Category Archives: Observations

Various observations about family, nature, life and whatnot.

June 20, 2015 · 11:32 am

Things I Learned from my Dad

Things I learned from my dad:

Folding the perforated paper on the dotted line, both ways, before ripping it out of the notebook. Invaluable still. Keeps me from wasting paper, cursing more, and making a ragged mess out of a should-be perfect piece of parchment.

Blowing into the edge of the stick side of the (carefully opened) popsicle bag before lifting the popsicle out of said crinkly sheath. Keeps the popsicle pristine and the little ice crystals from sticking to the bag. And red or orange or purple no. 5 from sticking to your hand, which also causes more cursing.

Having a spotless car. Dad drove me crazy with his meticulous top-to-bottom, left-to-right way of washing vehicles throughout the years. But there was never a spot on the El Camino, Datsun, Caprice Estate, Cressida, or ’87 Toyota Pickup when he was finished with them. I wish I could say my Prius is the same. I’m lazy and run it through the automatic. But if I did grab a hose and proper sponge, soap, and tire brush, that girl would look like an Amsterdam black diamond.

Singing in church. Dad wasn’t considered Johnny Cash but he was definitely not tone-deaf. His baritone timbre vibrated around a 2-3 pew radius and his timing impeccable. If I got off track during “It is Well” I could always count on him to steer me back. There was no big screen with a PowerPoint flow of lyrics to follow. It was old school hymnals and Dad could read music good enough to keep that mass of naked voices around us sounding like, well, a choir at church!

Pushing me to get out of my comfort zone. When I was a kid I wanted to be an actor. When I got into high school I wanted to be in the school play. When I told my dad I wanted to act he replied, “You can’t act.” I was crushed. He was usually my advocate. But because I was a shy girl and never liked to put myself out there I guess he thought it was a pipe dream. So I took that lack of faith and made it my goal to prove him wrong. I ended up not only being in the play, but being the female lead. And guess who was in that audience every single night of performance? And with a camcorder to boot.

I could go on and on about all the things Dad taught me. How to gas up and start a lawn mower. How to use an old bed sheet to rake leaves on and dispose of lawn waste. How to do a proper cannonball. How to play “Chopsticks” on the piano. And I could go on and on about all the things he tried to teach me that just did not compute. Using the weed-eater. Math beyond 4th grade. The proper way to pack a car trunk. How to dive.

I hope he knows how much his presence in my childhood and into mid-adulthood means to me. A lot of other kids weren’t and aren’t so fortunate. And I know I don’t tell him enough.

Thank you Dad for not only teaching me things but for being present along the way. You were there for me even when I did stupid stuff. You held my hand and let me know you did dumb things too and everything would be okay.

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Happy Father’s Day, Dad. I love you.

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June 6, 2015 · 11:02 am

Oranges, Sage, Sand and Time

Yesterday while stepping outside the office to the parking lot I caught a whiff of some kind of dry brush percolating its arid scent in the late spring warmth. It immediately transported me back to 1989. To a sandy and rooted path towards the Mediterranean sea. I looked down at my feet and couldn’t believe I had really gone on that trip all those years ago. Seems like an eternity. The girl who traveled there had freckles and bushy brown hair and a wondering mind. I still have the freckles and a matured version of that mind so it must have been me.

I love how smells take you to places and evoke memories in an instant. In the midst of everyday life we step back and take a deep inhale through the honker and relive a moment as if it were right at our feet.

Take oranges for another example. That smell of freshly sliced citrus transports me back to an even earlier time. To childhood and the kitchen counter and the oranges stacked in a bowl during Christmastime. It is always Christmas when I smell an orange. And now the citrus fruits lining my lanai swell and ripen in wintertime.

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Fresh cut grass reminds me of Tennessee summers and my dad and my brother and the aggravation then prideful relief when the yard work was finished.

Decaying leaves and burning wood always remind me of fall and Halloween. The beginning of school days. Trick-or-treating. Playing in piles of orange and red and brown fallen oak and maple. Writing somber poetry.

Curry and coriander bring forth memories of Christmas Eve and our now decade-long family tradition of enjoying an Indian feast before driving around to see all the neighborhood holiday lights.

Instant coffee and tobacco– my grandparent’s house. Powder soap and crayons– elementary school. Soft, sweet Petunia– my mother’s garden. Aveeno Eczema Therapy lotion– my son’s infancy. Rain– lazy summer days and escaping to shelter. Cinnamon– all the good memories ever all wrapped into one.

Last night I stared down at my feet after a good jog on the causeway. The terrain underneath reminded me of that path to the Mediterranean sea and the desert of the Australian Outback and all the places I’ve been and seen and experienced. It’s still a bit of a shock how much I’ve done. The smell of the salty, shelly gulf wafted around me and I smelled not a memory but a presence. I was home. And alive in the present with all the memories of the past in my brain waiting for the frontal lobe to spark the temporal and let me relive them again, if only for a time.

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November 17, 2014 · 11:01 pm

Writer’s Cube

My writing muscle has kind of atrophied. Who was it that said there is no such thing as writer’s block? Was it Stephen King? Sylvia Plath? Oprah? When I first heard that I thought, “Bullshit”. But it only took me about 12 hours of off-and-on pondering to realize how freaking true it is.

It’s not that we don’t have anything to say. It’s that we have so much to say we don’t know where to begin or how to collect our thoughts. So we are incapacitated by this.

Kind of like I feel now.

I’ve had a few people encourage me to get back into writing. Because they are awesome supporters. And I have been pretty much off the grid for a while. I’ll explain the reason behind that at a later date. Maybe.

How I’ve missed typing these keys onto WordPress. But there’s so much pressure to be “perfect”. To say something that truly matters and inspires and is up to my own self-imposed standards. But what it boils down to at this point is that I just keep writing. Because when I stop it is not good.

It’s like a bubble is stuck in my throat. A block in my brain. And all I fantasize about at work is creating some form of art. I even daydream of coloring in a coloring book because at least then I would be doing something artsy. Even at the elementary level.

I even thought about writing at work. Like I used to do at every other job I ever had. Scribbled poems on the back of movie ticket paper. The outline of a story on a spare photo packet envelope. A line or two on a napkin at lunch break.

It doesn’t matter what you do for a living. The artist in you has to get out in some way or another. I remember writing poems at my very first job as a telemarketer in between cold calls. I even recited some of them to my stoned and bored coworkers. My fuzzy memory says they were impressed.

So here I am. Working out my writer’s muscle. I don’t want to block myself in. So maybe I’ll call it “writer’s cube”. Because at least then there is 3D space with which to create, fill, play.

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August 31, 2014 · 12:02 pm

Birthday Blogging

I just renewed my domain name and blog site. This means I have been WordPress blogging for a whole year. Happy first birthday Busted Flip Flops!

These flip flops have been seriously busted lately. I haven’t written all month. Certain instances and situations have occurred which have kept me away. But I was never truly away. Not in the spiritual sense anyway.

It actually feels weird to sit here and write. How I have missed it. I am feeling a little rusty like my bicycle chain. But I can still pedal. Although a little creakily at first.

There are so many things I want to write about but for now I just want to say thank you to all my readers. I have enjoyed your presence and comments and inspiration. I have enjoyed reading and connecting with my favorite bloggers and entering into this WordPress world that has so many times brought sunshine to my flippity flop walk on the rocky beach.

So cheers to this first birthday! Let us raise a glass. Savor the sweetness of the written word and let it permeate a moment and blossom into its full-bodied flavor. And walk along side me for another year, busted flip flop to busted Croc (or your footwear of choice).

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July 9, 2014 · 10:03 am

The Wonder, Not the Worry

I like to people-watch. And not in a pervy, stalky way either. Get your head out of the gutter. OK maybe that was my head in the gutter.

I like to study how people interact with each other. Wonder what their story is. Listen to their conversations. Relish in their native accents. Imagine what it’s like in their world.

I don’t claim to be a professional people-watcher. I am not out in public every day. Some days I only leave the house to walk the dog. And lately I try to avoid the neighbors too because I don’t want to hear how my bike being parked under the car port is a community violation.

But I digress.

Today I was at a nail salon. I’ve been getting trimmed and buffed and shellacked and waxed there for over a year now. So I’ve become comfortable with the staff and the place. The owner’s 7-year-old daughter is usually there. She is an only child like my son and I like to see how she happily entertains herself when she’s not entertaining the customers. At one point she was staring out the window, singing to herself. Her little fairy-like voice flitting among the sounds of feet being scrubbed and the buzz of the nail buffer.

For a moment I was very envious of her. I wanted to trade places. To be in that child-like state of wonder again. To know Mom was just an arm’s length away. That a hot meal was eventually waiting for me, groddy peas and all.

Then my eyes began to dart over to a fiery woman in her seventies. Her sunset-colored nails were drying so she sat in front of another customer and they spoke about old bastard bosses and the bargain of online shopping. Her Long Island accent filled my ears with happiness. “Can somebahdy give me an excuse not ta go to tha supah mahket?” She asked the entire room as she stood up to leave. I laughed out loud. Only time I ever heard a Long Island accent growing up in the south was when I blissfully watched a Woody Allen flick.

Then there was the lady who was dutifully and a little militantly trimming my cuticles. Her hands were strong but her arms soft. I looked at my own arms, tanned from bike rides and tanning lotion. Toned like someone who has and takes the time to do push-ups and other crap that hurts like hell but feels good when it’s over. I wondered if the lady ever had time for herself. And if she did, what did she like to do? I imagined her strolling in a market, perhaps back in Vietnam, sun shining on her smiling face.

The little girl interrupted my day-dreaming.

“Let’s play rock, paper, scissors. Winner gets to do their favorite trick,” she said with a Chiclets-toothed smile.

“OK.”

Rock, paper, scissors, shoot.

We both drew scissors. Tie.

Rock, paper, scissors, shoot.

Her scissors cut my wimpy little paper.

She did a funny little dance.

“Nice trick.”

“Again,” she demanded.

Rock, paper, scissors, shoot.

My rock slammed her flimsy scissors.

I flared my nostrils as that is pretty much the only trick I could think of while having my nails poked at and my feet grated.

“Wow, how did you do that?” She was wildly impressed.

When they called me to go to the waxing room the little girl followed me. As the blonde Chewbacca fuzz was being ripped from my eyelid flesh she started examining my tattoos.

“Will this come off?” she asked in her fairy-voice as she stroked the quill tatt on my left arm.

“No. It’s permanent.”

“You have any more?”

I showed her the one on my right arm.

“What does it say?”

“It says ‘wonder not worry’. It reminds me to look at the world in wonder instead of worry. Like the wonder of a child.”

“Like me. Like I do,” she said sweetly. She hummed a little tune as she left the room.

I realized the 7-year-old understood what I meant. And I realized I had been taking my own tattoo-etched advice in those moments before.

I can still be that child with the faraway look in her eye, singing songs, playing games.

And with a few rips, some cold cream, and the diligent hands of a woman 9,600 miles away from her homeland, I can have some fuzz-free unfurrowed eyebrows, too.

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June 28, 2014 · 2:54 pm

The Scream of Silence

It was brought to my attention last night at a neighborhood party that I had not contributed to my blog lately.

I knew this would happen.

One of my avid readers, the boyfriend of the party host and the only male there, mouthed at me from across the room and plateful of cheese and crusty garlic bread.

“Your blog.”

That’s all he had to say really. I knew he would at some point in the evening bring about my accountability for my writing.

“I know,” I mouthed back at him. “I’ve been applying for jobs lately. Not a lot of time for my writing.”

My avid reader is deaf. He contracted polio when he was twelve. Woke up one morning to complete and total silence. I cannot imagine losing my hearing. Sometimes I think I’d rather be blind. To not hear the crescendo of a song that makes your whole body vibrate? To not hear the birds sing outside the window, reminding me of simplicity and nature? To not hear the myriad of beautiful (and not so beautiful) voices and accents from around the globe in their own rhythm and cadence?

But my avid reader doesn’t let this silence deafen his life. He fishes. He shops at the flea market impatiently with his girlfriend. He attends parties. He drives the old ladies (and intoxicated) people home. And he reads lips from across the room.

I am in awe of this ability. I try to read lips, too. I usually look at a person’s mouth when they are speaking to me. It helps clear the wobble of communication in loud places. But my avid reader not only reads lips, he recognizes accents, too. He knew I came from somewhere-in-the-south when he first met me. His girlfriend is English, and boasts a refined Liverpool accent. Thank goodness because she enunciates with the precision of a stern schoolteacher. I can’t imagine poor avid reader trying to read the lips of some of the people I heard mumbling their way through life during my childhood.

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Despite his handicap, which perhaps he doesn’t even recognize it as that, he is one of the happiest people I know. I hear his laughter all the way down the street sometimes when I’m walking the dog.

I claim to be, and am, a very auditory person. I have music playing almost constantly. I can’t even brush my teeth without clicking my iPod to shuffle. But when my son and husband went away on a trip for a week I did not turn on the TV or music until the day before they arrived. It was as if I needed that calm quiet. That peacefulness after years worth of conversation and children and cartoons and the pop of Nerf guns.

I wouldn’t want the absence of sound all the time like Avid Reader. Although that absence does magnify the other senses. Maybe colors are more vivid. Hugs are deeper. The gulf breeze more caressing. Faces have more character.

And just maybe words, lines, and stories birth an even bigger life within the scream of silence. And when at a party full of cackling women the silence must be just heavenly.

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June 13, 2014 · 12:20 pm

Vacation, All I Ever Wanted

I don’t get how some companies only give their employees a week off for a whole year’s work. Thank god and universe my company (Starving artist/stay-at-home Mom) has a more flexible vacation policy.

I’m not saying I’m ripping it up in Rio or chillaxin it down in Fiji, but I am able to take a few days here and there to discover the wonders and rejuvenating benefits of staying with family and friends in the great American south.

Rejuvenating? With family? Actually, yes. Keep it at three days tops and you’re golden.

I just came back from a girl’s trip. Me and two of my besties finally converged to chill in the Florida sun like we did every summer for years until kids came into the picture. So this trip was a little different in that instead of packing a pipe we had superhero figures, Barbies, and juice boxes in our myriad of bags and suitcases.

Yep, we brought our kids.

Now I had spent a little time with these kids and besties over the last five years or so but it was only for brief moments when one of us was in the same state as the other. But you know when a friend is a friend for life even if you don’t see or talk to each other often.

The three of us got together again and it was as if no time had passed.

We picked off right where we left- comfortable and making squirrel noises and doing silly dance moves in between making pb&js. You should have seen the clockwork cadence of our moving about in the condo kitchen while cooking, cleaning, and opening a plethora of Prosecco.

And the kids got along famously.

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Now luckily I was the only one on her period so there were no foul moods or irritation. Only some “Stop being so bossy!” And some “We’re not going to the pool until you eat something other than fruit gummies or Klondike bars!” That coming from us Moms to our kids, of course. The only thing we had to yell at each other was “Hey that’s my wine glass!”

The three of us saw each other through high school, college, and those weird years afterwards where we were each in totally different places and phases in our lives. But we still made time for each other on our days off. Blueberry pancake breakfasts, afternoon swimming, box wine, piling in the hatchback listening to 311 and going to the movies. We were the three musketeers, or the three squirrels, as we called ourselves (thus the kitchen squirrel noises).

To see them now, all mature with stable jobs and children and talk of Cub Scouts and art projects was so interesting. They have each aged like fine wine in that they are more comfortable in their own skin. And seeing them is like a mirror for me. I remember where I came from, what it took to get where I am now. My wine has aged, too. It is subtle sweet and full-bodied. Not that it couldn’t use a few more years in the barrel, but perhaps breathing in a carafe is more of its stage now.

I will miss my friends greatly. That little vacation came at a perfect time for each of us. And my son said it was the best time he’s had with me.

It wasn’t Fiji but it was just what I needed. Sometimes good friends, silly board games, and an undiscovered wine is all you need to feel as if you’ve been to an exotic island and inhaled a breath of fresh air.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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May 3, 2014 · 6:09 pm

A Discarded Shell

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Today I saw a turtle making its wobbly way through a patch of wet grass. He was coming straight for the road. I looked on the other side and noticed a pond. In his determination to get to that refuge he was unaware of his possible demise.

Or perhaps he studied the traffic patterns of a Saturday afternoon and knew this was his best chance.

Remember Frogger?

Only this wasn’t a post-Pong, pre-Mario game. This was real. One wrong move and that shell, no matter how sturdy, couldn’t protect him from the weight and speed of a moving vehicle.

I prayed the cars behind me saw him. And perhaps the jogger on the sidewalk might catch a glimpse, run over, and carry the poor thing across. There was no where for me to stop so I moved on. I couldn’t linger in the rear-view for fear I might see the worst. A shattered shell. A busted dream. A snack for the vultures.

What happens to the shell? It is discarded. Its crushed pieces refuse on the street. A reminder to look before you cross. And once you do, you do it with all the heart and speed you can muster under the heaviness of the hull.

Perhaps the shell is taken and studied. Or even collected like pretty beach shells we use to decorate our houses and yards and hold them to our ear to hear the ocean.

Or maybe another organism finds in the abandoned husk a new home.

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March 18, 2014 · 1:22 pm

Voices

Last night I did dinner and a movie with my kid. Despite last week’s report card being abhorrent, he came home yesterday with a citizenship award. I nearly dropped his ripped, crammed three-ring binder on my foot.

As we sat there at the pizzeria pre movie, picking and eating the bubbles off our slices, we stared at each other as if mere strangers. Or perhaps people who’ve come to know each other so well there was nothing left to say. His preteen aloofness was hanging over the mozzarella and gnawing at my cheerful disposition. Still I didn’t push too hard.

Eventually the conversation went from me going on about something I can’t even remember now to him slowly opening up to me the way he did just months ago. He revealed to me why he has been acting out recently, why he can’t make decisions, why he’s afraid. I can’t break his trust so I won’t go into details. But let’s just say it had to do with voices.

The voices we hear in our heads can sound like our own. They are the yin and yang of our existence and decision-making. They can sound like our parent’s, sometimes full of praise, sometimes belittling. They can sound like a voice we wish we had but were not born with.

After dinner we sat in the back row of the movie theatre and watched Lego 3D. I pride myself on recognizing the voices of the characters in animated flicks. Morgan Freeman was one of them. But pretty much everyone can recognize his strong, smooth, calming timbre. One of my friends told me she falls asleep to Through the Wormhole, narrated by the soother himself.

We plowed halfway through a medium bag (cause it’s just a dollar more than the small!) of popcorn as we donned our plastic 3D glasses and laughed at the witty dialogue. I laugh out loud. My kid doesn’t like this. Anyway, it was a pleasant and much-needed Mom and son date night.

This morning I was reading one of my poems to myself. And of course that parental voice chimed in. “Did you really do all the editing you can to make sure this is finished?”

Then the yin interrupted. “Ah, but it is finished when it is finished.”

Yang added “The end is the resolution and the beginning the question.”

I pondered these suggestions. Then I decided to reread the poem again. But this time with the voice of Morgan Freeman resonating through my brain. And it. Sounded. Magnificent.

Morgan Freeman

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March 14, 2014 · 4:16 pm

Enter Title Here

I’ll be honest. I have no idea what to write. My writer’s guilt is trying to bury me in its heavy sand. I’m supposed to go out with the girls tonight but won’t feel I’m owed that unless I get something out there. To you. My dear readers.

My arm is sore from a beautiful tattoo I got yesterday. It’s a tatt of a quill pen. Now what kind of writer would I be if in the week I got this work of reflective art on my body I did not at least spend some time with my quill pen of 2014– my computer’s keyboard? All the crumbs from protein bars and peanuts have been wiped away from it. I know I shouldn’t eat at my desk but it has become a nice little habit. One more minute spent at the keyboard is one more possible word written, read, or commented on.

Why is it that some weeks the words flow like water coming out of the bathtub spout, while other weeks there isn’t an even annoying drip? Does my brain need rebooting? Am I too focused on life’s dramas? Some of both?

Busted Flip Flops. My solace. My respite. My breath of fresh air. My busted little home away from sometimes busted little home. I have to dust off the crabwebs. Shovel out the sand. Fill it with a sea of words to keep it alive and satiated. Keep me alive and satiated.

my tatt

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