Velma and Aunt Dixie

Got my hair cut today. This is a pretty exciting event for me, because I tend to put it off so long that by the time I go it’s dull and lifeless, and I look like someone who forgot to perform basic upkeep. I am someone who forgets that, but I do shower regularly, so I’m not altogether awful yet.

I don’t do appointments well. There are so many things I need to schedule and make time for and keep in an appropriate time slot that when it comes to my hair, it’ll get there when I get there, and that’ll be when I feel like it. So I walk in to my normal place and get in that afternoon.

After I was done, Mr. C decided to get his hair cut as well. This was probably because I looked so good, and because he’d put off his routine maintenance as well. This works well for him because his hair is all curls, so as it grows it just gets curlier, and at night while he sleeps I can play with the ringlets. But today he decided to get his cut too, so while I waited I sat in the mall and waited.

When I went back he wasn’t done yet, so I sat in the waiting area, where I could see him and we could talk about his hair, which was turning out way shorter than I had planned.

In another chair across the aisle (on a chair means one is sitting on it, in a chair means one is having their hair attended to) was an older woman, 70’s, probably, though I’m not good with age guessing. Her hair was untouched, as yet, and her stylist was the guy who cut mine last time I was in, a young guy with huge hoops in his gauged ears. He did a great job with my hair last time.

He was gesturing above Velma’s head with some enthusiasm. I’m pretty sure her name was not Velma, but I have to call her something other than the older lady. Velma’s hair was a short blond fluff, not colored but not colorless, not grey, and she wanted it colored. Jack, or whatever he was calling himself, was explaining about older hair, and color, and how it didn’t take quite the same way as hair that’s younger and still in possession of its natural hair color. Velma seemed peeved, then understanding, and Jack kept talking. I’m not sure what color she was hoping for, maybe a fire engine red, or a deep chestnut, or maybe just more blond. Blondes have more fun, right?

My stepgrandmother (which is an awkward phrasing) had a sister, our Aunt Dixie, with red hair, the sort of bright red hair not seen in nature, and even as an older woman she wore it that way, with bright red lipstick to match. My stepgrandma had lavender hair, something her grandchildren all found quite amusing. Once, when I was 12 or so, I was visiting Grandma, and she and Aunt Dixie and I went out for Chinese food. I choked on something or other, something which I’m still quite good at, and the two of them pounded it out of me.

Velma reminded me of Aunt Dixie, except Aunt Dixie would have never allowed her hair to fade to that barely blonde shade. But she wanted what she wanted, like Aunt Dixie, who would never back down in a fight. I wouldn’t want to tell Velma she couldn’t have what she wanted. Every so often she would grimace, as if Jack weren’t living up to his end of the bargain, or as if she couldn’t believe the gall of this young punk.

Or maybe he was her grandson. I don’t know.

Mr. C was finally done, and I had to deal with the shock that his hair no longer had curls. They were all gone, and his hair now needs to grow out a bit. I was so shocked that I didn’t have a chance to find out what Velma was going to have done to her hair, and now I’ll never know.

The last time I saw Aunt Dixie she was living alone a couple of hours north of where I was living, and I’d driven up to see her. She had a fusty mobile home, her lifetime fitted into the nooks and crannies. She insisted on making me a dry bologna sandwich, though I said I was fine and in no need of sustenance, especially since the previous visit when she’d forced one on me. Aunt Dixie was not taking no for an answer.

Though her hair was no longer red, but pure white, she was still the same Aunt Dixie. She showed me some of her artifacts, one of which was a nude pencil drawing of her a boyfriend had made when she was much younger. She had, she told me, lots of admirers then, and lots of boyfriends. “I was really something then,” she said. I laughed with her and ate the dry bologna sandwich and warm glass of water, remembering that Aunt Dixie was young once, her whole life ahead of her, the world a giant box of surprises to be pulled out, one after the other, until the surprises are gone.



If we’re lucky, there’s always just one more surprise left though, just one more glittering package of wonder to open, before we’re done.

Sleeping With The Dog

When I woke up this morning, far too early as usual, there was a handsome man on one side of me and a furry dog on the other side. It’s like waking up in heaven, except for the excess hair. I’m not sure heaven is as furry as my life with a dog.

When I fell asleep last night Ash was on my pillow, making those cute sleeping dog sounds that only a dog can make. Sometime during the night he left my pillow, probably sleeping at the foot of the bed, or on the floor. At 4 am he woke me by standing next to the bed and giving me the stare. He never says anything, he doesn’t have to.

No one ever hears him except me, and that’s because he doesn’t have to say anything.

We got up, went downstairs, and I let him outside. He did his dog thing out there, and came right back. It was a lovely early morning, though as far as I could tell it was still the middle of the night. But the air is fall air, and even in the dark I can tell the color of the air has changed now that it’s fall.

When he came back in we went back upstairs, because I was half asleep still and intended to become fully asleep again. I went right back to sleep, not knowing what Ash was doing. He doesn’t get into any trouble, not like when he was little.

The reason he sleeps on my pillow is because when he first came to live with us he could fit in one of my hands, just a tiny little guy with black soft fur. He was disarmingly cute and harmless, and by disarmingly, I mean, he could destroy pretty much anything, and did. He could not be left unsupervised. This was when a crate would come in handy, and he did have one, and we used it, but at night I’d let him curl up next to me, and he’d sleep that way all night. It kept him out of trouble, and if he left the bed I’d wake up and capture him before having to replace anything of significant value.

In theory.

Eventually he grew out of the phase where he eats everything in sight (including more than one pair of glasses, a wall, and kitchen cabinets), but he never grew out of the phase where he falls asleep close to us, even though he’s now 68 pounds of dog.

Anytime I need to lay down during the day, which is often because sometimes I’m in pain, and sometimes I’m tired, he jumps up next to me, and if he thinks I’m not paying attention he’ll snuggle up against my side, or he’ll put his head on the pillow next to me, the pillow the handsome husband usually uses, but only at night, and he’ll look at me with those eyes that are sometimes brown, sometimes as black as his coat, and he’ll fall asleep. He’ll sleep with me as long as I want him to, as long as it takes, or until he needs to go outside, whichever comes first.

And at night he falls asleep above my head, and sometimes, when I’m lying in bed reading before sleep, his head, which is really really hard, will come crashing against mine and his head will come to rest next to mine, so he can feel me next to him while he sleeps. When he’s awake he may put his head on top of mine, an advantageous perch to see what’s going on, and he rests it there as if he’s a part of me.

This morning when I woke up and found him next to me, stretched out, his head on my pillow, he was sound asleep, as was the other occupant of the bed. They’re both sound sleepers, so this happens frequently. I tried to reach down to pull up the other blanket, but I couldn’t move. And so I said to Ash, “Move, will ya?” But he just kept sleeping, and so I pushed him just a bit, and I grabbed the blanket, and he just kept sleeping.

I read while they slept, comfortable and warm with my guys, the only sound their barely discernible breathing.



Sometimes I shake one of them just to make sure they’re still breathing, but usually I just let them sleep.

A Stepfather's Death

Recently I attended a funeral for a lovely man who married my mother years ago. Then they buried him next to my mother.

We didn’t get along well for many years – by the time I met him I was already married, and living overseas, so it’s not as if knew him as a stepfather. When I had first called my mother and told her I was getting married (at the altogether unreasonable age of 19 to a man I barely knew), my mother, who was in a relationship with the man she would later marry (we can call him Jerry, because that was his name), said, “I don’t want to get married again. I’m happy with things the way they are.”

“Fabulous!” I said, or I didn’t, but I was a traditionalist, partly from having seen both of my parents do the multiple marriage thing. Several years after I married, far from family and with just two drunk witnesses, my mother announced that she and Jerry were indeed getting married.

I find this often happens after I get married. Suddenly people who were happy with the status quo just minutes ago decide to change it. Probably because I make such a fantastic looking bride.

They had the church wedding of Mom’s dreams, and I was there, running around like a crazy person, organizing and putting people in their proper places, because no one else was stepping up to do it. That’s me – show me something that’s not being handled, and I start handling it.

That was my Mom’s fourth marriage, and last. It’s nice when they find someone and settle down, isn’t it?

When they retired they moved to Montana and began an idyllic life amongst nature. Since they were from LA, this was a major change, but they loved it.

I’ve always been the difficult child. Obstreperous, imperious, demanding, wanting people to like me while simultaneously shoving them away because I knew they’d let me down in the end. So my family relationships were usually difficult – I know my Mom tried to like me, and I’m sure Jerry did too, for her sake, but I didn’t make things any easier. My siblings were better received, and that irritated me, which made it worse.

But it all works out in the end, doesn’t it? When my mother got cancer (or came down with cancer, or contracted cancer) I started making trips to visit, driving from here to there in a day, unless I blew a tire (once), or ran into a deer (once), and then I would stay overnight in Spokane or wherever the poor deer had died, and finish the trip the next day. I’d stay and help out as I could, which mostly consisted of visiting with Mom, because there wasn’t anything to do. Jerry had become Husband Of The Year in one fell swoop. He waited on her hand and foot, made sure she had whatever she needed and wanted, and treated her with the most tender loving care.

This made me most happy.

When Mom died I was there, and my sister was there. I called to her from Mom’s bedside, and she came in, and then we got Jerry from upstairs, where my sister had insisted he go to get some rest.

I’d like to not ever see that kind of grief on someone’s face again.

Jerry has four kids of his own, so between them he had 7. I made a few trips to Montana after Mom’s death, by myself, to help him to deal with Mom’s things. I spent days in her office – she kept everything she’d ever received. On another trip we dealt with her clothes, and with other artifacts. Once my husband and I visited as part of a vacation, just to spend some time with him.

For one visit on my own I had taken the train – my husband was worried about ability to have incidents on the way. But somehow I injured my knee, and after only a few hours of work in Mom’s office, I couldn’t stand on it, nor could I move it. We took me to a doctor, who confirmed it was my patella – I’m not put together particularly well, and often things don’t work as they should.

Jerry wanted to take care of me after that. He wanted to feed me (which he’d been doing anyway), and he wanted me to rest, and he would take care of everything else. This was the side of him that I’d seen when my Mom was sick. I almost considered hanging out with him for a few days just so my every need could be met while he doted over me.

When Jerry died I wasn’t there. His children were with him, at least some of them, but the last time I talked to him he was happy. He had gone to Oklahoma, where his son lived, to get treatment for the cancer that had returned, but he came down with pneumonia, and his cancer had spread. He went into assisted living from the hospital. I’d call and talk with him, and while at first he talked of going back to Montana, he soon realized that wouldn’t happen. One of the last times I talked to him he was happy, said he was playing bingo, which he’d never played before, and he had a lift to his voice.

Maybe he was happy he’d be with the love of his life again.



It was a really beautiful day for a funeral. I miss him, but I know he’s no longer missing my Mom, so that comforts me.

Taking Care of Yourself

When all around you are running around with their psyches in disarray and the world is in danger of imploding, what do you do?

If you’re anything like me, and I sincerely hope you’re not, you assume that it’s not only about you, but that it’s somehow your fault, and even if it’s not your fault, that it’s your job to fix it.

If you ARE like me, I hope you’ve invested in some good therapy, because we can drive ourselves nuts with this sort of thing.

I grew up convinced that I was not enough. I wasn’t good enough, or pretty enough, or smart enough, and I grew up knowing that if I wanted people to like me, I’d sure as hell better have something to offer, like fixing their problems, or being helpful, or giving them something. I managed to learn early on that giving people things wasn’t helpful and made me go broke fast, so if I give you something, it’s because I want you to have it. And I do like giving gifts, I really do.

And I discovered that I can’t fix anyone else’s problems. I tried, but it wasn’t productive. When my ex-husband, Stew, was severely mentally ill I first tried to fix his problems, but that didn’t work, because I’m an accountant by trade, and he had no problems with numbers. Instead, I gave him the support he needed to work on his own stuff. Besides, I had my own stuff to work on at the same time.

If you know someone who has a mental illness or is going through something really tough for them, you can’t fix it, no matter how much you want to. What you can do is support them as they navigate through their own minefield. Sometimes this means you have to erect your own defenses to protect yourself. It’s so easy, when you’re close to someone, to let their worldview become a part of your worldview. It’s not productive if their world is dark and scary, because you don’t want to be there.

You really don’t. There are so many other worldviews out there, so we should try to avoid the scary ones.

I could make a political joke here, but I’m not going to. Such restraint!

One of my carryovers from my dissatisfying childhood is my reassuring nature. “No problem,” I’m used to telling people, even if it IS a problem. “It’s okay,” I’ll say, in an attempt to prop up their fragile ego, when it really isn’t okay. “Yes, by all means, stomp all over me and leave me for dead, I’ll forgive you because I’m so damn empathetic and I know you’re in pain,” is something I might have said if I felt like using that many words all at once. But it’s not okay. It’s a hard one, for me, because I want to please people, I want them to like me. (Newsflash: Some people will not ever like me, no matter what. One of my sisters has told me she’s not interested enough in me to buy my book, which is basically about ME, not even to just have it and say, “My sister wrote this.” I didn’t really understand this concept because if any members of my family write a book, I’m buying it, and I’m promoting it to everyone I know. But this is life – some people will like us, and some won’t, and it doesn’t matter if we lie down in the middle of the freeway and let them run over us – in fact, that might make them like us less.)

And make no mistake, I do go out of my way for people all the time. But now, when I do, it’s because it is okay, it isn’t a problem, and I do want to do it. And I do this for people who appreciate it, usually.

With Stew, I had to learn it wasn’t okay for someone else, anyone else, to act as if I were their personal verbal punching bag, and that it’s my responsibility to myself to say, “That’s not going to happen.” He needed someone to tell him when what he was doing wasn’t okay, that his illness did not give him license to behave anyway he liked. He needed that far more than someone putting up with his occasional bad behavior, because he could no longer recognize what was okay, and what wasn’t. When you’re ill, whether it’s depression or something like schizo-affective disorder, your perceptions are off, and when that happens, you (and by you, I mean I) need someone to tell you what’s okay, and what isn’t.

Occasionally I slip up. But then I recover. It’s an ongoing process, this self-improvement thing.

Sometimes the best thing you can do for someone who needs help is to let them figure it out on their own. The best thing you can do for yourself is stand your ground. Where you draw that line is up to you, as long as you realize there is a line.

I could have said this in just a few words, but I like words: “Don’t let the bastards get you down.”

The Color of Light

I tried capturing it in jars, first a Hellman’s mayonnaise, not only rinsed out, but scoured, cleaned within an inch of its life. Outside was the crisp light of early fall, the trees not yet turning but on the verge. The sky bright with free floating dreams, the kind that rarely float close enough to catch. I stood underneath the pear tree where the light was subdued, and I held up my jar, as high as I could reach, and the light flowed in. It filled my jar, stopping just short of the top, a clear bright color with the promise of cool nights and fire.

When I put the lid on the light tried to escape, pushing back against the lid while I pushed down, and just a bit of it got out, not much, but more than I’d like. I wanted the jar full, so it could last all winter, and not run out halfway through January.

I tried a pickle jar, scrubbing the jar first with a scouring paid, and though I couldn’t fit my whole hand in I used two fingers, wanting to make sure the color of the light wouldn’t be contaminated by any extra pickle flavor. I stood next to the house on the first cold crisp day of winter when the air was brisk enough to turn my nose red. Instead of holding the jar up I swept it next to me, scooping up the light. In the jar the light looked white, though it was as clear as the sky. I was stronger this time, and sneakier, and before the light knew what was happening the lid was on tight. It wasn’t as much light as I had in the mayonnaise jar, but in the summer I don’t need as much of the winter light, so it should last me.

By spring we had moved, and the light I wanted to capture wasn’t available at our new place. I had early fall, and the first day of winter, but I wanted the spring of where we used to live, not the flat spring of where we were living. The spring air where we used to live was full of promises, the dreams drifting down close enough to touch before they spun away again, light as gossamer, as fragile as a soap bubble. But where we were now, there were no dreams floating by, just a flat blankness of space, with no color to the light at all. It was as if the color was gone, replaced with fallen dreams that crumbled to grey ash in the harsh spring days.

I didn’t try to save any of it. I wanted no reminders of that spring, and I scuttled through the days with my eyes half-closed. Sometimes, but only rarely, I would open the Hellman’s jar a tiny bit, just to get an idea of fall or winter. This would last an hour or two before fading away again.

And that summer was the summer I left home, packing up my jars and my memories, and heading out of town, walking down the two-lane highway away from everyone I had ever known. When I couldn’t walk anymore I stopped, and I sat on a boulder twice the size of me, and I put my two jars next to me, their colors out-of-place in the heat of the summer. These were cool clear colors, not the dry desert colors of where I was now, and I resolved to return to those colors.

The next day they found me though, pulling up alongside me in the wood paneled station wagon, calling to me. “Annie, come get in the car.”

I kept walking, foolishly hoping they would think I was someone else.

The car stopped then, and my father, a short man with a smile of regret and an air of having been done wrong, got out of the car. This was what I had feared the most, that he would find me and take me back. But I stopped, and turned, and looked at him.

What I saw on his face was not happiness, but it wasn’t sadness either. “Annie, you have to come home now.”

“I can’t see the color of the air there,” I told him, knowing he wouldn’t understand. She would, if she would get out of the car, but she wouldn’t.

“Foolishness.” He scratched his chin, overgrown with a few days’ of stubble, and he stood with his legs slightly apart, ready to run after me if I should take to running. Just in case. It had happened before, me deciding to run, but I’d learned that no matter how hard I tried, he’d always catch up to me, grab my arm, and pull me back towards him so hard I’d probably fall, and he wouldn’t catch me.

“Air doesn’t have a color. Just get in the car.”

My mother peered out the side window at me, her brow furrowed. She never understood why I ran off, though she knew what I meant about the color of the air. Sweat glistened on her upper lip, and on her forehead, and I walked to the car, thinking of how beautiful she was even as she was determined to return me to my prison.

Towards the end of summer I took an empty jar, this one having held salsa, and I scrubbed it clean with the scrub brush my mother kept for the potatoes, and when I’d done that I scrubbed the label off, and then I scrubbed off all the glue. I wanted it perfect, one perfect jar for the end of summer light.

I walked out at twilight, past the end of the street where there was nothing but desert, and I held my jar high, willing in the still desert air. The twilight air had more color to it than the daytime air, and the briefest glimmer of hope that sparkled like a worn bit of metal that has just the slightest bit of life left to it.

Once the lid was on, keeping in the twilight air so it couldn’t get out, I took it home, and I placed it on the shelf next to the fall and the first day of winter, and they glimmered together, far off dreams and the present, telling me to hold on, that spring would come again, and that next time perhaps I could capture it. Next time perhaps I would want to capture it, the spring of a new start, the dampness of spring soil waiting for seeds.

The color of the air glimmering on my shelves, telling me to hold on, that new colors were on their way.

It's Always A Choice

I had a dream. This is not uncommon. I have dreams fairly often. It's sort of what I do when I, uh, sleep. But in this dream we were touring expensive apartments in high rises, not that we necessarily wanted to move there. No, we need a house with a yard and a fence for the dogs we'll always have, because no way am I taking the dogs downstairs when they need to go outside. I'm far too lazy.

And as we toured the apartments, some of them quite lavish and huge, we ran into other people who were also touring. And then we debated the various merits of various apartments. This one had too many bedrooms, that one had too many stairs, the other one didn't have enough space. The one at the top of the building, however, had everything, including a view. 

I do love a good view. We could see the city for miles, and it was a beautiful bright day, much like today. 

As we were leaving we were talking about our finances, and why we couldn't afford one of these places, and you said to me, "It's all that stuff you buy at 1 Sale A Day."

Enraged, I turned to you and said, "I only bought one thing from 1 Sale A Day, just once, and it was twenty-seven dollars."

"Oh," you said, "I thought it was more. You get those emails all the time."

"Yes, they send them to me every day. That's why it's called 1 Sale A Day. It doesn't mean I buy anything."

You weren't exactly apologetic, but you shrugged your shoulders, as to say you were glad we'd cleared that up.

We were in an elevator, and preparing to go down, and it occurred to me that I have a problem with high speed elevators, which is that I float towards the ceiling.

As far as I know, this is only a problem in my dreams, and not in real life. It's not as if I've ever actually floated in an elevator.

There were other people in the elevator with us, and when it began its descent I floated toward the ceiling, and I was embarrassed, because everyone else stayed right where they should, feet firmly planted on the ground, while I was hanging out in mid-air. I felt unnatural and a bit conspicuous. 

Someone said to me, "You can come back down to earth if you twist and force yourself down."

This hadn't occurred to me. I'd though I was stuck in the air for the duration. 

I don't know if I stayed up in the air, or if I came down, but knowing I had the option seemed to make a world of difference. It was my choice, now, whether to float, or whether to stand on my own two feet. 

And I remembered it this morning, when I should be working, because I remember that it's always a choice, whether I stand or float, whether I come down to earth or stay above with my head in the clouds. 

(I almost typed heads in the cloud, but I've only got the one head.) 

It's always a choice for me to make. 

I Used To Be Funny

Humor is so subjective. People used to think I was funny. Then I wrote this damn book.

Suddenly I'm not funny anymore.

I've had people start reading the book in front of me, while I'm standing there, which makes me uncomfortable, but I feel awkward saying, "Don't read it NOW! I'm right here!" So they start reading it, and they laugh.

This is true.

This is good.

I want people to laugh. All I want to do is entertain people.

But people who haven't read the book don't think I'm funny. They think I'm a humorless mental illness advocate, and they ignore me. They don't want to read a book that isn't amusing. Sure, there's sad stuff too -- I like to think of it as a well-rounded book, but if you haven't read it or heard about it (which is still most people in the world) you wouldn't think it was particularly amusing. Maybe it isn't, particularly, but at least some of it is.

Of course, there could be people who read the book who don't get the joke and don't laugh. Not everyone finds me funny, even when I was known more for being funny than not. Some people just think I'm a smartass, which I am, because it's an excellent defense mechanism.

I don't laugh at the 3 Stooges, and I don't laugh at . . . other things that rely on physical humor at the expense of wit.

However, I laughed so hard at Cabin in the Woods that I insisted we go see the movie again the next weekend, and I never do that. I'm not a horror movie aficionado -- I like good horror movies that rely upon characterization and atmosphere to show us the things we fear most, which is often ourselves, but I avoid slasher movies and movies that are just about the gore and body count. But this movie was so funny. Blood and gore everywhere, all the horror movie tropes brought into one hilarious romp of total disaster. It's the absurdity that gets me, the over-the-top culmination of all horror movie cliches brought together in all their ridiculousness. I still can't hear elevator doors pinging without thinking of elevator doors opening to reveal scads of movie monster cliches emerging to massacre anyone in their path, then closing, then ping! And then open again with more cliche monsters . . . again and again. We Americans like things over the top -- we have to keep outdoing things, going faster, being richer, creating more outrageous events, and this was a perfect representation of our skewed overachieving culture.

We almost just can't be anymore.

I want to be funny again. I want to stop taking myself so seriously, because my life is pretty damn cushy these days.

I did stand-up a couple of times. Other comedians were relying on stale bits, or exaggerated physical humor. One guy flopped onto the floor and acted like he was having a seizure so the audience could see the bottom of his shoes, on which were written . . . I don't remember what, but it wasn't very funny.

My bit was actually funny. I mean, I can't tell, but the club manager said I had good material, and a good deadpan delivery. It was so much fun, just making people laugh. If I had the energy I'd go do it again.

Then again, if I had the energy I'd go do a lot of things.

And time. Time and energy.

But I'm not sure if I can be stand-up funny again.

But now that I think about it, the best thing about doing stand-up was that I got Stew to go up and do it too. He didn't want to -- he was pretty apprehensive around crowds by then as it was, and then he tried to pull out at the last minute, while we parked at the club.

"I can't do it," he said, "I just can't," and he was shaking.

I told him he didn't have to if he didn't want t o. It's not like it was mandatory. It was supposed to be fun.

"You don't have to, but I'm going, so you do have to come in and watch me."

And so we went in, and after I did my bit and people laughed he decided, "What the hell," and he got up, and he went up on that stage and he performed. Well, I thought he was funny the first time I met him, so I wasn't surprised he could do stand-up well. It took a lot out of him, but he did it. I was so proud.

We were both similar in that way. We just want to make people laugh. I'm a strong believer in laughter for medicinal purposes.

When Andrew and I are together we're always making jokes. Stupid jokes sometimes, but humor is such a part of our daily routine that it makes me happy just being around him. He comes up with the most outrageous things.

Maybe with his coaching I can stop being so serious and start being funny again. Then again, my humor is often so deadpan even I don't recognize it.

Or can I?

We all need things to make us laugh, whatever it is. We have so many options to choose from, if we only know where to look.

The End of Summer

I’ve never really grown up when it comes to summer. Each summer I have the same issues with wanting to be out playing instead of inside working. Growing up, I never worked in the summer. A job might have been a good idea in high school, but my time was filled with looking after my younger brother, and a job just never fit it into the schedule.

Besides, I never had any skills and didn’t know how to get a job. Instead I took care of Jeff, picking him up from preschool, hanging out with him, answering his endless questions, hanging out by the pool with him (he was a much better swimmer than I by the time he was 3), and letting summer float by.

I still want summers to float by. When it was hot, really hot, I wanted the summer to fly by, the sooner the better. But when the temperatures go down into the 70’s and 80’s I just want it to float by, lazy days where I do what I want, a giant summer vacation. It doesn’t, of course, because I still have to earn a living, since money doesn’t grow on trees.

This summer I also tried to convince myself and others that I was a writer, and some people are still buying that lie. I’m still buying it myself, though I have certainly faced the subject head on and should, by all logical measures, abandon the idea and console myself with a life of being paid by the hour.

No such luck. I have faced really dark times. I have doubted myself, and I have been tired and frustrated. I have fought against encroaching depression, which is just something I have to do, no matter what I do with my life. I have wished for other skills and other knowledge, and I have wished to not care if I never write again. I have repeatedly dealt with the idea that I am not a special snowflake, that I may be more hype than substance, that writing will always be my “little hobby,” something which people think is cute in a sort of, “Oh, isn’t that cute that she writes those little books” sort of way.

I always wanted my family’s approval, and even though they like me well enough, it has occurred to me that it’s not that they don’t approve of me, but they’re just not that interested in what I do, and that we have no common ground. Also, it’s not that they don’t consider me good enough, it’s that I don’t. I will always wish they approved of me, and though people tell me it doesn’t matter in the slightest, it’s as if it’s built into me, and I can’t escape it.

I haven’t floated through this summer as gracefully as I would have liked. For that matter, doing anything gracefully isn’t my forte. I consider Labor Day weekend to be my last glimpse of summer, and once it’s over I can return to my real life of working on numbers and fitting in some writing when I can. Of course, that describes my summer also, but in summer it’s so much more work to get myself to sit down and do the work when the sky outside is so blue and I know, just know without even thinking about it, that I belong out there.

After Labor Day is when I restart, again, and hope I can do it better this time. Or at least do it without so much self-doubt. Or at least do it without banging my head against the wall wondering why I can’t do it better. Self-flagellation is not something I aspire to, though I am quite good at it. In summer I can excuse myself because it is summer, but this summer I have been very hard on myself. I hope to lessen it, though I’m not yet sure how that will happen.

Summer is coming to an end, and I am still fighting off this virus that makes me so tired, makes my throat hurt, make my chest feel like there’s a giant weight on it. Or maybe it’s hay fever. Or maybe it’s just the end of summer, barreling down on me like an out-of-control freight train. (An overused metaphor, but still useful now and then.) Maybe it’s just another stop on my journey to wherever it is I’m going.

This is why I put off scheduling a doctor appointment. “Doctor, I’m having problems, and I think it’s because summer is ending.” “Doctor, I feel like crap, but it’s probably just the freight train headed my way.” “Doctor, if I’m so healthy why do I feel so bad?”

“Doctor, it’s the end of summer, can you make it painless?”

I love fall, and I love winter, so I shouldn’t have a problem with the end of summer. But I do – new beginnings, the concept of change, the idea that another year is speeding by and I’m still looking for my place. I have all the pieces: a great husband, great dogs, a great place to live, work I’m paid for, daily gratefulness for everything that has brought me here, where my greatest joys are, and still, still I keep looking for more.

Now I need a nap. It’s the virus thing, of course.

A Word or Two About Colonoscopies

Two days ago I checked in for a routine colonoscopy and discovered, much to my surprise, that I am 54 years old. This was quite a shock, as I was fairly certain I was still 53. At this rate, I’ll be well on my way to 60 in no time at all. As it was, I hadn’t eaten for a day and a half and my digestive system had been going through hell since the night before, so I’m fairly certain I looked at least 54, maybe even 55.

Should I be sad about my impending old age? I mean, what’s the alternative? If I weren’t progressing chronologically I wouldn’t be alive, would I? So isn’t aging the better option?

I could be stubborn about the entire thing and claim that I want neither to be dead, nor to be aging, but that sort of viewpoint is rather illogical, isn’t it? It’s not as if mother nature is playing a cruel joke on me or anything. I’m fairly certain that everyone else is going through the same sort of thing – unless one’s a vampire, but then there’s whole “can’t be out in the sun” issue. I’m not sure it’d be a good trade-off.

It’s not the aging that bothers me, it’s the pain in my legs and being so tired I could really use a good nap right about now. Those things have nothing to do with age however, so I can’t lay the blame on the calendar, as much as I would like to blame someone.

But there are so many good things about aging! In no particular order:

1.  No one expects me to look like I’m 20 anymore. This is good, since even at 20 I didn’t look like I was 20.
2.  I’m wiser now than I was then. That’s not saying a hell of a lot, since being wise isn’t a) all it’s cracked up to be, and b) not something I’m really good at, even now. But still.
3.  AARP has me on their radar and sends me lots of lovely junk mail.
4. I can turn down invitations with “I’m old and feeble, and so therefore can’t go.” This usually gets me a disdainful look, but I’m too old to care.
5. I can start planning for my retirement! You know, the one that I won’t be able to take for a good many years yet since I have a teeny little retirement account.
6. I no longer have to wonder, “Should I have kids, or should I not?” Really, it’s sort of late to think of things like that.
7. I get to have routine things like colonoscopies!

II   I think number 7 is definitely the best part of being older. I had so much fun not eating for a whole day, then ingesting vile fluid that turned my insides to fluid, which had to come out repeatedly over and over again all night, then the next morning, when I got to ingest more vile fluid. While I was doing so, I was thinking: Really? This is necessary? They can’t figure out a better way to take a look at things? This is modern medicine at its finest?

Everyone says a colonoscopy is no big deal. And they’re absolutely correct. It’s the prep that sucks the most, and the colonoscopy itself is a breeze, mostly because I had no idea what was going on when it was going on. Afterwards I was ready for a huge meal, and then a long nap.

I know what happens when one doesn’t get diagnosed in time, and so how important a colonoscopy is. My friend Stew, who stars in An Uncommon Friendship: a memoir of love, mental illness, and friendship, didn’t get one when he needed one, and he was only in his mid 30’s, so it hadn’t come up. Instead, he was subjected to all other kinds of tests and diagnoses and procedures, and by the time they got around to figuring out he had colon cancer, it was too late, and it had already spread to his liver. I watched from a distance as he grew worse, and then I was there with him for his last days, and I sat with him and told him everything would be okay.

“Okay” when one is dying doesn’t mean the same thing as when one is not dying.

For months he threw up everything he ate, and even during those last days, anything ingested came back up, even a few sips of a smoothie. We couldn’t even give him morphine orally because it would come up also. Instead, he received topical morphine, rubbed into his arm.

Here’s what I have to say about colonoscopies: If you’re of the age when you should be screened, get one. Seriously. It’s a major pain in the ass (pun intended), and I’m happy knowing I won’t have to do it for another ten years, but it’s better to find out if there’s something going on sooner rather than later. Early detection = better chance of beating it. This is coming from someone who tends toward the “whatever” philosophy regarding her own health, so if I were you, I’d listen.

I don’t want to watch anyone else die from colon cancer. I’d rather everyone get old with me.

The Queen Gives Us A Scare

Our oldest dog, Honey, is 14 or so. She's aged very gracefully, much better than I have, and at the last vet visit was declared in fabulous health fora dog her age. Still, knowing she's 14, we're on the lookout for any signs that things may be going awry.

Going awry happens to all of us eventually, doesn't it?

Late last night we were hanging out on the couch, as we tend to do late at night when we're considering going to bed but not yet up to making the long trek up the stairs. Ash was probably laying next to me with his head in someone's lap, or close to it, probably me, since he finds me very comforting. We saw Honey get up from the carpet and walk towards the kitchen, behind us. She does this sort of thing all the time. "Should I lay here? Should I lie there?" She still has trouble with lay and lie, not knowing which is the appropriate word. It's okay -- she's a dog and not expected to have perfect grammar.

We heard her lay down, behind us, on the floor, which she seems to like because it's cool, and then we heard scrambling and thrashing.

Scrambling and thrashing are not sounds we're used to, though occasionally she slips on the hardwood floor and then tries to cover it up by acting as if she meant to do it all along. Andrew looked over the couch and I said, "What's going on over there?" I can't see back there because my head doesn't do 180 degree turns. I  blame my parents for not producing something more functional when they made me.

"I don't know," he said, "But . . . "

And then he jumped up and ran to her. "There's something wrong!"

I ran to her also, as did Ash, who regards Honey with all the reverence due a supreme being.

Her head was at an awkward angle, twisted so that her left eye appeared to be bulging because of the angle of her neck, and she looked desperate and unhappy and confused. We knelt by her and tried to move her head, but it wouldn't move, and her desperation didn't seem to be dissipating, despite the fact the three of us were standing over her like avenging angels. Of course, it wasn't avenging angels she needed, it was help of some sort, if only us stupid humans could figure it out.

"We need to take her to the vet," I said, and Andrew went looking for the number to the emergency vet.

We recently used the emergency vet when Ash consumed chocolate chocolate cake to celebrate my birthday, so we know which one to go to.

As Andrew looked up the info I stayed with Honey, and I petted her and told her everything was going to be okay. Then I looked at her as a whole, instead of focusing on her head and her bulging panicked eyes. "Hey," I said to the poor thing, "Where's your other leg?" I could see one back leg on the side she was laying on, it was right there where it was supposed to be, on the floor, but the other one, where was it? The one leg was there, but there should have been two legs. When last I saw her she had two back legs, not just one.

Did I mention that this year Honey has grown a fabulously healthy thick long coat? It's gold and soft and fabulous, and things can get lost in there.

Like legs.

I found her other back leg at her neck. She'd broken a toenail on that foot, and when she'd been scratching herself up at her neck, or ears, the toe had caught in some of that luxurious fur and was stuck there. My dog was not having a seizure, or an attack of some sort, and she wasn't anywhere close to being terminal. She just had her toe stuck to her fur, which was why her head was twisted to the side with the toe attached to it.

Oh sure, it's funny now.

I yelled out that she was fine, that I'd found the problem and what I really needed was a pair of scissors, because that fur was not going to be dislodged easily. Andrew couldn't find the scissors, and as he ran around looking for them I tried to separate her toe from the fur that was quite attached to it. Just as he gave up on the scissors and brought me a knife I separated the toe, with the hair coming loose in a big clump, and Honey was free.

She was shaking quite a bit by then, no doubt more alarmed by my panic than by the fact that her toe was stuck to her neck, so I sat down with her in the living room and we calmed each other down while I cut off the offending toenail. I tried another toenail as well, but she wasn't ready to have anything else done, so I made an appointment with her to do some more grooming on both toes and fur today. If she cancels on me she has to pay a cancellation fee.

She's fine, and she says the only problem is that she would like to have servants who are a bit quicker with a diagnosis. I told her too bad, she's stuck with us.

The Death of My Father

Wednesday night while I sat at the airport, waiting for my sister to pick me up and take me to the hospital where my father lay dying, my father’s heart stopped for the very last time.

My timing is often off, but this is a new level of inept, even for me.

                

My father and I had our differences, though I think he was unaware of them. Okay, so I had my issues. The last time we talked on the phone he’d called me, which was unusual because he usually waited for me to call so he could complain about how long it’d been since he’d heard from me. But he needed to talk, and I heard from him a deeper level of sadness than I’d heard before. He was tired, he was sick, he had outlived his siblings, and he was, as far as I could tell, just waiting.

He’d been waiting for years. He didn’t expect to live to the age of 83, so when he did, he didn’t know what to do with himself. Around thirty years ago I was told I’d better get home for Christmas that year, because he wasn’t expected to live much longer. His heart was going. He’d had a stroke, a heart attack, lost a kidney, and he was, according to his doctors, a walking time bomb.

So I traveled from Europe to be there for Christmas, and can you believe it? He kept on living. I didn’t mind so much. It was a relief to have him still around.

We expect our parents to just keep going, to always be there because they always have been, and then suddenly they’re not, and it’s as if they’ve abandoned us. This is because they have abandoned us. The nerve of them.

During our last phone conversation I let him talk, as I always did, because he did love to talk. Mostly about himself of course – his world had become so small that all he really knew about was himself, and so he talked and he talked and he talked, and I’d interject the appropriate comments when needed. He was insistent on staying in his own apartment, though it wasn’t feasible. He couldn’t walk, he couldn’t take care of himself, but he didn’t want to go in a facility, and he didn’t want to pay anyone to take care of him. I told him we just wanted what was best for him, because we only wanted what was best for him. My sister was at his beck and call for years, and he counted on her to keep him in his own place for . . . ever.

Last week he went into the hospital. He had an infection, he wasn’t well, and they talked of sending him home in a few days, but not home, to a rehab facility, perhaps assisted living after that, but he kept getting worse instead of better, and suddenly decisions had to be made. He never wanted to talk about his wishes, just that he was going to die in his own apartment, thank you very much, though he never shared with us how he saw that happening. Perhaps he would go to sleep one night and not wake up. Perhaps he kept finding himself alive each morning and wondered “what the . . . ?”

He thought about what would happen afterwards, and he prepaid for his cremation. When his wife died, suddenly and unexpectedly of a massive heart attack (she who thought she was going to outlive him and had planned her life for after dad), he had no money, and we, his four kids, paid for what needed to be paid for. We were glad to do it, and one of us was her child too. He didn’t want that to happen again, and so he made sure it wouldn’t. But he didn’t plan for up to that point because how could he? How can you plan for something when it can happen so many different ways?

Maybe he would die quietly one night, his once frail heart giving up, the ticking time bomb finally going off. Perhaps he would die in a car accident. Maybe he’d be stricken with an illness and go slowly. Who knew?

Years ago he had cancer. This was long after his heart attack and his stroke and the loss of his kidney. Or was it two heart attacks? Two strokes or one? No matter. After his wife died he lived alone, and then, one day, he was diagnosed with bladder cancer. He went into the hospital, they removed his bladder, and he had a long and difficult recovery. But he recovered, cancer free, and after recovery he was moved into an apartment close to my sister.

I was there when we packed up his old apartment, up at Big Bear where he’d lived for years. His move to this apartment had left with fewer possessions, and this next move would leave him fewer still. He didn’t much.

But it seemed like no matter what happened to try to kill him, he’d just slough it off and keep going. And then he has the nerve to not even wait an extra hour for me to get from the airport to the hospital. Can you believe that? I got here as fast as I could. I made plane reservations, packed, got to the airport, made it through security in record time, even trying out the new scanner thingy, made it to my gate when they were doing last call, and got on the plane. Gosh darn it, I was going to be there to be with him!

I’m good with dying people. I’m good at sitting with them and holding a hand, or listening to them if they can or want to talk, and I’m good at being a calming influence. I can sit for hours next to their bed, just in case they need me. I can tell them what they need to hear, and I can reassure them. I can make sure they’re not alone. (It’s the living I have a problem with. The dying are easy.) He had no appreciation for any of my other talents, but this was one that I could use, and then he dies before I can swing into action.

Possibly the only thing I could have ever given him, other than the annual slippers he liked for Christmas, and he leaves before I can be useful. I could have been a better daughter, but I wasn’t, and there’s no going back. But that’s okay. We only do what we can when we’re doing it, and there aren’t any do-overs. If there were, so many of us would be doing over we’d never get anywhere at all. Besides, it took me a long time to accept myself the way I am, and damned if I’ll feel guilty now.

He was my dad, and I’ll always remember how hard he tried to take care of us when he was on his own, between wives, a single dad who kept us fed and clothed and secure, and how he gave me some fabulous siblings who I love very much. He produced some awesome human beings (not me, but the others), so he deserves a lot of credit for that. He was stubborn, often difficult, self-centered, and not very imaginative. But so what? I wanted so much to help him – I didn’t want him to suffer, or be in pain, or be sad and alone. And at the end, he had my sister, as he had for years, and she and my brothers, were there for him, and with him. And three out of four ain’t bad, is it? But he knew I was coming, they told him so, and so I expect he knew we all wanted the best for him, whatever form it took. I like to think he was happy at the end. Let’s go with that theory, since there’s no way to know for sure. 

Better Pain

There’s worse pain, and there’s better pain, and I’m currently experiencing better pain, though it sounds worse than it is. Or does it sound better? Less pain, that’s what I mean. I’m not trying to say that I’m a masochist and the quality of the pain is suiting me nicely, thank you very much. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I’m totally on your side if you’re into pain. I won’t be inflicting the pain because I’m not a sadist either, but yeah, whatever makes you happy.

After a weekend wherein both legs decided it would be fitting to punish me for my lack of attention to their needs (whatever those might be) I’m quite happy to have less pain now. As if the fibromyalgia by itself isn’t bad enough, one knee is also inflamed and has been for weeks. I think the anti-inflammatories are starting to kick in though, just in time for the Thanksgiving Marathon.

This isn’t a real marathon, in case you were wondering where to sign up. It’s the standing in the kitchen type of marathon.

 I wonder how people with real pain, as opposed to my whiny, self-indulgent pain, deal with it. I can well imagine how frustrating and annoying it must be, as well as painful. For weeks I’ve been consigned to keeping off my bad knee, keeping my legs elevated when possible, and cutting down on my trips up and down the stairs. I went to Las Vegas in this condition, knowing it was a bad idea, but committed to a work conference I didn’t want to miss. When I returned home three days later my right knee was twice the size of my left, but the conference was worth it.

Since then, my efforts to keep up the appearance of occasionally taking care of my house have been stymied. I’m fortunate that I have 1) a desk job, and 2) a desk job in my own house, so I can keep the traveling to a minimum. How do people not as lucky as me deal with it? If I had to go to a job every day I’m pretty sure I’d be damn bitchy about it.

Yes. I’m pretty bitchy anyway. It’s always “me, me, me, ow! My legs hurt!” like anyone cares. And really, how bad can it be?

I am extremely lucky in my pain. I may wonder when it will ever end, if it will ever end, because sometimes it seems to go on forever, but that passes, and each day I decide that the next day will be a better pain day, and that I will wake up cured.

Over the weekend, when it was at its worst, I really missed running. I haven’t run in years, and I don’t really wish to return to it now, but the idea of it sounded very appealing, and that’s because, no doubt, I couldn’t do it at all. I used to run, and once, when I was quite a bit younger, I was even fast. I’m no longer fast, and I hobble more than I walk.

We’re often like that, I think. When we can’t do something we weren’t that interested in to begin with, we wish we could do it. It’s the possibility of it that we miss more than anything else.

I don’t, however, wish I could date again. I’m so happy to never have to go through that again. And high school. There’s something I’d never want to repeat. Talk about pain. But running? That wasn’t painful, and while I wasn’t thrilled about it overly much after high school, I could, and did, do it. Wishing I could again isn’t because I miss running, it’s because if I could run, that would mean my legs weren’t all washed up, and if my legs weren’t all washed up, I could do a lot of other things that are hard for me now. Like exercising – I’ve had to stay off the recumbent bike for a few weeks so it sits there in the corner of my office, all sad and forlorn, and I’m thinking that in the next few days I’ll give it a shot again. It misses me so, after all.

To everyone who has pain, I wish you less of it, whether it be physical, mental, or emotional. Whether you have pain or not, I ask that you not inflict any pain on yourself or others. Life has enough pain in it all by itself that we don’t need to make more of it. Everyone gets their share, fair or not, and if there’s anything I could do to alleviate yours, I would. Not to get all sentimental on you or anything, but you often don’t know what pain others are in, so keep that in mind.

Let’s avoid causing pain of any sort, because there’s certainly enough to go around already. Instead, let’s see if we can alleviate pain. It may not make it all better, or any better, but at least we won’t make a bad situation worse.

Anyway, we’ve got Congress for that.

Sorry. I had to slip that one in there. I could just use the generic term government though. All the same to me.

Happy Veterans Day. Really.

We love us our veterans, don’t we? As a peacetime veteran, I’m all about Veterans Day. I didn’t spend several years of my life hanging out in a uniform so I could get a day off once a year, which was just as well since it was many years before I had Veterans Day off. And I wasn’t in when there were conflicts and wars, only pretend let’s-get-ready-just-in-case practices. It was no big deal for me, because I am lucky.

But here it is Veterans Day again, as it rolls around each year, and I want to thank everyone who served. So there you go.

Last week I was in Portland, and on my way home. One of the freeway entrances that I frequent often has people on the corner. Cardboard signs abound, pleas for help, and sometimes cardboard artwork. The clientele differs. Sometimes they’re young and healthy looking, and I wish they had other options than to stand on a corner and wait for people to hand them money.

I know, I’ve been told many times that “they” make more than I do, that “they” could work if they wanted to, and that “they” will just spend any handouts frivolously. I don’t hand out money, but that’s mostly because I never carry cash. And I don’t carry cash because I probably would hand it out. And then there would be none left for me. I wouldn’t hand it out to everyone, but there are times when I see someone and I think, “I wish I could give that person something.” But I can’t do everything I want to do.

On this one day there was only one person on that corner, and he was old, and thin, and his sign said he was a veteran, and he was homeless. He couldn’t move very well, but there he stood, with his cardboard sign, inviting anyone to stop.

Was it true? As far as I know. People have said I should be more suspicious of others, but I’m not, and that’s just the way it’s going to be. He looked like a veteran, worn out and used, and then discarded because, well, he’s no longer much use to us, is he? He can’t be sent overseas to fight, and he can’t be put to good use, so there he is, on the street corner.

“He doesn’t have to be homeless,” people say, but I don’t know. I do know that many are homeless, and many have problems that aren’t addressed because there isn’t enough money to take care of them all, and we easily assume that their problems are because of who they are, not because we’ve let them down.

He reminded me of Fred, my once hospice patient who was also a veteran, until he retired. He went to war, he came home with health issues, and as he was dying he was still awaiting word on whether his exposure to Agent Orange qualified him for disability. He was dying from a respiratory disorder, but the VA said it wasn’t their fault – it was his own fault for smoking.

Maybe it was, maybe it wasn’t. I don’t know.

I’m not nearly as knowledgeable as I would like to be. I don’t have answers, only questions.

On this one day I had a ten dollar bill in my wallet. This happens very infrequently. I pressed the little button on my fancy car that tells the window to roll down, and the man with the sign hobbled over to me. I handed him the ten dollar bill, and then he grasped my hand firmly in his, and told me to enjoy the day, for it was sunny, the sky a clear bright blue. I told him to enjoy the day also, and he smiled, and then the light changed. He hobbled back to his spot, and I drove onto the freeway, lighter for the loss of ten dollars.

Sometimes being lighter is the best thing that can happen to us.

People will say, “He’ll only spend it on booze, you should never give them money,” but I don’t really care. Get this: I don’t even care what he spends it on. That’s his business, not mine. I’m not his mommy, I’m not even a social agency. I gave him a gift of ten bucks, and what he does with it is up to him.

What we do speaks volumes about what we think of our veterans, and no matter what we say, it’s our actions that tell the truth, not platitudes.

My nephew recently came home from war. I want to thank him, and tell him I love him, and I hope he never needs to rely upon the government, for it may let him down. But that doesn’t mean people will. The government is one thing. People are another.

People are what I still have faith in. 

Living On The Edge

Despite my current occupation, I’m a daredevil at heart. Accountants get a lot of bad press, and I’m not sure why. After all, engaging in mortal combat with the IRS isn’t for the faint of heart, is it?

But it’s more than that. It’s a reckless disregard for my personal safety, a willingness to go right to the edge of propriety, a longing for just a bit of almost danger, all while avoiding the IRS because we’re not, y’know, besties or anything.

Today I outdid myself, and I removed all the privacy settings on my Facebook account. I KNOW! I’m courting disaster and I feel all energized!

Since that worked so well for me (though there hasn’t been time yet for my new settings to put me in danger, though I’m sure by nightfall I’ll be totally sorry), I’m also going out to lunch without a knee brace or a patella strap. It’s all about living on the edge, though being unable to get either of those on underneath my jeans helps.

I’m considering having a milkshake on my way home. A totally milk-based product! If that’s not living on the edge, I don’t know what is. (And I’m not just referring to the edge of the toilet seat that’s probably in my future, if I should carry out this plan.)

I may leave my driver’s license at home today. How’s that for potential danger? What if I get pulled over for going 25 in a 45 zone? “License and registration,” the mean cop will say, and I’ll come back with, “Ha! Left my license at home! Now what are you going to do?” I really have no idea. I’ve never done anything as dangerous as this.

I’m just getting started here. I could write myself a really large check, more than I have in my account, and deposit it into another account, hoping I get more checks in the mail today! Well, wait, that’s a little too daredevilish even for me, so we’ll skip that one.

How about this one? I’m not going to floss tonight. Nope. No flossing tonight. Am I courting potential tooth decay and loss of teeth? YES!

I’ll check in later and let you know how it went. If I end up in jail, I’ll be calling for bail money.