He’s patriotic. I listen to Toby Keith. He likes to celebrate his birthdays with a barrage of noise and lights. I like fireworks. He likes to wear three basic colors. I’m ok with that.
Once thought to be a match made in Heaven, Mr. Fourth of July and myself no longer seem to be extremely compatible. In fact, I think our rocky relationship officially ended last weekend; right around the time I discovered I might have the pleasure of riding home from Priest in the ever-interesting company of my tow-truck driver.
Somewhat unfortunately for me, the Fourth of July is quickly becoming synonymous with trips to the dentist, listening to the grating sound of chewed ice, and other cringe-inducing experiences. While I, like the majority of my compatriots, delight in singing a heartfelt rendition of the Happy Birthday Song to our great country once a year, occurrences on this fateful night the past two years seem to indicate I might fare far better in altogether boycotting the star-spangled festivities.
Last year, in what looked like a valiant attempt at breaking my very first bone, I fell through a dock after watching fireworks from the middle of the lake. This year I awoke on the fifth with the somewhat disheartening, and yet not altogether surprising, news that my car had decided to attempt a bit of off-road action the night before. Apparently the physical pain and humiliation of last fourth didn’t quite satisfying the rapacious appetite of this our lone summer holiday. Interestingly enough, the weekend prior to the fourth my friends and I (unintentionally) listened to DMB sing “Crash into Me” a total of seven times. Perhaps I should have taken it as a sign of things to come. Only “Crash into that Tree” might have been a more accurate title.
While in all fairness the weekend did produce an impressive collection of noteworthy highlights, ultimately my car sacrificed its all for our jovial celebrations. Upon returning to Spokane, American Way Collision (ah, the irony) estimated the cost of repairing the damage to my car at $3700. The estimated net worth of my car, prior to the accident: $2800.
Sigh.
And so I press on from this, yet another painful ‘growth experience,’ sans a vehicle. But on a brighter note, I have been able to drive a truck for the past week and a half. As a further bonus, my newfound truck experience has been filled with sideways glances and mildly bewildered stares. I’m not sure, but I think it might have something to do with the license plate covers.
But someday I may really be ‘The World’s Greatest Grandma’.
I posted a picture of him for a silly Instagram-related game and found him waiting for me in my dreams, something which occurs so rarely it still explodes solidly-constructed dams inside me each time I see his face, mustached and smiling at mine just the way he always did, just the way I always remember him. As usual he didn’t say much, not anything I could hear or remember, but he was there and I knew it, and when I → Read more...
I have words washed out to sea. Words ushered quietly from my lips to my fingertips, waiting patiently for the right tide, for the moon to bring my stories alive.
I have words being reviewed, words accepted and words rejected, and I’m clinging to my favorite lines, fighting for them, and it feels strange and new and exhilaratingly infuriating, this tug-of-war of wills and how the slightest bit of caving can make me feel like I’m flirting with abandoning the sanctity → Read more...
[Alternately titled: Story, The Second: The Girl Who Moved To Washington State]
It began simply. A direct message on Twitter first, followed by texts; those texts, in turn, begat plans. With those plans came anxiety and apprehension – I didn’t know you, not your face or your voice or anything else, and I wasn’t sure I was ready to – but also something exciting, a strange and unexpected hope hovering quietly on the horizon. And then we met, conversed and laughed → Read more...
Stories I said I had. Tangential stories and life-changing ones.
Until today I haven’t known where, exactly, to begin. And so quiet this space has mostly been because some beginnings are tricky. Sometimes it’s quite impossible to denote where something ended and something else entirely began.
I’m not going to be able to tell you everything, but then the best stories never really do, do they?
(That’s not a trick question. I promise they don’t.)
(Unless the story was penned by Henry James, in → Read more...