You are currently browsing the monthly archive for May 2008.
I pushed with some effort on the heavy, frosted glass double doors and entered the reception area. A beautiful young woman sat behind the polished steel desk with a phone to one ear. She looked up as I entered, flashed a welcoming grin at me, then gracefully held up her index finger in the universal “gimme one second” gesture and waved invitingly toward a bank of nearby chairs.
As I sat and waited, I ignored the available coffee table full of business and technology magazines in favour of watching the woman. Her face was soft, and still rounded a bit with youth, but you could tell that she was concentrating on what the person was saying on the phone, and responding confidently. She wrote in a file in front of her, then politely rang off with the caller.
I watched her stand from the desk and deftly place the folder into a cabinet. I was struck by how small and fragile she looked. As she started to walk toward me, she suddenly stopped.
“Oh, I’m so sorry – I have to get that,” she explained before she turned back to the desk and reached for the phone once more.
“Good morning, ABC Systems. How may I direct your call?” She sounded so much older than she was. At least thirty. I could hear both the fatigue and the excitement in her voice. But no one else would be able to discern them. “Certainly sir, may I ask who’s calling?”
She pushed a button on the phone and her professional voice lightened only the slightest of tones for the next person she talked to. “Hi Bill, Jim Dodds is on line three for you again… Sure, no problem, I’ll take care of it.” She pushed another button, caught me staring at her, and grinned.
“Mr. Dodds? I’m sorry but he’s not in the office right now – may I take a message for him? Certainly, sir. I’ll let him know.” She wrote as she spoke, then hung up, punched a few more buttons on the phone, grabbed her purse from under the desk, and sprinted towards me.
“Quick, before it rings again!” she giggled.
I couldn’t help it – I was stuck to the spot.
She looked at my face and her eyebrows lifted in confusion. Wrinkling her nose a bit, she asked, “Wha-aat?”
“Nothing,” was about all I could choke out. “I’m just… you look… and sound… you’re so grown up and professional…”
“Oh, you’re just silly!” she laughed, and grabbed my arm, pulling me out of the stuffy corporate office and over to the bank of elevators that would take us to an elevated walkway and attached mall.
We bought lunch at a food court and ate in a nearby indoor garden — Thai food for me, and a bucket of homemade fries for her. Carbs mean nothing to her, the skinny little….
As we ate, we talked about anything and everything. And nothing. It was so easy being with her. We walked through the mall and looked in a few stores – mostly girly shops, with lingerie and dresses. Several times she unselfconsciously hooked her arm through mine and tugged me excitedly toward something.
With only a little bit of time left, we returned to the bank of elevators again, where she would go back up to work, and I would go out to my parked car and head home.
“Thanks for coming for lunch with me, Mommy!” she said and gave me a warm hug, completely uncaring of the group of businessmen and women standing nearby. “You’re the BEST,” she breezed impishly, then kissed me on the cheek and floated away, into the waiting elevator car.
My cell phone, stuffed deep in my purse, chirped the distinctive sounds of a text message. I retrieved it and looked at the display. It showed a local, unfamiliar phone number. I read the message.
“Um, Doc, check this out?”
“Who’s it from?”
“No clue, but they wrote: ‘Was it you and faisal talking behind my back?’ “
“Know any Faisals?”
“Nope.”
“Huh. Well, reply anyway.”
“And say what?” I asked, puzzled. “‘Wrong number, dude’?”
“Nah,” says my ever helpful spouse. “Text them ‘Yes’.”
I love how his mind works. I don’t dare listen to it, but I love it.
When our beautiful teenage daughter started putting down her looks, I made a conscious effort to stop self-criticising my own appearance so much. When our son started avoiding photographs, I pushed to overcome my lifelong camera phobia long enough to at least get some family portraits done. As a parent, few things stop me in my tracks faster than realizing that one of our kids is developing a negative habit – purely and simply a habit – based on being around me.
If our children ever figure out that the one way they can get me to do something is to act self-conscious or scared about doing it themselves… god, I am so screwed.
A few weeks ago I let them talk me into trying Guitar Hero III. I’ll admit, it’s fun, and addictive, but I used to like Foghat and now my fingers are gibbled and I’m hearing freakin’ “Slow Ride” in my sleep! D.S, somehow, someday, I’ll get even, man.
Not only do we have GHIII, but Cob bought Rock Band with his first pay cheque. That’s one of the lovely perks of having employed teenagers – a bunch of new gadgets and games in the house, and we didn’t have to buy any of them.
With Rock Band, Jan plays the drums really well, but hates to sing. Ari has never sung, and refuses to even try. Cob will sing unabashedly with karaoke or Rock Band – he’s got a surprising amount of confidence that way – but he’s not fond of always being stuck singing and never getting to play the other parts.
I had watched the kids play this thing many times and, I admit, the singing aspect intrigued me. Basically, it gives you the lyrics and a scrolling line of where your voice should be, and when you sing into the microphone it displays where your voice actually is compared to the line. Make your voice follow the line, and you get the best score.
I played the guitar and the drums with them. That was fine. But naturally, the kids goaded me tons of times to try the singing, too, and I always refused. What I hadn’t admitted to anyone was that I was secretly starting to think I might try it some day, when I had the entire house to myself, just to see how bad I was now. Of course, there’s two main problems with that plan: 1) I get the house entirely to myself about, oh, twice a year, and 2) I probably wouldn’t know how to hook the damned thing up and turn it on! Which of these seven remote controls do I need to use again? Input number what? Sheesh, kids and their newfangled gadgets, these days….
It was a Sunday. Jan’s boyfriend wasn’t here yet, so we had a rare moment together with just the five of us. We made a huge, delicious brunch together – the kind we normally only do when we have guests. We laughed and joked, and I was in a full-on, sappy, maternal mood.
The little buggers took full advantage, and before I knew it, I had a microphone in my hand and had agreed to try singing. “Just one song, and I’m not singing loud enough for you to hear, and it has to be something I at least know!”
My heart raced and my hands immediately started to sweat just holding the frigging mic. I’m not even exaggerating.
The last thing I ever would’ve expected is to discover that I can sing “Dead or Alive”, “Black Hole Sun” and “Tom Sawyer”. Those were the first three songs we did, because I at least knew them, and I scored 95-99% on each of them. Okay, okay… I was on Easy level, which a hormonal 13 year old boy with laryngitis could undoubtedly ace… but hey… the point is, I actually sang, kinda, okay noise came out my mouth in a somewhat structured manner, and the dog didn’t start howling and nobody’s ears started bleeding!
Oh, and it turns out I can fake my way through most Black Sabbath songs, but I don’t even remotely fit into “Celebrity Skin”!
I have no idea how I managed to pull off those scores – the game must be calibrated to accept mating calls of a moose and still let a player pass to the next level. All I know is, I learned my lesson way back when I was a kid singing to Mellissa. I may be brave enough to mumble quietly into a mic with the only audience being the people I gave birth to and who know they won’t inherit a dime if they ever speak of this to anyone — but there isn’t enough beer in the world to make me sing in front of anyone else, or to tape record myself ever again.
Although…. Hmm. Who knows what technology might be able to do for me in another twenty years.
The only person in our entire family who I ever heard sing when I was growing up, was my mother. On the rare occasion when she does, my Mum sings very softly, daintily, almost apologetically. I love her voice and used to try to trick her into singing more often, but whenever I outright asked her to, she would always say, no, no, she didn’t have a good singing voice any more.
“Any more.” After her knee-jerk humility, she often tacks on that she used to have a good voice, in the past. Thinking about it now, it’s the only thing I can remember my mother saying that she was notably good at. It’s like she allows herself this one vanity, but only because the talent doesn’t, in her mind, still exist.
When my last brother moved out, he left behind his old radio/cassette deck. I used to spent every Labour Day weekend crouched over it, listening to CJME’s annual Top 300 weekend, the wheels of the crappy old deck squeaking as I tried to record and capture some of my favourites songs. I eventually saved up enough babysitting money to buy a second-hand portable cassette player with headphones from a kid at school. It was this rickety combination of audio equipment that produced my first vocal project.
When I was home alone, singing along to the radio, if I tried really hard I was sometimes able to make my voice blend and disappear into that of the singer’s. I don’t know how old I would’ve been – eleven or twelve, maybe – but I remember that I had been listening to a Mellissa Manchester tape I had bought, as she belted out one of my favourite songs at the time: “Don’t Cry Out Loud”. I remember struggling, and failing, to match Mellissa on some of the low verses, but totally matching her on the chorus, much to my surprise.
I’ve always been deeply aware that what people sound like to others is vastly different than what they sound like in their own heads. I just assumed that I was a bad singer – the thought that I could be anything otherwise, never, ever, occurred to me. But I wanted to try to find out what degree of bad I was. I mean… was I bleeding from the ears horrible? Scaring small children and animals bad? Or just squirm and hastily leave the room unpleasant?
It seemed like a prudent move to determine this, alone in the relative safety of my bedroom, so I wouldn’t make a total fool of myself in front of others.
So I stuck an old Woolco blank cassette into my brother’s recorder, and carefully cued up Mellissa on the portable player. I reasoned that if I put the headphones on, I could hear the music and sing along like I always did, but by pushing the record button on my brother’s deck at the same time, the built-in mic would pick up only my voice from across the room and I’d be able to properly judge how bad I sounded, since I wouldn’t be recording the music or the other singer.
It’s painful even now to think about it. Good lord, I couldn’t have set myself up for humiliating failure any better if I had tried. Five seconds into the playback of my experiment, I yanked the ribboned tape out of the cassette, stretched and crumpled it, then burned it in the burning barrel.
Fast forward, oh, about twenty-odd years. I’m sitting at a table with my husband and children, and we’re casually hanging out with our friends who happen to be professional singers. And talk turns to the term “tone deaf“, and whether everyone can be taught to sing well.
I’m not really clear on how it happened – there may have been some beers involved. Actually, there would have had to have been. But I remember one of our friends turning to me and saying, “Here, try and sing this note,” and then he expertly hangs a crystal clear, strong, beautiful note, in the room. And it hangs there. And hangs there. Then he stops and says, “Now try and make that same sound.”
: blink : blink :
He may as well have asked me to give birth to a fourth kid, right there and there, in front of everyone. Hell, that would’ve been way more do-able! I looked over at my children, who had been kind of quiet and zoning out a wee bit around us adults, but they were now suddenly keenly alert.
Don’t kid yourself, children have extra-sensory radar when it comes to opportunities to watch a parent make a complete ass of themselves.
I didn’t want to wimp out in front of my kids. I would’ve cheerfully wimped out in front of my friends and my husband - no problem! But… my kids… watching… no good reason not to try, other than pure chickenshittedness….
AAACCCKKK!!!
I nearly strangled my pal. But with my luck, even that would’ve sounded good coming from his mouth, and he would’ve insisted I try to match that note, too!
&*%$#!)(*&!!!!… Sure. Uh huh. I’ll just get right on that, chum. With no song to kind of vocally guide me so I could flail around for a bit and then try to fall into the note. No lyric attached. Just a bare, naked, single sound. And I was supposed to try to repeat it.
Well. Ahem. Being a mere fucking mortal, of course I bombed horribly – I squeaked out a single sound that probably wasn’t even in the same octave, and thus the experiment ended.
I found out years later that I got cool points from my kids for at least trying, and I’d be surprised if my pals even remember doing this (as I said, there may have been some beers involved). But I vowed that it would be at least another twenty-odd years before I ever tried to croak out a musical note in front of anyone again!
I didn’t quite last that long.
This insomnia stuff really wears on a person after a while. At least mine is only periodic and temporary – I can’t imagine how brutal it is for people who deal with this all the freaking time. I have a tough enough job not thinking too much during a regular day, but it’s even harder when all else is peaceful and quiet, and my head is still yakking the hell away at me.
I have a half dozen or more blog posts in various stages of development – mostly mental, only – and I can’t seem to be arsed to do anything useful or entertaining with any of them.
But lessee… the personal trainer… maybe I can at least write that, and the easiest way might be to start with a rough outline of the last two years of our eldest child’s life….
- Ari completes high school except for a few minor credits that keep him from getting a diploma. He decides to join the military – always a strong interest for him – and get the remaining credits that way. At the time, he’s 18, has never been away from home for more than a few days, and never traveled more than a province away.
- He drags his feet. He’s so young. The army is a huge deal, and if he had a pal that wanted to join at the same time, it’d be different, but he doesn’t, so he wavers. Time passes. He plays video games. We, his parents, give him a kick in the ass about growing up. He increases his existing local part-time job to full-time, and finally completes the remaining courses and officially earns his diploma. Yaaaay!!!
- His boss loves him, but Ari does not love his boss. His boss has imported several workers from an impoverished country and is treating them in ways that are very contrary to Ari’s morals. Ari has a very powerful view of right and wrong. He does the math on his savings account, and resigns from the job at Christmas. He has enough money saved to pay his rent (yes, we charge him a token rent) and his other responsibilities for several months while he trains to join the military. After two years, his interest in an army career hasn’t diminished, and a healthy dose of working in retail for an abusive boss has only added fuel.
- We already have a cheapo home gym/weight set, and we volunteer and buy a treadmill as well, so Ari can run and workout to build up his strength to meet the physical requirements and survive boot camp. Ari runs. I offer him some gentle advice and information about how to train more effectively. But I am just his mother, and therefore know nothing.
- Months pass. We frequently discuss with him his decision to join. We do our damndest to keep our own opinions out of it and walk the line of not encouraging or discouraging – just lovingly supporting. Toughest. Part. Of. Parenting.
- Ari assures us repeatedly that he hasn’t changed his mind, and it’s the career path he’s chosen. But… Ari hit a plateau with his training, and doesn’t think he’s good enough yet to meet the physical requirements. He doesn’t ask for help, or talk to the recruiting officer for advice, or any number of suggested possibilities. He’s independent. He does it his way, and in the process gets more discouraged. He forgets to exercise some days. His savings are dwindling, and he feels pressured by time. He starts to talk about maybe looking for another local job and putting the army on hold. Again. My head silently implodes and my heart stumbles and sighs in frustrated exhaustion. They’ve both been running high-speed for months on their own treadmill of sorts, trying to deal with all the thoughts and emotions.
Here’s my thing as a parent – be what you want to be, and do what you want to do. I don’t care if you flip burgers or practice law, just take care of your responsibilities and be happy. It’s your life, and I’ll support your decisions no matter what.
But as a mother, I hate the thought of my kids making fear-based decisions. My purpose in life is to help them develop enough of a sense of themselves, and the world as a whole, that they can make their own choices, and grow through them.
Life is a series of choices, constantly, through every waking minute. To have to always pull those decisions up from an uncomfortable, dark well of fear and insecurity must be a living hell. I honestly can’t imagine what life must be like for someone who is fear-based, and I know that there are MANY people who live that way. As much as I don’t agree with some things they do, I have huge respect for the struggle they have to constantly deal with. If I do nothing else as a parent, I want to help my kids not have to live in that kind of a well all the time.
I don’t know if Ari is talking about finding a local job because he’s changed his mind and doesn’t want to join the army, or because he’s scared of trying and failing. We’ve talked with him, and he assures us it’s not the former – that it’s only because he hasn’t been able to hit the physical minimum, and time is running out. I think I believe him. I also think he hasn’t been able to meet his fitness goal because a part of him is scared of trying and failing.
Trying and failing sucks – there’s no two ways about it. But not trying *solely* because of fear sucks, too. Fear is brutal to work around, but not trying doesn’t make it go away. If anything, it feeds the monster and forfeits whatever power and strength you have. Sometimes you might examine all the angles and decide not to try because you’re too scared or there’s too great a risk, and I totally respect that – so long as you’re honest with yourself about your choices. So long as the choice is voiced by you, and not by the fear.
Does that make any sense? Is there a clear distinction made there?
So… anyway… as his mother, it’s been driving me crazy to see Ari struggling with himself like this. And it’s all about me, ya know. So I looked up “personal in home trainer” on the internet, expecting to find that they’re way out of our price range. Turns out they’re not – or, at least, not all of them. I don’t want an ongoing, weekly trainer or to go to a gym – I just wanted someone to come in to our home, see the equipment we have, and help make up a structured workout program to suit our goals, and show us where our technique is off.
Yes, ‘us’. I have, for some unknown reason, suddenly gained a noticeable amount of weight in the last few months and it’s all in my waist, and I’m pretty pissed about it. I’m not comfortable, my clothes aren’t fitting, and I’m damned sure not buying new ones. I hate this. So I’ve been trying to seriously workout, too. It started as my attempt to subtly encourage and help motivate Ari, because lord knows his stubborn male pride won’t let me outright help him in any way, but now I need it for myself just as much.
So I broached the subject with Ari of having a personal trainer come in for a day – because I wanted to try it, ya see, and I was a little uncomfortable with the idea of doing it myself, and he’d be helping his mother if he was willing to do it, too, so I wasn’t so squirmy….
Ari’s not an idiot. He didn’t fall for it for a second. But he’s a great kid, all in all, so he just looked at me, grinned and shook his head a little, and said, “Okay.”
As it turned out, it wasn’t an exaggeration or lie on my part at all. Once the handsome, incredibly strong and built (but not so built it’s gross) trainer dude came in and started working with us, and demonstrating different positions, and touching me and showing me how to move this way and that, I was grateful to have my son nearby. Whew. Is it getting hot in here?
So the upshot of this little nutball idea of mine is that Ari can no longer hide behind any excuse of not knowing how to train (‘course, now neither can I, dammit). Either he’s going to decide to get physically fit enough to join the army, or not. And if he gets fit enough, either he’s going to decide to join, or not. But he can’t fart around any more and let that part of the equation mask any fears he may have – he’s going to have to be honest.
I know, I’m a pain in the ass, bitch of a mother.
It’s no secret that I’m a big fan of street artists and non-destructive graffiti. But holy cow, this video displays a whole other level of ambition!
It’s best with the sound on. I love the effort and creativity, but I was strangely disturbed by a lot of the visuals.
Which, of course, impresses me even more.
I’ve been in low gear for the last wee while – pedaling fast, pulling a load of different things, and not sleeping very much at night. Exceptionally heavy dream action going on (as you saw) when I do manage to conk out, which is bizarre because I very rarely dream.
I still have a bunch of housecleaning to do tonight, in preparation for a personal trainer coming here tomorrow.
“Personal trainer.” It sounds rather… decadent… doesn’t it?
Life is such an adventure.
More, once I catch my breath.
As I was driving near the new [local community] Superstore today, I was horrified to see an elderly gentleman suddenly collapse in the middle of the busy street. I immediately pulled over to the side and went over, but even quicker to assist was a group of teenagers/young men who were driving in that lane and who could have easily run over him if they had not been paying close attention and stopped quickly.
By the time I got to them, the young heroes were assessing the situation and gently helping the man to his feet, with care and respect. They had everything under control, and more vehicles were slowing down and stopping, so I returned to my car. When I pulled away, I saw the boys standing with the older man, safe on the sidewalk, patiently supporting and protecting him as he got his bearings.
I am a parent of three teenagers, and it frustrates me when I hear people grumble about “kids these days”, and how society is going down the tubes because of lack of morals and respect. Yes, there are spoiled, violent, irresponsible youths these days. But there are also bitter, nasty, mean-spirited senior citizens as well. And a dozen generations ago, our ancestors were probably saying much the same things. How selective our memories, and our perspectives, can be.
No matter where – or when – you live, there will always be people who make life unpleasant. But there will also always be bright spots and hope, if you just allow there to be, and these young men were another example of this. I hope their parents are proud.
I squinted and sat up just enough to see over my husband’s shoulder. 4:32. I collapsed back on the pillow, my mind both fuzzy and racing. In it was what seemed to be at least a full chapter of a detailed story that I had absolutely no idea existed before I’d gone to sleep.
A woman watched a group of giggling teenage girls walk down the street of the small town. When they thought no one was near, the girls each quickly and gracefully placed white linen pieces of cloth, somewhat like the large collars of habited nuns, over their heads and drew the slitted fabric down around their shoulders, past their hips, and then stepped fluidly out of them. As her eyes trained back up from the girls’ feet, the woman realized that the girls were now all suddenly wearing different outfits than they had been seconds before. Laughing delightedly at their quick change miracle, the girls walked en masse into a shop.
The woman hastily crossed the street and followed them into the building, wondering if she had just seen what she thought she had, but also knowing without a doubt that she did.
Deliberately positioning herself so the girls couldn’t help but overhear, the woman started chatting with the shopkeeper, subtly but carefully inserting some specific details about her own young daughter’s behaviour – details that were sure to catch the attention of the young teenagers. The previously cool and snobbish group looked at her, uncomfortable and wary, before they wordlessly agreed that it was time to leave – time to get away from her. She tried not to be threatening as she followed after them, and as she struggled to call out the right combination of casual words to entice the oldest, and most quietly confident girl of the group, to stop and listen to her cautiously.
The threads of sleep were getting thinner and thinner and I raced to try to retell the story to my awake self, before they faded and disappeared completely. I lost a big chunk of it here, though. There was something about the two females walking toward a marshy field by the train tracks, and finding a place to sit for a few minutes, preferably by a clear little puddle of water, and not near a disgusting polluted one.
The woman was talking about her daughter and using that connection to ask the girl questions about the clothing trick, about her life, about things that the girl had to try to carefully weigh and decide how much to answer, before she did. The woman was excited but tried to keep it in check and play the role, to show the girl that she already knew everything and that talking about it was entirely safe and natural. She had to fake it properly, otherwise she’d scare this precious resource away, and be left confused and alone with her unknowing, yet again.
As I try to type this – these last, faint whispers of the dream – it’s hard not to feel frustrated that they’re almost entirely gone, and that something so cool can’t be hugged closer and kept. The only thing I remember now was the dramatic closing line of the mental film, where the young teenager, still wary but warming swiftly to the woman in the excitement of finding someone so much like herself, tentatively asked, “Now can I ask you a question?”
And the woman replied, “Sure, of course.”
“When did you first realize that you were a witch?”
The woman broke the girl’s gaze for the first time, and looked down at her own hands, clasped tightly in her lap. “Right now.”
I’ve got to stop eating espresso cheesecake late at night. Or else, maybe… start eating more of it?
Now that Cob is working, and Jan is moving out in a couple of weeks, we recently did some shuffling of our family cell phones so Cob could have one of his own.
We just got the first full month’s bill for his phone:
3175 minutes
736 text messages
Oh, did I mention that his girlfriend has her own cell phone, too?
Thank god for “My Five Friends” payment plans!
