree. Maybe he is acclimating after all.

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Road Gators, Vultures & Turkeys, Oh My!

Adventures / Cryptids / Just Plain Random Weirdness / Technology

I got me one of those new-fangled ‘smart’ phones about a month back. My previous phone was pretty old, took lousy pictures, and internet was next to impossible. I balked at spending so much on a new phone considering how little I used the old one, but not wanting to fall too far behind in the world of technology and thinking having something better for an upcoming road trip might not be such a bad idea, I bit the bullet and took the plunge.

Miraculously, I was able to transfer my minutes from my old phone to my new and input my contacts all by myself. Over the next two weeks, amongst other things, I learned how to answer my phone! Remember when all you had to do pick it up and say, “Hello?” I wanted to get to know this new piece of equipment as best I could before my teacher, my 23 year-old-son, was no longer available. Amazingly, my computer geek boyfriend’s phone is even more primitive than my old phone! He would be of no help whatsoever.

They say there are two tests that will either make or break a relationship; a building/remodeling project or a road trip. A road trip with a smoker not allowed to smoke in the car and this unfamiliar method of phone GPS promised to be an adventure. I was assured his need to smoke would coincide with my need to use the ladies room. This was not quite how it happened.

Our trip west was just over 1600 miles long one way. He’d traveled the roads twice on his own before and we’d made the journey together one-way a year and a half ago. His trips took two days. Our prior one-way took three, but we were pulling a U-Haul with a car stuffed to the gills. We allowed ourselves the time he’d made it in, two days. It seemed reasonable at the time. It also seemed a simple enough plan to take along lunch and drinks and snacks for the road. These were strategically placed, or so we thought, so that the passenger could easily turn around in their seat and get whatever beverage or edible was wanted.

Long story short, someone had to stop to pee AND have a smoke a whole lot more that there was need of the ladies room. Course, being as my daddy always taught me never to pass up a chance to pee while on the road, I made use of these stops, too. There was no hope of visiting Boggy Creek in Fouke, Arkansas, let alone play at Dinosaur World in Kentucky, but we did see plenty of Road Gators. Clearly we have different priorities when it comes to travel! Next time, damn it! As for those snacks and drinks, ease of retrieval involved undoing ones seat belt, turning around and half crawling into the back seat while your pilot cruised along at about 70 miles-per-hour keeping an eye out for the numerous police cars. Of course, if a cop had been spotted chances are pretty high in our less than nubile conditions, we’d never had made it back into our proper forward-facing seated positions in time. Hot coffee in a foam cup or thermos top was a blast. It was an adventure alright.

Admittedly it took longer than planned. We would like to blame a generous amounts of stop and go traffic due to construction, but I think it had more to do with too much coffee, sore bottoms, tired arms, head and neck aches, full bladders, nicotine fits, leg cramps, hunger and just plain “I’m tired and I’m cranky” moments. We rolled into the driveway of our final destination at about 1:15AM, a good three hours later than we’d hoped.

Our return trip thinking may not have been as well thought out as we’d intended. It’ll be faster if we miss all that construction, right? What’s a couple extra hundred miles, right? We’ll be going faster, right? It’ll be fine. Even if we get in by midnight, that’s alright. Did I mention Jim had to be to work by 2pm the day after we planned on getting home? No? Well… yeah. That’s not quite how it worked out either.

We got off track before we even left Texas! This is where the aforementioned new phone technology comes into play. It seemed a simple enough plan. Instead of going through construction riddled Waco and congested Dallas, we’ll just cut across and head towards Shreveport, Louisiana. Piece’o’cake. ‘Cept somehow we found ourselves heading towards Houston. Why does the car’s compass say we’re headed southeast? Without a paper map, we had to rely on my phone’s GPS which I had used maybe twice before and, of course, ‘Connection To GPS Has Been Lost’. Eventually, it kicked in well enough and long enough for me to figure out where we’d gone wrong and get us back on track, while Jim expertly avoided hitting a flock of five or six vultures dining on road kill armadillo. Past experience told him that it was in our best interest to not be driving around in the Deep South with a dead vulture pressed into the grill of the car.

We zipped through Louisiana and Mississippi like nobody’s business, keeping an eye on the numerous road gators, making certain they weren’t flesh and blood gators. We even stopped at the Mississippi Welcome Center and did a touch of site-seeing. Alabama welcomed us and at 9:30 we started looking for motels. By 10:00 our exhausted bodies and brains were settled in. As we unloaded the car, and the loud drone of whatever big and bizarre nocturnal bugs and birds they have in the woods of Alabama buzzed around us, we wondered what State “Deliverance” is supposed to be set in and if we were anywhere near there. (Answer: The remote northern Georgia wilderness on the fictional Cahulawassee River and no.) Course… there’s still Big Foot or Skunk Ape or whatever they call him down there, to deal with!

Our hopes high, we gobbled down hardboiled eggs, blueberry muffins, bananas, and coffee the next morning in the motel room and headed out, bright and early by 7am. Tennessee and Kentucky proved to be our friends. Yeah, we’ve made it to Virginia. I silently wished there was time to visit my cousin in Roanoke. And then, we saw the flashing lights.

“Urgent Message When Flashing” the roadside sign warned and told us where to tune for details. We tuned in. We listened. It didn’t seem to pertain to us. We sallied forth, returning to whatever decent rock station would come in, settling on country as we had to. Several miles later, “Right lane closed ahead. Prepare to stop.” Traffic reports on the radio told us there were delays ahead. We slowed to the pace of a rolling parking lot. Dead still and a walking pace swapped places for the next fifteen to twenty miles, at least. It seemed like a hundred. Jim threatened to get out and walk alongside the car while I drove so he could have a ciggy. It probably wasn’t really such a bad idea. I’m sure we’d have stayed abreast of each other well enough. Thank God neither of us needed to use the restroom.

Over the radio we heard something like this: “The right lane of Interstate 81 North in Botetourt County near mile marker 154 will remain closed until approximately 7 p.m. while crews continue clean up from a tractor-trailer accident. The tractor-trailer was hauling around 2,700 turkeys. Crews on scene are still removing turkeys from the area. Drivers are advised to keep watch for any other birds that may still be loose in the area.” What could we do but burst out laughing? I know, I know. It shouldn’t have been funny at all. Poor terrified turkeys and all, but all I could imagine were turkey running amok along the roadside like some sort of Warner Brother’s cartoon and an incident with my brother when he was just learning to read.

It was a different road trip entirely. I was seven. My brother would have been about ten. We were headed to Florida and suddenly he said, “Well, where are they?” One of my parents asked, “Where are what?” He said, “The chickens.” Confused looks were exchanged. “What chickens?” “The chickens I keep seeing the signs for.” More confused looks took place. He was instructed to point out one of these signs if he saw another and sure enough in only a few more miles he announced triumphantly, “There’s one! See! Speeding chicken by road! So, where are the chickens?” My parents both burst out laughing. “No, honey, that says, ‘Speed Checked By Radar’. My brother was quite disappointed.

We, too, were disappointed in some strange way. Not only did we not see any amok turkeys, speeding or otherwise, by the time we reached the accident site there was nothing but a dusting of white feathers scattered along the road while clean-up crew men picked up traffic cones and freed us to return to full highway speed once more. The Cracker Barrel in Bristol, Virginia fed us and the skies just outside of Winchester delighted us with a beautiful sunset. It was clear by now we were not going to make it home by midnight, not even close. GPS told us we still had five and a half hours to go. Stopping for the night seemed more sensible than getting ourselves killed.

Sleep was short and fitful. I felt so bad for Jim, knowing he was not sleeping any better than I was and that he had to be into work that afternoon. I took first shift driving, hoping he’d be able to get in a couple more hours of sleep at least. I’m pretty sure we were both feeling the stress more than either of us let on. We just wanted to get home.

By noon, we’d passed yet another test of our relationship. I realized along the way that different things about these trips and driving seemed to annoy us. That really worked to our advantage, because when one person was getting antsy and annoyed, the other was able to remain calm and interject some humor into the situation. We make a good team, me thinks.

Now… about that building project.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Let’s Play Pretend

Adventures / Childhood fantasies / Just Plain Random Weirdness

I may be pushing the Big 5-0 but as it never really sank in that I was an actual, real-life “growed up” until I turned 40 that make me more like 8. Right?

A Facebook (and RL friend) posted a series of wonderful watercolors last week that depicted images of children playing Pretend. Nerdy Childhood I was taken back to my own childhood when we ran around the forbidden lumber yard that was our playground, leaping immortally from one twenty foot stack of swaying lumber to another, with sticks making ‘Pew-pew-pew’ sounds as if shooting ray guns.  We adopted such names as Annie12 or Robert36, adapting to the popular television series of the time, “Logan’s Run” of which I was a HUGE! fan.  We also played our home grown version of “Planet of the Apes” and the more common, Cowboys and Indians.  As I was often the sole girl involved in these games of pretend, I found myself tied to a lot of trees or locked in jail so I could be rescued by one or another of the ‘big strong boys’.

We never got too fancy like today’s modern LARPers, (Live Action Role Players) who seem to think they’d stumbled upon some sort of new amusement by dressing up and carrying fake weapons and thumping each other with them. Sorry, I was doing that back in the 1970’s, guys. Best weapon ever; a thin, green branch – not too thin but just enough to be nice and springy. Willow worked really well, just saying. When properly loaded with a small, half-rotten apple these bad boys left bruises and you arrived home with enough rancid apple sauce on you to require a change of clothes and a shower. Headshots were common and though the most gratifying for the shooter, they were the least pleasant for the kid on the receiving end.

There are those that would argue that as we get older and grow-up, these games of Pretend are tossed to the wayside and left behind like so many Barbie dolls and stacks of Legos. As adults we are supposed to focus on work, making ourselves a home, driving cars, paying bills and all in all, being responsible without the annoyance of fantasy and imagination clouding up our more mature minds. To those people I place my thumbs to my temples with my fingers wagging in the air, stick out my tongue and give the Raspberry Salute! Neener-neener.

As Foghorn Leghorn might say, “Who, I say, who in their right mind would give up a part of their lives that brought them so much joy?” NOT IT!

Computers were just coming into fashion when I graduated from high school, a-way back in 1984. Along with Pong and Tank, Space Invaders and Pac Man there were the earliest versions of what we now call, First Person Shooters. The graphics on these babies left something to the imagination, but that was okay, we’d imagined ourselves to many places before then. If I could imagine a twig to be a space age ray gun, it wasn’t much of a stretch to see myself as that little blip of a man made up of 16 pixels.  My favorite game of this sort of “Questron”.  Hours upon hours were spent hunkered down in my mom’s home office in the semi-darkness playing black jack, getting into fights, robbing stores and, of course, battling beasties with my 3 pixel sword!

The next level of Pretend for me was when I was in my early twenties and I was introduced to the world of LambdaMOO. Holy Hook-Up, Batman! You mean I can do Text-based RPG with OTHER PEOPLE via this new technology called ‘The Web’? How crazy is that?  I can type on my computer at home, someone in the UK can read what I type only moments later and reply almost instantly?!  Sweet, baby Jesus, make it so!  My first character in this new and wonderful world was Lady Vivianne, a pale and powerful vampire mistress. Of course, everything you created in these MOO worlds was text-based so they attracted a lot of creative writer types. It gave you a chance to spread your wings and put yourself smack dab in the middle of one of your own stories as the main character! Better still, you could connect your little corner of the MOO to the corners of others! It was a seemingly endless series of homes, caves, oceans, cemeteries, clubs, pubs, forests and unfathomable dimensions of time and space.  “Hello, my name is Pam and I’m a MOO-Addict.” Yes, for a time it was that bad. For the few years I was mainlining these sorts of places I always thought, “Wouldn’t it be awesome if we had graphics as well as text for something like this?”

When AOL came out with their chat rooms, the population and popularity of the MOOs took a definable nose dive. Instead of having to wait in the queue to get logged in because traffic was so heavy, you would be instantly connected only to find maybe a hundred or so others logged in. And half of those had been idle for over a week. Another quarter might be active but secreted away in their little worlds and if you were really lucky, you could find maybe a dozen or so willing to interact with you.

By now, I was married with children and doing the Growed-Up things that were expected of me. I went to work. I did housework. I took care of the kids, paid my bills, bought cars and a house.  For many years the world of Pretend was enacted with my children. Match Box cars and Barbie dolls, digging in the dirt with Tonka trucks and spreading crayons and coloring books all over the dining room table filled the void of creativity I so much need in my life.  Together we played what are the more recognizable First Person Shooters on Ye Olde Playstation II and, of course, The Sims. As an aside, I was quite horrible at a James Bond Based FPS – but I digress.

Kids don’t  stay kids forever, sadly.  All too soon they were teenagers and playing Pretend with Mom just wasn’t the thing to do anymore. But lo, fear not! What’s this? Second Life, you say? Tell me more! Ladies and Gentleman, welcome to that world I once dreamed of LambdaMOO With Graphics! NICE graphics! No more 16 pixel people for me, no, sir. It’s no joke when I tell you that I have heard A LOT of people who play Second Life referring to their Avatars as “my Barbie doll” or “my Ken doll”. But, Barbie and Ken never had it so good. There are limitless possibilities in Second Life. There are things in Second Life I never could have imagined and things I wish I’d never seen or known existed. This is the imagination’s playground.  If you want to know how to survive in Second Life, you really need to watch this video, too! Man Vs. Second Life LOL. Oddly enough… my first Second Life character was also a rather powerful female vampire. Go figure!

And here is where my narrative takes a slightly sad turn. There are apparently people out there that believe that just because they don’t *get* a certain something that it must be bad and harmful to the person who does get it and not only that, enjoys getting it. Trying to truly explain to someone what Second Life is goes beyond difficult. I feel a little sorry for those folks. Maybe they’ve lost touch with their Inner Child. Maybe they had really bad childhoods and playing Pretend reminds them of that. Maybe they see those of us who are still able to play with such childlike abandon as inferior, as sad and pathetic. We must be miserable in our lives to want to escape for a few hours into this fantasy world that has no basis in reality.  As if going to the movies, going to a stage play, watching a sit-com or a ‘reality’ television show doesn’t do almost the same thing.  For me, they are the sad ones. They are the ones that can’t take their own imaginations on a journey into an endless world of possibilities. They prefer to sit at a distance, to be spectators instead of participants in their own entertainment. Their minds are too muddled up with grown-up gunk to let themselves play Pretend anymore and let someone else do the work for them.  They would rather sit in front of the Magic Blue Box known as television with no chance of interacting with what’s happening on the screen.

Second Life and places like it have made it possible for this Introvert to come out of her shell. I’ve made wonderful friends through these mediums. One of which I’ve had since 1995! We played together in LambdaMOO and by gum… we still get together once in a while on Second Life! We’ve met in person all of ONCE!  but we’ve shared so much of our lives in these past almost 20 years, our friendship is just as strong and real as if we saw each other face-to-face every day. (At least I think so. I hope he feels the same.)  Through the ups and downs of our lives, we’ve pulled each other through. Isn’t that what being friends is really about?

Yeah, there are a fair amount of idiots out there, too. You hear people say how dangerous it is to meet people online. It’s dangerous to meet strangers in bars, too. It’s dangerous to race cars and jump out of airplanes and climb cliff sides and go white water rafting. It was really dangerous for that group of kids I grew up with who loved to race across the tops of piles of logs and swaying twenty-foot cut timber piles. It was dangerous (and painful) getting hit with a half-rotten apple flung from the end of a stick, too! It’s called living, folks and sometimes you just have to take that leap of faith and pretend you know the outcome.

And sometimes… well, sometimes that Leap Of Faith makes you buy a one-way plane ticket to a place you’ve never been to meet up with a guy you’ve only met once before and it all turns out pretty darn good! So good that we no longer HAVE to play Pretend on Second Life anymore in order to be together, but um…. sometimes we still do, simply because we can. (Not to mention finding pirate ships to sail and shoot cannons from is pretty hard to come by these days.)

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Sherlock Holmes To The Rescue!

Adventures / Murder-Mystery / Writer's Life

When we first started talking on Skype I never really thought he had much of an accent. So, how come now that we’ve been living together in the North for almost eight months, I’m starting to hear it?

As some of you know my boyfriend is from Texas. His father was in the Air Force for many years and the family moved around a lot. He’s lived in Germany, France, Colorado, New Mexico and several other Southern states but Texas was always home to them and it was to Texas they all returned and lived once Dad’s military days were over. Living in so many places as a kid certainly tempered the Southern sound of his voice compared to his parents. His mother, for instance, seems to think ‘Jim’ is a two-syllable name, Jee-im. Sherlock Holmes would have a field day in our house what with my mom insisting that the part of your mouth your teeth are embedded in are called GOOMS and that you can carry your lunch in a paper BAGE. WTH, Mom? Where’d you learn to talk? Oh, wait. Not even twenty miles from where I did. Go figure!

Shortly after he moved up here, he noticed how much I use the phrase, ‘what-not’. Apparently of all the BIG things they have in Texas, the phrase ‘what-not’ is not one of them.  It quickly became a joke and we started adding ‘what-not’ onto the end of as many sentences as possible. In exchange for him adding ‘what-not’ to his vocabulary it was decided I should start saying ‘fixin’ more often. As in, “We’re fixin’ to go down to the store.”  It has provided us with much more amusement than it probably should but we tend to be easily amused (and what-not).

The other night we were playing ‘Second Life’ and he started talking about a mutual friend of ours, Al – as in short for Albert. We met Al at a place called Crack Den. Fun to RP with but as we haven’t been there in nearly two months now, haven’t  seen him.  “Jee-im” says we’re going to have to get Al a motorcycle for the new area he’s been exploring lately. It’s a lot like Crack Den. I’ve not been there myself as of yet. Anyway… SL motorcycles don’t come cheap and I’m thinking, “Why would he buy Al a motorcycle when we haven’t even seen or heard from him in two months?”   I ask, “Is Al even there?” He shakes his head a bit and says he doesn’t know. And I’m like, “So, why would you want to buy him a motorcycle?” He replies, “As the new Sergeant At Arms in the MC he should have a bike.”  And then it hit me. He wasn’t saying AL at all. He was saying OWL.  I start laughing.  I know very well who Owl is and suddenly the whole conversation made sense. “OH! You mean Owl not Al, as in Albert.”

 He chuckles, “Sorry, I was speakin’ Texan.”  

 One of these days he’s going to say ‘awl’ or ‘oil’ that way and I’m going to end up lost… again.

In the meantime, I’m fixin’ to head over yonder to get some coffee an’ what-not.  I need someplace ‘quite’ to sit an’ think about how I’m going to get him to use the words ‘wubble’ and ‘squee-haw’.

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The Mother Within

Adventures / Just Plain Random Weirdness

It’s happening. I sense it peeking around the corners at me. It lurks in the back alleys waiting with all the patience of a cat watching a mouse hole. It smells my blood. It knows, oh yes indeed, it knows there’s no way I can escape my own mother growing inside me.

Don’t get me wrong, my mom is AWESOME! and to see those little sparks of her emerging from me during certain situations isn’t always a bad thing, unless it’s when that part of her is the part that wants to smack some idiot upside the head with a two-by-four. Not that mom ever did that of course, at least not literally – that I know of. Twice this week I have wished for said two-by-four. In fact, a large hammer and two shovels were given serious consideration late Monday morning by myself and two of my fellow co-workers.  Ah, yes. The joys of working with liars and thieves. Gotta love it! Said thief rather reluctantly returned the ill-gotten booty this morning. Guess there is some sort of guilty conscious in there after all. I made sure to thank the person for the return of the ‘mistakenly taken’ property.

But, in the heat of the  moment when I realized what had happened, my mother emerged in one of her darkest forms. You just don’t want to mess with Jackie when she sees an injustice being done ‘cuz she’ll damn well set you straight right to your face and not give a flying fu… erm fish, what you or anyone else thinks about it.  Right is right and wrong is wrong.

Mom came out again last night while Jim and I were at Karaoke.  I don’t drink a lot. When Jim and I go out I will have usually just one beer or mixed drink then go right for ginger ale on the rocks. Last night I indulged and was half way through my second beer when it happened.

Some dork had arrived earlier and was either smashed out of his mind or off his medication. I suspect both. Jim and I are sitting listening to the singers of wide ranging abilities croon to their hearts content and this dude is getting louder and louder and by his own mistake, he sat down next to me just moments before Jim went up to talk to the DJ about a song. Feeling pretty brave, ya know, with all of 1.5 bottles of liquid courage running like wild fire through my veins, I tried to very,  very hard to ignore this guy. I really did. But when every other word was spoken was the F-bomb and said less than a foot from my ear, Mom has her limits.

My mother turned on that bar stool I had sat so quietly at all evening and she looked at him through my eyes and said, “Do you mind? I am trying to listen to these people sing and if you say ‘f—‘ in my ear one more time I’m going to knock your ass off that barstool. Shut the f— up!”  *ahem* He looked back at me as if I’d suddenly grown a second head. “What? I wasn’t swearing.” I replied with, “Don’t what? me. All you’re saying to me is F-this and F-that. Say it again and I’m gonna smack ya.”  Apparently a friend of his overheard this and came over and said, “Is he bothering you.” I said he was and for the next five minutes or so she stood there talking to him telling him to stop cussing and leave people alone. I turned my attention back to the stage, took a deep breath and realized my heart was ready to leap out of my chest – or maybe that’s what it feels like when your mother releases her possession of you.

Just then Jim innocently and ignorantly strolls back and sits down beside me. He’s got his own beer buzz going on and the girl who has by now taken the offending Mother-rouser out of the picture comes over and says to me, “Sorry about that.” To which I nod and say thanks and we all go on our merry separate ways. Jim looks at  me, “Huh? What was she sorry about?” I told him he’d missed all the excitement and would tell him later on the drive home.  His remark later, “You shoulda said something. I woulda kicked his ass.” I snickered, “Nah, woulda been more humiliating to him if I’dda done that.”

So, *ahem* the part of my mother that speaks up and says something, the part that has a spine and doesn’t take crap from people is growing inside me. As I sit back and consider the situation and add my grandmother to the equation – oh yeah. I see where this is going real fast, kids!  “You kids! Get off my lawn!!” Just kidding, she never said that – but I’m getting the gumption of two of the most amazing women in my little corner of the family tree. And, woe unto the fella that messes with my daughter! She’s only 20 and she’s been displaying this trait for years! She’da kicked that drunk dude’s ass first and asked questions later.

So, thanks Mom and Gramma for spending a bit of time with me these past couple days. I can see so  much better where you’re coming from and where I’m headed and it’s not such a bad place at all.

 

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A Haunting We Will Go

Adventures / Haunted / UrbEx

What with all the hoopla going on about The Conjuring, (which I have yet to see, btw) and the myriad of ghost hunting shows out there, I figured it was time I shared my own ghostly experiences. It truly makes no difference to me whether others believe in this sort of thing or not. My boyfriend is a total non-believer and I still love him regardless.

The earliest true ghost story I was told came to me from my maternal grandmother, Angeline.  She was visiting friends for the weekend and had been given the spare room to sleep in. This room was used by anyone who came to visit them, including numerous grandchildren. On her first night there, she was preparing for bed. As was her habit, she always read a bit before turning off the light for the night. She was doing just that when the door opened and a little girl entered the room already dressed in a simple, white nightgown. The child smiled at my grandmother and asked if she could sleep with her because there wasn’t any other place to sleep. Angeline, of course, didn’t hesitate to let the child hop into the big bed with her which the little girl did and wished her a good night. Gram finished her chapter shortly after, turned off the light and went to sleep herself. By the time morning came about, the child had already gotten up and left the room. Gram got herself up, dressed and headed out to the kitchen where coffee was brewing and breakfast was already starting to be made. As she got her coffee, she asked her friends which grandchild had come to visit. They shook their heads and denied that there were any grandchildren there at all for the weekend. Gram told them about her little night visitor. It was then that they both smiled and said, “Oh, that’s our ghost. She shows up sometimes.” Prior to this, they had never mentioned this presence to my grandmother.

My earliest personal experience I’d have to put around the age of 11-12. At the time my best friend, N., was living in a very large, very old house. Keep in mind the house had two staircases. There were the front stairs with a fancy carved, curved banister – lushly carpeted at the front of the house. At the top was her brother’s room, to the right was her parent’s room and her room was located through a doorway at the start of a long hallway.  At the opposite end of this hallway, that was lined with doors, was the bathroom. There were at least three more bedrooms they didn’t used up there. Beyond the bathroom was the second staircase that lead to the back of the house and the kitchen.

As we sat up in her room talking and playing records we heard someone come running down the hall, knock on her bedroom door then run back down the hall.  N. had an older brother and this sort of activity would be right up his alley so we didn’t really pay much attention. It happened again a few minutes later. The sounds were very clear and we both heard them. The second time she told him in true little sister fashion to “Knock it off!” as she pulled the door open. Of course, there was no one there but clearly he’d made his way down the front stairs quickly. N. closed the door and we went back to whatever we were doing but kept our ears open, determined to catch her brother in the act. Running footsteps, KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK… N. yanked the door open. The hallway was empty.

We went downstairs to where her parents and brother were sitting watching TV. N. said, “Mom, tell B. to stop coming upstairs and knocking on my door!” Her brother, who was sprawled on the sofa looked up, kinda confused, “Huh?” Her mother said, “He’s been sitting here watching TV with us for at least an hour.” N. and I looked at each other with surprise and retreated back upstairs to her room.  The sounds did not happen again that night.

Many years later when I was newly married, my  husband and I were searching for a house to buy for our new family. We wanted something old, with character and maybe a little bit out in the countryside. During our search we found a lovely house and prior to contacting the realtor we were having a look around the outside of the place. It needed work but it looked big enough and the location suited us. It was early Autumn and leaves were already changing and falling to the ground. The front yard was scattered with them and as you walked they made that lovely sound of rustling. I was on one end of the house, towards the front. My husband, R. was on the other side towards the back. As I stood looking up at the eaves and determining that a paint job would be in order, I heard the leaves moving as of someone coming back around to where I was standing. Assuming it was R. I didn’t pay too much attention. Movement caught my eye and I looked down to see a youngish woman in a white dress that dated around the turn of the century round the corner of the house. She had brown hair that was loosely pulled up into a ‘Gibson girl’ style. I looked right at her and she at me. Then she was gone. No fading away just suddenly not there.  Startled and excited, but not scared, I went in search of R. and told him what had just happened. Though we did not go on to purchase this particular house, we did find one more in town and where I still live, that is also haunted.

We bought the place in January 1995 and the haunted stories are too numerous to get into here in any great detail. Our first indication was within weeks of moving in when the back kitchen door opened several time on its own until R. said, “Okay, we know you’re here and you are welcome to stay, just stop opening this door and waking us up.” It never happened again. The porch light turned on and off on its own a lot at first. The television did the same.  Kids toys have rolled out of rooms in which there were no kids (or anyone for that matter) playing with them. Footsteps have been heard going up the stairs or walking across the dining room. I’ve heard the front door open and close thinking my son was coming home from work only to go say hello and find no one there. I’ve heard footsteps come up the stairs and a bedroom door close as if one of my kids had arrived home only to find myself still alone. We attribute all of this to a man named Hermann who – by his own daughter’s telling – died in the bedroom upstairs that we designated as the guest room. Over the past years, I’ve grown rather fond of Hermann’s visits. He’s never done any harm to anyone and as far as I’m concerned he can visit whenever he likes.

So, now you know why I’m A Believer. Other things have happened in other places. Not always pleasant things but each one has only solidified my belief that Spirit can and does return to this world and that we can interact with it.

 

 

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Pass The Toilet Paper, Please.

Adventures / Family & Relationships / Mental health

They say the secret to living a happy life is surrounding yourself with the people and things that bring you joy. That’s not always as easy as it sounds and along the way you’re likely to lose a lot of people you once called ‘friend’.  We all know it only feels good when you are the one doing the dumping. Being the Dumper is so much more liberating than being the Dumpee.

As Dumper, I’ve known the reasons behind me decisions to rid someone or something from my life. If the Dump involved a person, I’ve tried to have the courtesy to explain to that person why. They may not have understood or agreed with my reasons but I have a clear conscience that I did my best to give them answers. As Dumpee I’ve not been so fortunate. There are a lot of unanswered questions in my mind about the reasons things went the way they did in some of my relationships. Learning to live with those questions hasn’t always been easy and in at least one case, I am still very confused about the whys. 

Maybe those involved feel that knowing the truth would hurt a whole lot more than having so many questions hanging in the air. Maybe they are ashamed of their reasons for dumping me. Maybe they simply don’t care. That’s what hurts the most, that and having it all happen so quickly and out of the blue.  You’re best buds for years and years then suddenly BAM! they won’t even speak to you or answer an email. They are just gone. If there had been the tiniest of red flags that things were in jeopardy, maybe there could be some sort of understanding but there wasn’t. It simply ended.

I’ve done some scrying in my day, read a few Tarot cards and rune stones but I’ll be damned if I’m a mind reader and I’m trying very hard not to assume what other people think because chances are pretty high I’d be wrong.  Yeah, being the Dumpee really sucks.

On the other hand, I try to imagine their reasons and see it as them letting go of something that no longer brought them any joy. I hate to think I have brought someone such misery as they’d quit speaking to me but maybe I have.  I want my friends to be happy even if in a couple of cases I’m not convinced these people have a clue what that means.  

All this hasn’t prevented me from being happy. These past couple years have been some of the happiest ones of my life. If not being able to share that happiness with a person or two is the price I have to pay, then it’s worth it. I am surrounding myself with the people and things that bring me joy and I will continue to do so even if it means I am the Dumper or the Dumpee.  I can’t be part of everyone’s life no matter how much of a shared history we may have. I do miss those people and the idea of growing old with them in some capacity. But, life is too short to dwell on what was and has been lost. I sincerely hope that those that have dumped me are doing the same thing – following and finding their bliss.  

In the end, the best thing to do for yourselves is use that little extra bit of TP you have, give your hands a good hard scrubbing and leave the bathroom and the waste behind. If you really needed that poo in your life it wouldn’t have left you, would it?

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The Secret To Life Is…

Adventures / Family & Relationships / Mental health

There’s a hash-tag thingy over on Twitter: #TheSecretToLifeIs I added my two cents to which I will tell you my contribution to at the end of this post.

My good friend Lily came over this past Saturday. I don’t get to see her and her husband Pete as much as I’d like. They are one of my most favorite couples. Of all the people I’ve known for more than twenty years, Lily is the one friend that I actually see the most. Maybe it’s because she doesn’t have Facebook. We can’t stay caught up on each other that way. It’s truly a blessing in disguise. We get REAL face time, sitting at the kitchen table noshing on homemade salsa & guacamole with chips and hot tea. It’s always ALWAYS a pleasure to spend time with her. Pity it only happens a few times a year.

We talk about a lot of things, Lily and I – pets, politics, religion, hobbies, work, family and etc. The topic of belief came up this time around. We share a very common belief system, it seems. That’s cool. I don’t find a lot of people that seem to get “God” along the same lines as I do. I’ve truly run the gammut when it comes to religion. I’ve been a Born Again Christian & a Satanist. I’ve been a Pagan & Agnostic. Today I classify myself as Gnostic which would take reams to explain so I will  merely suggest you take a gander over on that link to save me a whole lot of typing time & space.

When I was Christian – boy howdy was I ever Christian – I spent a lot of time wearing crosses and praying in churches and reading the Bible and singing worship songs. When I think back on those times I find it really hard to remember actually BELIEVING in what I was doing. I suppose I must have but somewhere in there I never had that JOY I’d heard so much about. I think deep inside though I simply felt those things: the crosses, the prayer, the Scripture – were just that… things. Maybe I was too young & inexperienced in life to grasp it all.

Let’s make it clear that the Satanic portion of my spiritual journey was very short lived. It was damn scary. You really don’t want t go there kids. ‘Nuff said.

I entered my Pagan path after that. I’d always been fascinated by witches and the like. I did my High School term paper on the different theories behind what had happened at Salem. I’m even a descendant of Rebecca Nurse. She’s like my 7th great grand aunt or some such thing. Yeah, the blood is thin but hey, it’s still fun to be related! I looked into Wicca and other variations of Paganism. None of them truly fit me so I ended up making my own version. It felt right at the time – sorta. But as with the Christian thing and the Satanic thing – this square peg never fit into that round hole. I couldn’t believe in the “power of crystals’ or any of that other stuff. To me the crystal was just a crystal. It didn’t contain any of its own powers but MAYBE it could be used as a focal point for a person’s own energies – much like the Crucifix I used to wear. Like in so many vampire movies, ya know? You have to BELIEVE in the cross for it to work against the Prince of Darkness.

I resigned myself to being a hermit as far as religion was concerned. Little did I know that even that was leading me somewhere else. I may not be seeing it by its technical origins but the word “Hermit” makes me think of “Hermetic” and/or “Hermes.” A few years ago a friend of mine asked if I’d heard of Hermes Trismegistus. I had to admit ignorance. He’d not really say a whole lot about it just told me to few books I might find interesting to look at. Being the research junkie I am and a big fan of the cross referencing of world theologies, I dove right in. And my keen interest in Gnosticism was born.

In as small a nutshell as I can explain we must go back to the beginning of my post and the Secret of Life. Remember the movie ‘Dumbo’ where he had that little feather held so tightly in his trunk? He believed that only while he held that feather, he’d be able to fly. Turned out that wasn’t the case. You don’t need the Feather. You don’t need that Cross, candle or statue. You don’t need that crystal or pentacle. They are just things of the material world. All you need to find and be with God is right there inside you. That is what Gnosticism has taught me.

And so… The Secret To Life Is You Don’t Need That Feather To Fly.

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I Now Pronounce You Hitched!

Adventures / Family & Relationships

It took almost 25 years but I’m pretty sure I finally attended a wedding and reception that beat the nads off my own a-way back in 1989.

Picture, if you will, a beautiful summer day in Upstate New York. It’s 11am and you’re in a huge backyard with 4 large tents, the mouth-watering aroma of BBQ chicken and a half a hog smoking waft your way. Casually and colorfully dressed guests are seated on bales of hay. There are a lot of bare feet. The table and chairs are dressed in simple white covers and decorated with clear vases of fresh cut flowers and potted Rosemary plants. Love & Joy are indeed in the air. The celebration is already starting. Of course, Janet the Bride, was radiant. Sam the Groom was handsome. As we sat and waited for the ceremony to begin Jim commented “This crowd is exactly like what I’d picture at a Grateful Dead concert. I’ve never been to one, but this is what I imagine it would be like.” And, he was right. 200+ people all gathered together in peace and love and joy. Wait.. that’s Woodstock,. Either way. You get the idea. And when Reverend Bob pronounced the couple married, I can honestly say that in all the weddings I’ve attended over the years, I’ve never seen a Bride actually JUMP FOR JOY before sealing the deal with a kiss.

Let the party begin.

14 hours, 8 kegs, 12 bottles of champagne and I dunno how many bottles of wine later – the celebrations were still going on. We dragged ourselves away at 1am Sunday morning at which time there were still about 20 people left jamming on guitars around the campfire.

This felt to me like the perfect celebration of Love for these two friends. I felt blessed to be there and part of their special day and night. And it stands in harsh contrast to more than a few other weddings and receptions I’ve been to where the music amounted to a cd player sitting all alone in the corner barely attended to and all was done with restraint and ‘proper’ manners. Some receptions you can hardly wait to get out of. This one, you regretted having to leave.

I’ve lived where I am now (about 1/2 mile from where the wedding took place) since 1995 and only now am I starting to feel like less of an outsider. I’m slow to make friends and slow to get out and about. I’ve always hesitated going to local events for some reason. In the past month I’ve met more people and made more new local friends than I have in the past 20 years of living there. What’s changed? This thing, called Love.

Rog and I went out a fair amount early in our relationship but we lived where he grew up. He knew people. When we moved to a town halfway between our respective home towns, we had to start all over again to get to know our neighbors. Rog was always good at that. I guess I’m just too shy sometimes. I try to be friendly but always feel odd doing it. Once the kids were in school we started to meet some other young parents. Then, sadly, Rog and I went our separate ways and though we have remained Besties! it’s not the same. The kids grew up and school functions ended. Left without anyone to aid me in my socializing, I fell into the life of a homebody. On rare occasions I would go out but it was nearly always awkward and uncomfortable. I couldn’t wait to get home. I constantly wanted to know what time it was.

At Janet and Sam’s reception, I didn’t have a clue what time it was most of the time. When Jim and I finally decided to call it a night, I was shocked when we got to the car and I found out it was 1am. I never felt bored or awkward talking to anyone and I am going to credit my new relationship with Jim for getting me get out there and doing the things I want to do again. By wanting him to feel at home, make new friends and be happy, I am also finding I am feeling more at home, making new friends and being happier, too.

Here’s to Janet and Sam whose weekend of peace, love and joy has surely spilled over not just into my life but into the lives of everyone else who shared it with you. Thank you and may your marriage be blessed and joyful!

 

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Strawberry Fields For Father

Adventures / Family & Relationships / Food, Glorious Food!

It was a weekend of firsts – well, A First. After living in the area nearly my entire life, I finally made my way to the Owego Strawberry Festival on Saturday. Was fortunate to get a parking space at the DMV Lot. The biggest reason I’ve never gone to this is I’ve never been with anyone who was in the least bit interested in going. Interested or not, Jim agreed to being dragged about crowded Downtown Owego. Trust me, he needs it to be socialized now and again. He’d be a hermit if I let him. In previous relationships I’ve always been the homebody-hermit half so it’s an adjustment for us both – a good one.

Anywho! The lure of strawberries and live tunes and whatever else they had there pulled us both away from our computers for a few hours and out into the sunshine amongst our fellow humanoids. Was a nice walk about, taking in the numerous tie-dye clothing vendors, jewelry hawkers, canned & baked goodies, arts & crafts to beat the band and oh.. yeah, strawberries. To be honest, had I not KNOWN it was a Strawberry Festival, I – erm – probably won’t have, well, known. I’m gonna guess there were a hundred or so vendors at this annual shindig. I think I saw five or six that were selling strawberry-related foods. Strawberry shortcake was there, of course. Strawberry Lemonade made a couple of appearances. The drink of choice at the two bars within the Festival Zone was – you guessed it, The Strawberry Daiquiri. Was hoping for a Strawberry Funnel Cake or maybe some Strawberry Ice Cream. Didn’t see any. The one place I saw that sold strawberries in the raw, as it were, was loading up their truck getting ready to leave as we walked by at about 4:00 on Saturday. I was hoping to see someone dressed as a giant strawberry making their rounds for silly pictures. Nope. *le sigh* There were a couple of good bands there, though and we enjoyed what we heard of them. Someplace you could get an air boat ride on the river but wasn’t able to really find out where it launched from.

We strolled outta there about five and ended up stopping in Candor at Iron Kettle Farm for strawberries. Was real quiet there – we’ll go back again and subject ourselves to their pumpkin madness in the fall.

Met my dad for breakfast on Sunday and after we’d solved all the world’s problems over coffee, we got onto the subject of local festivals. Owego has strawberries, Marathon has maple syrup, Newark Valley took the apple, heck even lil ol RIchford does a weekend dedicated to the potato. Binghamton has a Fairy Festival. In fact, I saw a few of their folks in Owego handing out fliers. It was REALLY hard to miss the 7 foot tall guy dressed in purple wearing matching purple fairy wings. No, he wasn’t a stilt-walker. Oh, and we can’t leave out the Scarecrow Contest held in Candor at their Fall Festival, laws no! M-O-O-N, that spells Scarecrow! Sadly, my own hometown is without a festival. Maybe Corn. They have a lot of corn out there.

A couple hours later, Dad and I parted company. I love spending time with my Dad. Always have. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve become more and more aware of how blessed I am when it comes to my parents. I truly could not have asked for better people to raise me. Oh, sure, they MAY have had a wild party now and then and they MAY have been such regulars at a local bar that I, at the age of around 12, could go and order a round of drinks for them without the bartender batting an eyelash, but they were always good people and always treated my brother and I fairly. They were encouraging and loving and much to my mother’s dismay – Dad and I were perhaps a bit goofier in public than she would have liked us to be. That was only on vacations, of course *cough* where Dad would apply the ‘We’re never going to see these people again” logic when Mom would strongly suggest he and I calm down. I tried to use this logic on my own kids but they didn’t quite buy into it as much as I did when young.

I’m gonna start working on getting Jim to go for it a bit more… one festival at a time.

 

 

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