Feeling Lame

One night Christian and I were parallel Facebooking on our laptops in bed. (I know! It's so romantic and intimate. I shouldn't have told you.) I told him that I hate it when I look at Online Friends and see no one or just dumb people. "It makes me feel so lame," I told him. He dismissed it with a shrug. "I never feel lame." Isn't that weird? He isn't lame, but still. I can't even imagine what it would feel like to never feel lame.

Anyway, if me and some weirdo I barely know from high school are the only people Facebooking late on a Friday night, I feel lame.

Brevity

My father-in-law threw his hat into the Twitter ring so I did too. He's basically the trendsetter in our family. I figure if he can do it, I can do it. Although this has not been the case with making sausage from scratch, doing continental philosophy, and reading Korean.

Once I found out there's this whole Twitter conversation going on that I didn't know about before, I felt left out. So now I Tweet. It's like way easier to think in Tweets than blogs. Me bored from books now 2. I don't really understand most of Twitter. I don't know how to Retweet, or respond to someone specific. But I did learn how to post a picture. Since I don't do Sudoku, I figure it's a good way to keep my brain sharp and fend off senility. I understand that Twitter is used to market, network, and find relevant content, which isn't really my scene. But my husband gets a kick out of my tweets and since I don't iron his shirts or pack him a lunch, it's the least I can do.

Some people claim that Twitter shortens your attention span. I've only been Tweeting for a day so it's hard for me to say. What it's already done for me, however, is increase my capacity to enjoy poetry.

From time to time I'll really dig a poem, but as a genre it's not my favorite. It's too concentrated. I know that's the whole point of poetry but I'm at odds with it because I want to know for sure what you're talking about including any crossed out words and deleted stanzas and why you crossed them out. And what you had for dinner. Yesterday and today I've read 9 Horses and The Trouble with Poetry by Billy Collins. I'm totally into it. It's like reading Tweets.

What is striking about Billy Collins is that even though it is poetry--distilled and sparse, he somehow manages to include all the details I'm interested in. Maybe all poems are like that. I was just never patient enough before.

I'm happy that birds
have come into vogue.
Truly, it is a little surprising
because they don't even have hands
or, maybe, that's the appeal?
The part about wings.

Still, this poem is WAY too long for a Tweet. OK, so, I wrote that poem. NOT Billy Collins. Get your own Billy Collins.

I Thought Robin Wright Penn Was Cool But I Was Wrong

I have a gift subscription to Interview magazine. It's really cute because the person who gave it to me doesn't even know it's slightly pornographic. I squint when I look at it until I get to the interviews. Today I read all about the actress who plays Hermione Granger. What a doll. I like her. I say that so you won't think I hate celebrities indiscriminately.

Remember Robin Wright Penn from the soap opera Santa Barbara? And then there was The Princess Bride and Unbreakable. I loved those movies. Now she's married to Sean Penn and does mostly artsy indie thinky sad movies. I have always assumed she's cool. She is interviewed in Interview by Francis Ford Coppola, who asks pretty interesting questions. I mean, I'd eavesdrop on a conversation between the Godfather and Buttercup if I could.

So I'm reading this article and I want to be intrigued. I expect to be intrigued. And Robin Wright Penn spouts off the same type of bashizznet I hear all the time from Gwyneth Paltrow. Poor Robin's dancing instruction ended when she moved from LA to San Diego. Even Coppola was confused, "You couldn't take dance lessons in SanDiego?" I guess it's the something something quality of the arts something blah.

Then Robin describes her teenage self as a quirky outsider without any friends. Also and incidentally, she was homecoming queen. Isn't it always the quirky outsiders with no friends who become homecoming queen?

The article ends inevitably with these two talking about acting and taking risks. I don't act (except for my role as a clumsy, lovable, honey-seeking bear in 3rd grade), but I don't disparage acting. I want to know the secrets of acting so I can just act poised. Surely Francis Ford Coppola and Robin Wright Penn have something useful to tell me about their craft. Get this. Robin tells Francis (with regard to acting) the story of a person walking on a beach and there's these two sets of footprints ya see, and looking back over the hard times there's only one set of footprints and the main person is all "where did the other footprints go during the hard times I was alone that is so sad" but really that's when they were being carried.

And Francis Ford Coppola, who had Michael Corleone assasinate the heads of the 5 other families during his nephew's baptism in total awesomeness, replies, "I'm 70 and I've been doing this for 45 years and I just recently got this understanding."

I'm sorry, but even the most humorless Mormon isn't that lame.

I Don't Know About You

I don't know about you, but I bought an awesome coat a few months ago at an "end of season" sale and I am totally stoked that I don't have to wait until next year to wear it.

I don't know about you but when I was a kid I thought 32oz drinks looked huge. They were short and fat. Now I feel deprived if I don't get 44. 32 ounces looks downright slender to me now. Slender like a tall cool drink of water where I substitute Diet Coke for water.

I don't know about you but I can't really watch American Idol. It's too sad. Will there come a lucid day when Paula Abdul or her posterity will watch footage from that show and not cringe? I can't take it. I'm sorry. Generally I like to be really into stuff like that because it gives me something to talk about with people I don't know very well. As a result of this, I have nothing to say.

I don't know about you but today my son asked me if you could skip water across a rock. I don't know.

I don't know about you but I STILL love blogging. Even though it's a little past it's prime what with the Facebook and the Twitter. It's like Twitter is high protein and Facebook is low-carb and I'm still over here blogging and eating potatoes because I thought any vegetable was good for you.

I don't know about you but I will never use the phrase "tickler file." Because what's in the file?

I don't know about you but I have vivid memories of the ground from when I was a kid. Asphalt, cracks in sidewalk, the look of carpet close up, crevices in linoleum. I looked down a lot.

I don't know about you but I love to take codeine.

I don't know about you, but I like to wear black Converse shoes. But I have to be careful because with some outfits and in some situations they make me look like a lesbian which I guess I don't mind. But I don't think they like it. It's kind of like how fat women get mad when pregnant women shop at Lane Bryant.

I don't know about you but when I was a kid I used to fantasize about being martyred.

I don't know about you but I think making dinner is for suckers.

I don't know about you but when people refer to me as a "lady" I know they mean "old." I know because that's what I call old women.

I don't know about you but I just don't think surprise parties are worth the emotional damage which inevitably precedes them .

I don't know about you but I hate getting up in the morning.

I don't know about you but one thing I've learned from having kids is the term "basically dry."

I don't know about you but I think flair is funny.

I don't know about you but I never refer to getting together with my adult friends as "playing." This would suggest a sense of whimsy that I do not possess.

I don't know about you but I think this post is just a little too long.

I Have a Variety of "Obsessions." This is About One of Them

I just read, well--skimmed, really, a book about obsession. The author claims that to be modern is to be obsessed. We're proud to be obsessed with our TV shows, jobs, and lovers--if it's really true love, that is. If you're not obsessed with something you lack passion. You're a dullard. I talk about a lot of obsessions here on my blog. I always feel a little bit bad when I do. Like you're all, "Great. Another post about [super heroes, X-Files, sugar cereal, NASA, old cartoons, Doug Fabrizio, etc.]" Now that I know it's totally modern, I guess I don't care anymore.

In other words, how many different ways can you start a blog post about Robert Plant? At least three. I find Robert Plant endlessly fascinating for many reasons which I love to talk about on this blog and in real life. I can't say enough about Led Zeppelin or, for that matter, the Honey Drippers. Sure, sure--in my youth I thought he was a sexy guy. Sure, sure--in my youth I threw my bra on stage at one of his concerts. But it's much more than that. He loves Lord of the Rings. He's so restrained on his album with Allison Krauss. He looks good in Levis. He loves Utah (At this point in my life I don't have time for people who hate Utah). He probably made a deal with the devil. His young son died.

I don't necessarily think Robert Plant and I have a lot in common. And I don't necessarily think he would find me interesting. My hope for Robert Plant is that at some point we could enter into a mutually beneficial co-dependent relationship wherein he becomes a father figure to me and I act as a place holder for his son, who would turn 37 this year. Just like me.

A few months ago I read Bumping into Geniuses by Danny Goldberg. That movie, Almost Famous, is loosely based on him. He represents and writes about rock stars. Goldberg writes that at Led Zeppelin concerts during those long and, in my opinion--very boring, drum solos, the rest of the band would go backstage to get a drink or something else R rated. But Robert Plant would stand offstage and watch John Bonham, his childhood friend, for the whole solo. I don't know if you know this but those solos are really long. I think that's nice. And kind of a cute image.

So normally I would read something like that, think about blogging about it, and decide not to because I already talk about Robert Plant way too much. Then I thought, why shouldn't I just do whatever I want?

Awful and Great

I met a new person yesterday, Justin Hackworth, who took pictures of my mom, my daughter, and me. He's pretty cool and interesting so I checked him out on Facebook--you know, like you do--and perused his blog. There are tons of photos to look at on his website which is, I suppose, not at all surprising. I clicked on the photos of his own two boys. The pictures are accompanied by simple captions which reminded me of how I felt about my children when they were little. I still have little children, but also bigger ones. They are in grade school. They can be cruel to each other and to me. Sometimes I am harsh and critical of them. Today in particular was a horrible day because I really tried to have fun with them. It's so much worse to try and fail than to not try at all, don't you think?

When I'm laying flat on my bed letting the covers puff up around me in hopes that my kids won't see me and will just go away and leave me alone I suppose there is some kind of subconscious thought that reassures me, "Yes, but if you WANTED to. . . if you had enough energy you would create and execute a scavenger hunt, shoot baskets, make homemade pizza and hello dollies for them and everything would be great!" Well, I did all of that today and it sucked. They fought. They sulked. They fell and got hurt and whined and threw fits. I was a sport and took the dog out into the creek with the kids and then I had to wash her off and she scratched me. I put cloth diapers on Ellen because she's allergic to disposables and she pooped all over and wiped it on the stairs. I should say, prior to that I got Spicy Cheetos for them as a prize for our basketball-shooting contest. Everything I did came back to bite me--including the Spicy Cheetos. It's so hard. It's tiring when they are little and you have to carry them everywhere and it's tiring when they're ages 2-11 and you have to do stuff like make dinner. And if Friday Night Lights is any indication of what it's going to be like when they are in high school, I'm not sure I can take it. It's awful. And it's also great. My kids are much better than most other kids and it is still awful and great.

When they are little, you wash them and dress them and they're just like little extensions of yourself. But by the time they are 11 they are totally separate. You never see them naked. Remember when you were 11? That's 6th grade, man. I know I still influence and take care of my son, but he's his own little dude. I was too. I rarely thought of myself as my mom's daughter even though I loved her. And yet I'm so hung up on my son still--what he wears, what he eats, who he's friends with, how he acts. Meanwhile I'm becoming more and more peripheral to him. It's OK though--on days like today I'm glad and can't wait for them to be gone--but it's not a very equitable relationship. And they'll never know until they have kids.

Look. Here's the photograph Justin took of me and my mom. I'm sure she agonized over me at times--you know, like you do--and I probably just blew her off. It almost seems like that even in this picture. I'm not even looking at her! I should be bowing down before her saying, "Thank you! Thank you for cleaning up the orange poop that leaked out of my cloth diaper onto the stairs after I ate those delicious Spicy Cheetos!" But I'm not. And I don't. And I probably won't. And my kids won't either.
Perhaps you are wondering, "What are hello dollies?" Well, you might know them as 7 layer bars. They have a graham cracker crust with nuts, chocolate chips, and coconut on top. My mom always made them for us and called them hello dollies. I love them. Do you know how I made them today? I looked up the recipe in a cookbook. That's right. Because I never helped my mom make them or paid any attention to how she made them. I've certainly never made any for her.