Side Track....

We are taking a little side track on the blog today...not that you would really know it because my blog is pretty much all side tracks, but from the list of what I was going to write about in my head this just jumped the line so, trust me, side track.

I'm reading a collection of short stories right now, not just a collection but The Best American Short Stories of 2014.  Get that? THE BEST.  So to get in to this collection you had to have been published someplace in 2014 and been good enough to catch the eye of the editor of the collection (that changes every year, for 2014 is was Jennifer Egan) and then you are published again in this collection of THE BEST.

I'm about half way through and let's just say that Ms. Egan and I would probably not share book lists. There have been a couple that were decent and a couple that weren't my cup of tea and a couple that were just...odd. Like I want to say bad, but the writing was competent, so not bad necessarily but just not great. With a short story you have very limited time to make a connection with the reader. Half the time on here I write micro stories so it's even less than that. You have to come right in with a hook, with a reason for the reader to care, with something, anything that makes the 15 minutes I am going to spend in this world worth it.

And some of these just don't have it. It never comes. It isn't there. I have a feeling Ms. Egan likes edgy for edgy's sake. I am a huge fan of edgy, but there has to be a story there. For example (and this is a HUGE spoiler so if you are going to read the collection feel free to skip ahead I will mark where you can pick the blog back up) There is a story about a woman who ends up with her husband's child from an affair he had. The boy is obviously severely autistic and the woman has no idea how to handle him and by the end of the story he is lost in the woods and there is pretty much zero chance he will be found.  Which should be incredibly sad right? But the author has used this child as a side prop to a story so there is no real connection to him at all. Or to the woman. Or to the father. Or to anything. You can tell it's not going to end well, it's practically telegraphed from the first paragraph, but you still really can't muster a give a damn about a 5 year old special needs child being lost in a forest in Colorado during fire season. Holy shit...if you can't make me care about that I am not sure how this is THE BEST.

YOU CAN START HERE AGAIN SPOILER FREE....

Okay, so as I'm reading these short stories, which are my thing, as you all know, and I am replaying in my head over and over the radio silence I've received from publishers over the years (which is fine, really, I have you all and I love you all for reading my stuff, I do) and knowing that I can't get any outside interest in my stuff (which really is fine, I mean I've accepted this, really I have), yet this this is THE BEST I wonder what the hell is going on. They were published not just once, but twice, with stories that are just okay. *sigh* (I'm fine. Really.)

So now I am taking a deep breath and remembering that not every story is for every person. Don't criticize the artist because their art isn't your cup of tea. Don't hate the player, hate the game.

BUT JESUS CHRIST THESE STORIES ARE NOT THE BEST!

So now I'm at a crossroads. I really had reached a point where I convinced myself that getting published wasn't the end all, be all in writing. After all what is published, right? I mean when I write something and put it on here you all read it so technically it's published right? I've never been motivated by money (much to Brent's chagrin) so being paid to write has never been my goal. But all of that being said, I feel like Last Comic Standing, "I know I am a better writer than..." and I sort of feel like I should at least put a push on one last time to get something in print with my name on it so someone else out there can read my stuff and be motivated to write because of how much they hate my stuff...

Family...

And now this one...

There will be another family(ish) blog but here is the general one.

Trips home are always complicated when it comes to family visits. When people come up here to visit they get our undivided attention. It's just them and us. When we go down there to visit we are dividing time between families. Including when each of our father's died, we made time in the middle of both of those trips for some time with the other family. Scheduling can be tricky and it can lead to cross communication and hurt feelings and drama. All of which I am allergic to....

So anyway, this trip was specifically to make sure we visited with my mother since she doesn't travel. We wanted to make sure she got however much time she wanted with us so when I called her with our travel dates I let her know Saturday afternoon and evening were taken with the reunion (that ended up not happening) but she could have whatever else she wanted. She wanted lunch on Sunday.
"Is that it?"
"Yep, that way everyone can join."
"Okay, but you don't want anything else? We get in Friday afternoon and don't leave until Tuesday morning..."
"Nope, lunch on Sunday will be good."

Ooookay....

Not going to lie, I was more than a little put out. But that's what she wanted so that's what we did. Later my sister texted me and let me know that now Mom wanted lunch on Sunday and then time after for cake. Okay. Is that all? Yes, that's it.  Okay...

So we let Brent's mom know that Saturday afternoon and evening and Sunday were taken but what time did she want? She wanted Friday evening, Saturday morning, Monday all day and Tuesday before the flight...You just have to laugh. We got her talked down to about half of that so we could spend Monday evening with friends as well. Then it ended up that she wasn't feeling well on Saturday so begged off from Biopark adventures after breakfast.

Now I will say it was a lovely visit. We saw Brent's mother's new house. She finally moved out of the place she and Jack had together. I was surprised that it took her as long to do it as it did. The new place is nice. It's in a gated community and has some lovely wrought iron work on the windows (Albuquerque) so she feels much safer than she did out on the West Side. It's closer to her office and the places she likes to go, including a new Sadie's so we had a wonderful dinner there the first night. There are skylights all throughout and she's put up mesh wiring along the fences so the cats can go out in the backyard with her. It's a little bigger than she really needs, but the layout, skylights and price were right for her so she took it.

Breakfast the next day was nice. We hit Weck's for papas and David and Stephen joined us. David was the Mastenbrook family stylist for years and years. I got him in the marriage as well; the man knows hair. He also became a close family friend over all of those years. I felt a little badly for Stephen because he had planned on going on a morning hike and got roped in to breakfast instead but sometime sacrifices are made, right? They are both doing well and it was lovely to see them. The only bad part was, as I said, Ann wasn't feeling well so she went home instead of on to the park with us. Though she probably enjoyed being at home more than she would have enjoyed dot harvesting in the heat with us.

Sunday was lunch with my family at Little Anita's. More New Mexican food, of course, then back to my mom's place for German Chocolate cake. The cake is a big deal to me. It's my very favorite. I've mentioned before that birthdays in my family were always done in bulk. So for August we had my Aunt Lucille, cousin Todd, me, and my brother John. Aunt Lucille's favorite meal was creamed tacos and John's favorite cake was German Chocolate so that's what we had. Along with homemade vanilla ice cream because it's summer and who doesn't love that? But over the years as Ann (sister this time not MIL) would make that cake it became my favorite as well. It's just perfection. She even sent a slab of it to Idaho Falls one year for my birthday. It traveled messily but still tasty! This time around my nephew Brian made his mother's cake so the torch was passed and I ate the rewards. You all know how I am about cake...

The visit was a good one. Only one or two testy moments about politics and differences in opinions but they passed quickly and fairly smoothly. Which is good, I was really worried it would be a tough one this time. With the Supreme Court rulings, the start of the next presidential season, Caitlyn Jenner and the Iran deal there were so many potential land mines that the fact that nobody got blown up is pretty damn impressive. Maybe Mom knew exactly what she was doing by limiting the time of the visit to just a few hours.

When it became apparent that the jet lag was catching up to Brent (he was in Germany last week and would fade for a bit every afternoon as his body thought it was the middle of the night) we said our goodbyes and headed out with no blood no foul. Not bad.

Another quick meal with Brent's mother and that wrapped up the families. No tears. No tone. Or not much tone, maybe a short burst of tone once but it was quick...nobody disowned. Not bad.

Now you are asking where the pictures are? Well let me tell you, I swear I took pictures at lunch with my family. I even moved from one side of the table to the other to make sure I got everyone. And they are not on my camera. Gone. And Brent's mom? I totally forgot. I had planned on taking a picture of all of us at the park and when she didn't go I didn't reset my head to make sure I got a shot of her the next meal we had. Just gone from my brain. But we did see them, even though there are no pictures. Instead here are our stand-ins, butterflies from the Biopark...

There we all are having lunch together...

And here is a lovely shot of Brent's mother showing us how bright the new house is with all of the skylights. 

See? Pretty much exactly the same...

Friends...

We will start here with the home blogs...

Okay, let's get background info going first, you all know I love my background...

We just got back from a visit to Albuquerque. We hadn't been back home since my dad died four years ago and the trip before that was for C's high school graduation to visit family who couldn't make it to his ceremony, the trip before that was for Brent's dad's funeral and before that I couldn't really tell you....but it had been a long time since we had been back and had time to see people other than family. 

When we first planned this trip it came about because we were talking about needing to go home to visit my mother. She's 83 and has been battling cancer for the second time and she just doesn't travel like she used to. Brent's mom comes up here once a year usually, but we hadn't seen my mom since Dad died. So we needed to head home. Then while we were talking about that visit the Class of 85 from our high school started talking about their reunion, and wouldn't it be fun if the Class of 86 joined in? We thought that would be a good chance to see people so we booked for the weekend they planned.

Then that fell apart. The Class of 85 wanted a reunion but they didn't want to help plan one. It all ended up falling on one person (Caren, she'll come back in this later) who was in the middle of just moving back to Albuquerque and starting a new job so not a lot of spare time when nobody else wants to help you. So it didn't happen. Which left us with an extra long weekend in Albuquerque and no real solid plans. We winged it.

Which turned out really well. (read that one sarcastically)

It started out with trying to get people together for dinner or drinks on Saturday anyway (the day the reunion was planned) and that didn't happen. I could understand Caren's frustration at that point. I can't plan things from Oregon, folks, let me know if you want to get together and where a good place would be....nothing but a lot of "oh yeah that sounds great let me see..." and then nothing. *side eye* Well we had already made plans with our friend Nikki to have dinner on Monday since she would be out of town until then so we thought, fine, we will just move that to a casual place people can come and go and who makes it makes it. Then another friend couldn't make that but sent a message saying hey, I still want to see you guys so how about I take Saturday? Great!

So now we had plans.

Which turned out really well. (read that one sincerely)

Dinner on Saturday was with our friend Chad and his wife Stormy. I've written about reconciling with Chad after a decades (not even kidding) long fight here and here and there was more after I wrote the second blog that I never wrote about because it wasn't my story to tell, someday he or Stormy will write about The Lie and I will link that, but trust me it makes everything he and I went through seem small. Anyway this was the first time we had seen each other face to face since we started talking again almost 5 years ago. I'm not going to lie I was a little nervous if the damage had been too severe and we would end up with long awkward silences. Yeah, no, that didn't happen. We caught up on current lives and filled in even more of the past issues and came out smiling. He's still my brother from another and now his wife is part of my family as well. The only weird part was that he got old and I didn't and we aren't sure how that happened. (joke, he said he got old I told him to bite his tongue because I didn't and technically I'm older than he is so it's not possible for him to be old when I am not) 

But there were a lot of gap filling stories. Things that talking about now made a lot of other things make so much more sense. And telling those stories, and the catch up stories made everything that has happened since then fit together like a puzzle. It's amazing how that works. When you can step back and look at things how they all fit together you get a lot of clarity. (this was a recurring theme) But dinner was great. Los Cuates, tamales, sopapillas, lots of laughter and a more than a few "Oh! Now that makes more sense!" moments.

And a picture before leaving because we have NO pictures from high school or San Diego. It's sad...

(also Stormy and Brent are totally ducking down here and are actually taller than me by a good piece)

Then we skip ahead to Monday....

Monday was originally just dinner with Nikki, then it was going to be Nikki and Caren and then we said, "hey, who ever is around, come!" and Eric joined us. Small group to be sure. But you know how it goes, people who are living there have lives to live. Kids need shuffled around places, work happens, spouses might not be all in for dinner with strangers, and really do we have anything to talk about with people we haven't seen in decades? I get it. And honestly, it worked out perfectly. There were people I would have liked to have seen, but I cannot imagine that it would have made the night any better, because it was a great dinner.

Nikki and Brent were in Entertainers together. Nikki and I became friends through that connection. We knew each other and were "friends" before that through the crossover of groups but not "Friends." When she realized that I wasn't going anywhere she made the choice to actually get to know me. As I've mentioned before that wasn't easy to do in high school. I was mad at the world and that came out as terrifying. But Nikki was important to Brent so I made the effort as well. And we ended up with a friendship of our own, friends to Friends. It was a good transition. She's also gorgeous. It was a little intimidating in high school, now I can just appreciate how blue her eyes are without wishing mine weren't so very brown. Okay, that's what I tell myself, but I would still love to swap. 

Caren and I knew each other in high school, we were both in drama, we were both friends with Nikki, but we weren't close. We were in different groups within the drama crowd and she was part of the friend of a friend circle that you know but you don't know. We reconnected recently and discovered we really dig each other. We both like sports (just a little). We have the shared history of Albuquerque and Highland, with a lot of cross over in friendships. We both tend to look at life from the ridiculous side. You know, "what is funny about this, let's find the joke." She's also pretty much the text book definition of vivacious. And she wore polka dots to dinner because she knows I love them. How great is that?

Eric was in Entertainers with Brent and Nikki so they are friends from that. Eric was in drama with me and Brent so we are friends from that. He's a twofer like Brent. Bridged both performing arts groups. Eric was probably one of the only people in high school more people were scared of than me. And that's only because of his size. He's 6'5"tall. Which is big now...in high school? It was HUGE. We laughed because I was never scared of him (I had no real sense of fear) and the only thing he is scared of is small women (his mother is a petite lady) so I would boss him around constantly and he did what I asked. He also played a very funny part in the night Brent and I started dating for the last time...which is a different story for a different time.  Eric was a year behind us at school and Caren was a year ahead so they met for the first time Monday, but you wouldn't have guessed it. 

We all laughed so much. That's the main thing to point out. So much laughter. And then stories shared. And remember how I talked about with Chad how when you got the "oh that makes sense!" moments? There were so many of those! We each had pieces of stories and when we put them all together it made for a completely differently story. But one that finally made more sense. There were things that if you only knew part you really didn't know anything. And it was great getting all of those pieces to put together. Even when Nikki told me "this better not end up in a story!" and I had to admit that please believe it was totally going in a story, I was already writing it in my head! 

There was also the line of the evening, you know when you get those moments that are going to be jokes forever? "But we were good kids..." that's going to be on that list. Talking about us versus "these kids today" and Nikki said, "We were good kids" and we all busted up laughing. But it's true, we were good kids, in that sense that we all had decent hearts and grew up to be good people. But we made some incredibly stupid choices way back when and were very lucky at times that things turned out as well as they did. Alcohol, police, random nudity offers, more alcohol, cruising, Yale Park, scripts for parents, tornadoes, a few punches thrown ... but we were good kids... We needed the rest of the Entertainers there and a few gallons of iced tea and it would have been just like hanging at Carrows. 

One of many, many shots taken at the end of the evening, and who needs a selfie stick when you have Eric's long arms??

So yes, there were a lot of people we didn't see, there were plans that fell through and people that were missing, but it was still great. And the good news is that the Class of 86 is already planning for our actual reunion so we can do it all again next year, but with more people and more stories.

I hope everyone makes it.

If not we'll just head to Dion's and see who shows up...

Age before beauty...

Gray hairs are unruly by nature.

They stand out.

Silver or white in a dark mane of hair.

Shining or dull.

Different. 

Even if you try to color.

They mock you.

Standing straight up.

Curly in straight hair.

Thick in thin.

Try to make them blend in?

Not a chance. 

They might look similar,

But they are never the same.

Gray hairs have earned that right.

Age has brought changes.
Don't try to ignore them.

Gray, grey, gray, grey.

Gray hairs are unruly by nature. 

And Go....

I have fifteen minutes to fill before I leave for the airport to pick up Brent. Not enough time to really get in to anything. Maybe part of a chapter in the book I am reading but that doesn't sound appetizing, which should tell you what I think of the book so far...there are flashes in there, something that could go well, or it could go badly and make me frustrated that a good idea was squandered...but so far it's almost a chore to read more. Not a good sign.

I could watch part of an episode of a TV show. But I just binged on Empire over the last few days and finished the season finale an hour ago. Letting that dose of cotton candy settle. It's just such a pure soap. So much drama in one family. I love it more than I should I am sure...nursing a crush on Jussie Smollet right now. I already had one brewing from his guest appearances on The Chew but after watching Empire? Oh my goodness...Jamal broke my heart. So good. (I checked his age, he's in his 30s it's not creepy, and yes I know he's gay. I'm a theater kid who grew up in the 80s you think this is the first gay man I've had a crush on? Child, please.)

I could look at my clothes and try and figure out what I am packing to take to Albuquerque again. But so far all I know is what I'm not taking. I hate packing to travel. I hate trying to decide what is appropriate for what crowd. I hate worrying about things that I shouldn't have to worry about but I do so thinking that I shouldn't doesn't matter...yes I know you think that doesn't make sense, but it totally does so there.

I could try and knock out a fiction piece but in fifteen minutes all I could manage would be a poem. Maybe a couple of haiku or an American sentence but only if I had a subject in mind and right now I don't.

So what I settled on was a fifteen minute brain dump blog. (we are 5 minutes in and I am running out of steam so this might not have been a great idea)

Not sure I will write tomorrow, cleaning and that packing that will have to be done then. Won't write over the weekend while we are away so it will be Wednesday before I start again. Then I will have like 12 blogs or so to do by the end of July to catch up to where I should be to keep on goal. Eek. I really do need to get more disciplined about the blog.

One of these days I will remember who I am and stop trying to make myself disciplined. Or I will accept that I can meet a goal, but not in a steady manner. It's all fits and starts. But why start now, right? I mean if I don't know me by now I will never ever ever know me...ooooh....

Okay, yeah, you caught me, I'm singing to fill time.

And that's close enough. I used up 10 minutes and by the time I get my shoes on and out the door it will be about right. I will grab that book to bring along just in case Google was way wrong on how long it was going to take and I will power through some more of that...let's see if it gets better.

Thanks for stalling with me. You're the best!

Gone girl...

He walked by her like she wasn't there

Made of nothing but memory now

Distant. Fading. Gone.

I'll never forget you

he once swore

How could he forget her

He loved her he said

Air. Memory. Remainders.
Fading. Disappearing.
Just reach out your hand

and I will always take it

Or walk through it

Smoke. Haze.
Clouds on the horizon

Who was she now?

She didn't know

Is this the real life?

They sat on a park bench eating lunch. Sunny days were meant for small breaks. She was staring at the new apartment building going up across the street when a woman in a grey dress seemed to float up the partially constructed front stairs. She was so graceful she looked like she belonged on a dance floor not a construction site. And that dress? It was so delicate, so gauzy, so...wait...see through? Not like the dress was see through but she could see through the woman herself. She leaned forward to get a better look....

"Do you see that?" she turned to her lunch companion.

"The woman in grey? Yeah, I see her. She's not real though, poor thing."

"She's not real? You and I both see her, she's right there, what do you mean she's not real?"

"Well, I mean, she's not real. Or at least she's not any more. I would guess with the level of detail involved she was real-ish for a while. Someone really worked hard on her. But now? Look at her."

"You think she's a ghost?"

He looked again, "I don't think so. She doesn't act like a ghost. I don't think she was made to be a ghost."

"You and I can both see her. She's translucent. She's not a ghost. And she's not real."

"Yep. That's what I think."

She looked at him and shook her head, "I have no idea what all of that means."

"Well you know there are only a few hundred real people, like really real people in the whole world right?"

She laughed, "What?"

"There are only a few hundred real people. The rest are all made up by them. The best they reach is real-ish."

"Are you crazy? Everyone but a few hundred people are made up?"

"Yeah, I mean yeah on the made up, not yeah on the crazy. Look people like to interact with other people. And they like variety. New stories. New people to meet. With only a few hundred real people around things get pretty boring. Or I would guess they would. There have been so many generations of made up people that it's kind of hard to imagine the before."

"The before?"

"Yeah, when there were only the few hundred. And then even when there were only scattered pockets at all. Before the internet I imagine it was especially barren in places. But now you can imagine people all over the world and interact with them so there are more and more made up people filling every space. It's getting to be much more crowded. Though you still get fade aways like her." He lifted his chin back toward to the woman in grey.

As she looked at her again the woman did seem even more pale. "A fade away? Is that what you call people who aren't real?"

"No, fade aways are the unreal people who are forgotten. Someone real made her up at some point but now? Now they've started to forget her. So she's just, you know, fading away."

"So she's dying?"

"No, not dying. Who ever made her didn't have her die. That wasn't part of what they made up. So she didn't die. My guess from looking at her is that she never made it out of what ever dance they met at. She just stayed there until she was forgotten. And now..." he waved his hand her way. She was still gracefully climbing and descending the steps, but she was definitely paler than she was at the start.

"So since we can see her. And we can see each other. That means that we are real?"

He smiled and shrugged his shoulders. "I have no idea. I mean I feel like I'm real. But maybe you made me up because you didn't want to eat lunch alone. Or maybe I made you up for the same reason. Or maybe someone else made us up but gave us a lot of details."

"A lot of details?"

"Yeah, okay, you know how some people you know everything about right? You know where they grew up, where they are now, where their family is, where they work and on and on? They have a lot of details. Then there are the people that you see once and never see again. They don't even have a name. Not a lot of details. Sometimes it's just because they aren't part of your story, but other times it's because who ever made them up just didn't fill them in anymore than a sketch. You know, like 'bus rider #1' in the movie credits. They are less real than 'coworker of 5 years' less details versus more details."

"If we were real wouldn't we know how to make people up?"

"Nah. The reals don't know they are the only ones any more than the real-ish don't know they aren't real. They don't even realize they are making people up. They just know that when you get on a bus there are supposed to be people on there, so there are. They know that they are supposed to go to school and have classmates so they have them. The world is populated by the people they think should be there. They don't realize they are doing it. It's just what your life is, you know? Well for most. I have met a few real-ish people who seemed to know they were only a part of someone else's story and didn't have one of their own. They weren't fade aways, but they weren't really substantial either. You know? Like the only details they had were about someone else."

"I don't think I understand."

"Okay, middle school. Do you remember middle school?"

"Sure."

"Okay, you know the girlfriend? She wasn't really a part of your group of friends she was just the girlfriend of someone. She was there sometimes but mostly not. And if you ever tried to talk to her all she talked about was her boyfriend? Same with some boys. They are just the boyfriend. Or in sports, they are just the teammates. These are the girls on the swim team...and some of them had real personalities and some of them all they could talk about was swimming."

"So assuming that all of this is true and you aren't just making up a complex story to try and pretend you didn't just see a ghost, how do you know about it all? How do you know about the reals and the real-ish and the fade aways and the sketches? How do you know all of this and no one else does?"

"I'm not the only one who has it figured out. You've seen the quotes right? 'Everyone is the star of their own movie' 'Be your own hero' Those are all from people who have figured it out. Some of them are real and some are just very detailed real-ish. Someone real wanted someone to talk to that was as aware as they were, so they made them. They could sit around and have deep thoughts or get high and dissect life. Neither one realizing that only one of them was actually real.

The first time I talked to someone about it was college. I had walked in to a classroom I hadn't seen before and when I opened the door there was nothing behind it. It was like a television set. Just a classroom door but nothing on the other side. I closed it and backed up and looked at it again and again and each time there was nothing there. Then someone behind me said, 'That room hasn't ever been needed, I would guess if you look at your schedule it's not really your class either.' He was right, I was off by two doors. But it didn't really explain why that one was just nothing. It should have been an empty room right? Someone imagined that room there for some reason and so the door was there, but nothing beyond. I don't know if I am real and I knew it was the wrong room so I didn't build it out, or if I am real-ish and just touched the wrong door that someone real had put there as a meeting place.

But that was the first time I saw behind the scenes. I tracked down the guy in the hall and we talked a lot about it. His name is Jonathon and we are still friends today. He has a lot of details. And we have shared experiences. Times when you walk in to a room and it seems like the conversation was stopped before you got there. Like it was just waiting for you to make it start. The times you have been out walking in a snow storm and it's silent. Like more than just quiet, but silent. Because no one imagined that anyone would be out walking in the cold so it was empty. Things like that. Like right now, maybe because we are gone nothing is actually going on at work. Maybe it's just paused waiting for us to come back before it starts again. Or did you imagine there would be a meeting while we were gone? Because if you know that they are working then I would guess they really are working. Most of them have pretty good details. Except for Kent on the third floor. He's pretty sketchy."

"This is all very confusing and I'm not sure I believe it. I think I'm getting a headache."

"I understand, it's a lot to take in at first. Though it could be worse. You could be her."

They looked back toward the apartment building and saw that the lady in grey was now just a blur. And then she was gone.

"Well, back to work."

And with that he packed up his lunch trash and held out his hand to help her up, "We wouldn't want to keep everyone there waiting."