Momnesia

Augusta, Ga - Sometimes, when I'm playing Klondike Solitaire on my Blackberry, I imagine I'm in the World Solitaire Championships. Those TV commentators love me, but the pressure is unbearable.

Augusta, Ga. - I waited two days to see a doctor about my toe because I refused to pay the ER co-pay. I needed to see a doctor on Monday, but first I had to keep a sales appointment. Luckily, it ended up being the awesome wife of a Facebook friend, who brought their adorable little year-old son with her. She had heard about my broken toe, so she was prepped for my stupidity. Crutches + me = DISASTER. I'm just glad I got there before her, and left after her.

I was psyched to get a parking space right in front of the cafe. I was not psyched that there was no handicapped cut-through. Thus began what I call the Turbo Crutch Boogie:

Step 1: Crutch up to the curb.
Step 2: Wonder if giants have been subcontracted to do construction in Columbia County, 'cause that's a frickin' high curb.
Step 3: Position crutches at bottom of curb.
Step 4: Using crutches as a fulcrum, launch body up and over curb.
Step 5: Land on un-injured foot. Ta daaahh!
Step 6: Feel tug of gravity.
Step 7: Crutch desperately backwards off the curb, to keep from falling on ample behind.
Step 8: Crutch in ridiculous wobbly circle, trying to regain balance.
Step 9: Repeat, to amusement of onlookers sitting by the windows of the cafe.
Step 10: Consider giving unhelpful onlookers a big hyah! of Crutch Fu.
Step 11: Give up, reconcile myself to embarrassment, crutch over to the fencing that surrounds the outdoor seating, and use it as a ladder.

The meeting was great. I really liked her, and I admired her family's story. I adored her smiley wee baby boy, and I felt confident that we'd have a good time working together to have a positive impact on a local business. And then we left. But I realized I'd forgotten a card from my purse, and went back in to get it.

Repeat Turbo Crutch Boogie.

I am a dancin' machine.

I retrieved the card from the table, shoved it in my sweater pocket. But as I neared the exit, my crutches - which are so old that Charles Dickens gave them to Tiny Tim, I'm pretty sure - slipped out from under me on the slick tile floor. "Uh oh," I thought. "Going down."



It was spectacular - and Ima letcha finish, J. Lo, but it was one of the great falls of all time. My keys went one way. My crutches the other. I made a noise like "huuuuuooooooomph!" as a hit the ground. It looked amazing, yet hurt not at all... unless you count the injury to my ego.

"....Awesome," I sighed mentally. "This is just how I was hoping my day would go." And then I realized I was talking out loud. Even better.

A cafe employee peered down at me with confusion and concern. "Ma'am? Are you alright?"

"Oh... yeah. Just napping," I replied, still lying on the floor. An entering customer stepped around me with a bemused expression.

The cafe employee - a friendly older lady probably supplementing her Social Security - gave a sympathetic smile. "Are you hurt?"

"Not anymore than I already was." My toe throbbed from the involuntary effort that every muscle in your body makes when trying to avoid a fall. But it was bearable.

"Do you need some help to get up?"

"Nah," I sighed. "I'm just going to lay here and collect my pride for a moment."

"Okay," she said, laid my keys next to me, and toddled off.

After a minute, when the icy blast of winter air from the door alerted me that I was still lying in the way of entering customers, I sat up. The cafe employees were going on about their business, and I was shielded from the customers (minus the two who walked in - hi there!) by a wall that ensured minimal mortification. And, luckily, I was wearing pants.

So, using a chair to help me off the ground, I gathered myself to leave. The car seemed light years away from where I sat. I briefly considered crying like a spoiled infant. Then I took a deep breath, berating myself with the knowledge that some people have to do this every moment of their whole lives.

"Besides," I thought. "Getting off the curb is easier than getting on."

A little inspiration

Augusta, GA. - Spent yesterday laid up with a migraine. Because I spent most of the day in bed - Saturday gone bye-bye, dangit - I wasn't able to fall asleep until 1 a.m. Then, I was driven into Emmie's bed by Sir Snorz-a-Lot and the fact that Emmie, herself, was stretched out horizontally across our bed.

All of that converged when, sometime around 3 a.m., Emmie started shrieking. Shrieking like hot branding irons were being pressed into her flesh. Like someone said that she could never again have ice cream. Like all the unicorns had died.

"Must! Help! Baby!" That's the only thought that was in my head when I leapt out of her bed.

But my left leg was asleep, for some reason, and with its first step, landed on a page from a coloring book. My foot shot out from under me, lodged in the carpet, and kept going. I heard a snap! (and maybe a crackle! and pop!), lost control, and then my whole body hit the floor. Hard.

Emmie was still screaming.

"I'm - ow (expletive expletive expletive) - I'm coming, sweetie!"

SHRIEK! SCREAM! GENERAL FREAKING OUT! HOLY BOB THAT STUPID PIT BULL IS CHEWING ON HER FACE AGAIN!!!!

I race-crawl to the bedroom, around the toys and coloring detritus on her bedroom floor, because I cannot stand on a leg that is asleep. And because my jammy pants are too big, they begin to slide down my behind. I try to stand, but a shooting pain in my foot stops me, and I leap forward as I fall, like a running back trying to score that winning touchdown at the Super Bowl. Another pain as my elbow hits the floor.

"Emmie, stop!" I hear Scott snap from a deep sleep. I can see Emmie sitting up in bed, face upturned in a full-on howl.

"WHAT is going ON?!" I cry, as I make it into the doorway, panting, on elbows and knees. It seems like I had to battle all the minions of the underworld to get there, but it really took me less than 20 seconds.

"I hab a bad dream!" Emmie yells.

Are. You. Serious?!

I stop. I hurt a lot. I reassess the situation. My instinct, now that I am awake, is that there is no immediate danger. Just call me Sherlock Holmes.

"Emmie. Come here to me now." I command.

"Yes, mother," she says, and is instantly before me.

"Why were you screaming?"

"Because she's a diva," Scott says, from where he is still comfortably ensconced in the comforter.

"No! Because I hab a bad dream! I dream dat you were my muvver, but den you take off your face and you be'd a robot!" she says, indignant.

I collapse on my back on the floor. My elbow is fine. My leg is awake, and tingling wildly. But something is not right with my foot. I feel it in the dark, groan, and pull it up to my nearsighted eyes to examine it. The middle toe is broken. A lot. It careens off to the left at an angle that is highly unnatural. Now that I see it and understand, of course it begins to hurt like mad. On top of that, the adrenaline begins to subside and I find myself wracked with shivers, teeth chattering wildly. To add insult to my obvious injury, my jammy pants have slid down to mid-thigh. I am lying on the floor, in the hallway, shivering, butt exposed, with a very broken toe.

"Emmie." I say, in a voice that carries with it the full weight of God's law. "We do NOT scream like that. Mommy was VERY scared. I thought the doggie was biting you."

"Oh. I so sorry, mama. I jus' hab a bad dream."

(sigh)

"Mommy is not happy right now. Mommy hurt herself trying to rescue you. Because Mommy is an idiot," I explain as I feel where I hurt for injuries.

"You not a idiot, mama. You a hero!"

Yeah, I really feel like it.

Augusta, Ga. -

"Honey, I'm going to get the mail," I call to my husband as I survey the front yard through the windows. It's dark outside, and wet.

"I comin' too, Mama!" Emmie thunders to the front door. She loves the mailbox, even though it's practically IN the road.

"Okay... Don't get hit by a car," Scott calls.

"Or eat by a elephant!" Emmie calls back, cheerfully nonchalant.

"Or trip and fall in the dark on the pecans!" Scott calls, as I slip on my shoes.

"Or get smash in da head wif a tree!" Emmie calls back, a grin on her face.

"And don't go in the street!" Scott yells, as I open the door.

"Or get chomp by a zombie!" Emmie wiggles her eyebrows and fingers menacingly.

Whoa, zombies? I slam the door shut.

"Wuss wrong, Mama?"

"Uhh..."

I'm not afraid of zombies. I'm not afraid of zombies. There's no such thing as zombies.

"I wanna get da mail."

"Juuust... a second..." I peer out the windows. All clear. For now...

"Less go, Mama! Maybe ders anudder Chrissmass card!"

Crap... I'm not afraid of zombies. I'm not afraid of zombies. There's NO SUCH THING as zombies.

"Whatchoo say, Mama?"

Did I say that out loud?

"Come on..." I open the door and grab the broom next to the door. (Sigh) I really need therapy.

Emmie pokes her head out, innocent curiosity etched on her face.

"Ders no zombies, Mama," she shrugs, as though commenting on the weather. Partly cloudy with a chance of zombies. Scattered undead with a light wind from the northeast.

But her comment snaps me back. When did my ridiculous neurosis get so bad that Emmie knows what I'm thinking? Good lord. Someone slap me.

"There's no such thing as zombies," I declare to Emmie, put the broom back, and take her hand on the precarious front steps. Stupid pecans roll under our feet until we reach the grass.

"Mama?" she questions.

"Yeah, Doodle?"

"If ders no such fing as zombies..."

"Yeah?"

"Den wuss DAT?!" she shrieks and points over to our left. I jump and whirl and clutch her to me - and maybe even pee a little - trying to figure out what she sees. Nothing! Just the neighbor's ugly bushes! Then a strange sound emanates. Emmie is having trouble breathing. What on earth?! I kneel and shove the hair out of her eyes, patting her back, just as she stumbles on her feet and lands on her side in the moist, cold grass.

"I TRICK you, Mama!" she shrieks.

Son of a... She is laughing at me!

And hard. This is so funny to her that she is wheezing, holding her stomach - and, of course, broadcasting our location to any peckish zombies that might be out for an evening stroll... FOR BRAINS.

"Are you kidding me?!"

"Yes! I mate a jote on you!" she screams between howling laughter.

"It was a rhetorical question."

Emmie is not concerned with Socratic method. She is too busy lying in the grass trying not to throw up from all the frickin' hilarity on which she has gorged herself. She gasps, clutching her stomach, and slowly devolves into soft giggles.

"Mama, wuz you scared?" she asks, rather unnecessarily, I think. I mean, I was either scared or a cobra snaked down my underwear.

"No, I was just playing," I lie - TOTALLY LIE - to her. "There's no such thing as zombies."

"I know, Mama. Das juss a story. But I fink you WUZ scared." she grins. This child is very pleased with herself.

"Was not."

"Wuz too."

"Was not."

"Wuz too."

... Yeah. Was too.

We've been at Borders for a couple of hours, now, and the pile of books we've gathered is now slipping out of our hands (damn you, Borders, and your $3.99 sale). The two younger children have devolved into turning flips and racing each other down the aisles. It's definitely time to go.

"Okay, troops, line up!" I call, marching my legs. Like magic, they fall in behind me, marching in rhythm. Wow. That's a first. "Fall out!"

We march through the bookstore, winding without reason around display shelves, until we reach the counter and get in line: "Halt!"

I'm so proud of myself for getting my little soldiers organized. They are standing neatly in line, quietly anticipating the purchase of their new toys - uh, I mean, books. Of course we bought them books... My daughter is grinning at me and when I look over, she gives me a salute: "Aye-aye, Captain!"

Dang Skippy, I think.

"Ma'am?" The clerk calls, waving to get my attention. "Um, you might want to march your troops over to the other end because that's where the line starts."

Oh.

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So I ran by Augusta Prep to pick up some paperwork, and once I got there realized that I had absolutely no idea where to pick it up.

"That's okay, I thought. "I'll just ask in this random office. Everyone is so nice here!"

And suddenly I was on my face in the foyer.

After a stunned second, I leapt to my feet and realized that I had completely missed the step up into the entrance.

Brushing my palms and the knees of my trousers, I darted from that (thankfully) deserted foyer into the nearest office.

The woman behind the desk smiled warmly.

"Did you see that?" I giggled.

"Oh, no. You didn't fall did you?" She asked, eyeing my pants for injuries.

"Spectacularly!" I laughed.

"Are you hurt?" she asked.

"Just my ego," I quipped. I couldn't stop chuckling. How ridiculous I must have looked!

"I'm so sorry!" She said, with obvious concern.

"Hey, I'm just sorry you missed it!" I laughed. "It was maybe the best fall ever!"

And I limped back to my car, trying desperately to hold my head up... while keeping my eyes on the ground!

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I am carrying a single car key on a Tinkerbell key chain.

Scott: "Did you lose your regular keys?"
Me: "No."
Scott: "You did."
Me: "No."
Scott: "Where are they?"
Me: "Uh..."
Scott: "That's what I thought."

AUGUSTA, GA. - My husband and I enjoyed free tickets to the Augusta Symphony on Friday night, and then spent actual Valentine's Day cleaning out our many closets and boxes and random pieces of furniture in our apartment. Later that afternoon, I passed our piano beside where my husband was cleaning out this piece of crap particle board armoire that held way too many freakin' books. A fluffy, flowery Valentine's Day card perched atop the keyboard.

"Oh, thanks, sweetie!" The card was very sweet, very poignant. "But I didn't get you anything!"
"That's okay," he grinned. "That's the same card I gave you last year."

I burned the crap out of my soup pot.
It's black and charred and smells a lot.
I called my husband, teary-eyed:
"Thanksgiving is done! The pot is fried!"
But he never panics; never fears.
My husband knows Wal-Mart is near.
And so when ends his radio show,
Off to the store my hero will go.
And while he's shopping on turkey day,
I'll try to wave the smell away -
But all that cooks is now on hold.
It's a story as new as it is old:
No matter how hard I work to prepare,
Something burns - I'm just glad it wasn't my hair.

AUGUSTA, GA - What price honor?

That's what I've been asking myself this week after passing a woman whose car had broken down on Riverwatch Parkway. It was blisteringly hot, the car obviously just had a flat tire that I could easily have changed in 10 minutes, and as I passed her she turned so that I saw she had a toddler on her hip.

I didn't stop.

I was running late for a sales meeting, and I didn't notice her until I was right on her. Besides, there's nowhere on Riverwatch Parkway to turn around until you hit downtown and she was on her cell phone to someone.

And yet... it didn't feel right to pass her when I could have helped.

Not that anyone else was stopping. You simply don't see that in Augusta. As a teenager living in metro-Atlanta, I broke down in my 1970 Chevy van plenty of times. Someone always stopped to help. As an adult, I've broken down a couple of times in my car. No one has ever stopped. Even sheriff's deputies only stop to remind people to get their car off the shoulder in a couple of days or risk having it towed.

And although I've complained about the fact that Augusta is far from the city of brotherly love - in both geography and personality - there I was, flying past a person in need with the capability to help her, but not the time.

I called Scott.

"Honey, there's a woman with a toddler broken down on the side of Riverwatch Parkway," I said.

"And?"

"And it's hot as hell and she's got a baby with her. Isn't there someone you can call?"

He paused for a moment.

"Yes. I can call dispatch to see if they can send someone to help her," he answered.

"Oh, thank you, sweetie. I appreciate it. Will you do it now?"

"Of course."

I breathed a sigh of relief, but I really wasn't comforted. It could take an hour before a deputy became available, and I'm pretty sure it was so close to shift change that not one of them was going to volunteer for the job. Even if someone did arrive quickly, I still felt bad at not stopping.

Still, I got to the sales meeting only a couple of minutes late and grabbed my stuff out of the car when one of the city's persistent homeless began a sales meeting of his own.

"Hey, baby girl. Can you spare a dollar so a brother can catch the bus?" he asked.

"I'm sorry; I don't carry cash," I answered, truthfully.

"You ain't got a dollar?" he demanded, not seeing irony in his incredulity considering that he also did not posses a dollar.

"I don't have a dime," I responded, looking him in the eye.

"Well, whatcha doing?" he asked, eyeing me in a way that - had I been carrying any money - would have made me clutch my purse closer to my body.

"Working - why don't you try it?" I shot back, opened the door to the air-conditioned office and left him outside on the broiling sidewalk.

Good work, Me. There's that charitable behavior you're looking for.

I'll admit that there are certain parts of my job for which I was unprepared when I moved into this position. The difficulty of finding public bathrooms when I'm out making sales calls is just one of them.

Another one is exiting Publix in Evans (which has a bathroom I can use) and finding my hubcaps have been stolen. It isn't the kind of thing you expect in the crime-free county. And yet, there I was, looking at my sad tires and wondering what the heck someone would do with them?


And then I tried to get into the car to see if they'd broken in and taken anything else, but my key wouldn't fit. What the hell? Criminals who are also locksmiths? And then I saw the upholstery. It was grey. Mine is brown. Locksmith criminals with a flair for decor?

No. It was not my car.

My car was two lanes over.


Note to self: From now on, memorize license plate.

AUGUSTA, GA. - Some nights when I get home, I open the cabinet doors... and close them again. I check the freezer... and then the fridge... what was I thinking at the grocery store?! Can I get away with making cranberry muffin chicken pie? Perhaps some soy and ginger cake? Nothing seems to fit together, and recipe sites like epicurious and allrecipes took so long to scroll through. Half of their suggestions had more ingredients (or took more time, I need dinner now! I can't marinate for 24 hours!) than I had. In frustration, I googled ingredient list recipe match and discovered there is actually a site called Recipe Matcher. Of course, it has its limitations. If all you have in your house IS actually cranberry muffin mix and chicken, you should have the Chinese food delivery on speed dial. But if you have a few more ingredients, or you're looking for new combinations for more of the same ingredients you always have, this is a fun resource.

AUGUSTA, GA. - Scott and I had a date Friday night.

Obviously, you did not hear me, or there would be confetti raining down upon my head and cripples would be lining up for miles outside my door wanting me to lay my miracle-making hands upon their ailments.

My husband and I had a date, a real date, with just me and him and nowhere we had to make an appearance and without a scheduled agenda or dress code. We exchanged words that didn't rhyme and sang songs - don't ask - not written by a cast of characters wearing matching shirts (or shirts of the same style that do not match because they are all different but still very bright colors, thank you so very much, Australia.)

But it is a good thing that he is my husband and not some poor, unsuspecting man who asked me out because after...
1) hitting 30, which was officially 15 years of torturous dating, I turned into a Minuteman-version of the Dating Game on guys, waving the flag of the United Personalities of Stacey with all of them screaming, "Love her or leave her!" and;
2) after squeezing a watermelon-headed baby out of a - well, significantly smaller... uh, hey, shut up! Stop thinking about my hoo-ha! But let's just say the experience put things in perspective...
... I have apparently forgotten the Rules.

I am beginning to think that I was raised by wolves but adopted by a kindly, aging, childless farming couple who kept me in the barn but tragically died early, gentle deaths leaving me a ward of the state, which found me another adoptive family very quickly, and all while I was still quite young but not in time to teach me social skills. Witness.

Stopped at the 13th and Telfair streetlight.
We're coming from the Hill and going to The Boll Weevil. I'm driving. Scott's window is open.
(thinking): I bet I can hit the sidewalk with my gum.
Scott: blah blah blah blah blah
Totally. I can totally hit that sidewalk with my gum.
Scott: And then I said blah blah blah blah.
His head is in my way. Can I make it past his head?
Scott: blah blah blah blah
Do I want to make it past his head?
Scott: blah blah blah -
"Hey, move back," I order.
He obeys: "What are you-"
(huck!) Damn. Not quite.
Luckily, Scott collapsed in laughter and grabbed my hand.
"See?!" he guffawed. "That's why you're my best friend!"

We make it to The Boll Weevil without me doing anything else utterly disgusting. They've painted the exterior of the building, and they're working on the exteriors of all of the buildings on that block. Looks nice, even if I'm not sure about the color choices. Mustard always reminds me of a candlestick in the library, and that's a messy way to die, but at least a nice place to do it. As I cut into the bread, I chop into my left thumb. Hard. Deep. There is blood on the table.

"Are you okay?" Scott asks.
"yyyeeeeesssss," I grimace. Hey! A candle.
"I want to light my straw wrapper!" I exclaim. And then I do it.
Oh shit!
"What are you doing?!" he demands, and, dude, I have no idea. The shiny lighty thing distracted me! I blow on the paper and manage to put it out. A cloud of fine grey ash shrouds our table and settles in my water glass.
"You want to just get an appetizer and go?" he asks, looking at his bleeding, ash-covered bride.

That would probably be safest.

Disclaimer: No alcohol was involved in the making of this story. That came later.

I don't know if anyone else does this, but I'm entered into all kinds of rewards systems. There's the VISA Rewards, the My Points system, the Zoom Panel surveys, the Buzz Agent membership. They're useful. They've bought gifts for loved ones, the crib for our daughter, various articles of clothing and gift cards and what-not. But they most insidious one is the mycokerewards program. Every time you open a cap, you have to go to the reward site and enter in a 9-digit number. it's been kind of frustrating, and I'm still NOWHERE CLOSE to getting anything, unless I want some digital furniture in a digital room that I create in a digital environment on the same website, a la The Sims.

Nope. I want some real stuff right here in my real environement, a la Real Freaking Life. (sigh) I may be at this another year before I can cash anything in.

Scott usually calls me a number of times throughout the day. But he didn't this morning. About noon I looked at A.C. and mentioned that. She furrowed her brow and said, "That is kind of strange." By 1 p.m., I was losing my mind and broke down and called him.

Me: "Hey, what's up?"
Him: "Nothing. What's up with you?"
Me: "You haven't called me today."
Him: "Well, you always hang up on me."
Me: "What? I do not!"
Him (mimicking me): "Whatdoyouwant? I'mverybusyandimportant! Myblogiswaiting!"

Okay. Maybe.

My morning ritual:

1. Wake up, scratch my head and then my ass and sleepily get ready to take Emmy to daycare.
2. The coffee begins kicking in when I am on Boy Scout Road; however, I am still sleepy and dreaming of one thing: a nice, warm bath.
3. Arrive back home to a frigid apartment and shake off my clothes.
4. Reach into the bathtub and pull the handle to start the bathwater.
5. Get soaked by a flood of 30-below water cascading out of the shower head.
6. Run through the apartment wet as hell, screaming every obcenity imaginable.

After my tirade I realize the only person who cares is sitting at her desk laughing and plotting her next move. Dr. Evil must be paying her extra. It has happened every day this month.