24, Family Style

24 hours in the car. That's just getting there and getting back. I am not Michelle Duggar. I don't travel with a list of fun songs we can sing or prepared to quiz my kids on the histories of the states we traverse. Mostly,  I huddle against the front heated seat, thank Heaven for the invention of DVD players, and cling to the hope that one of those all-too-brief respites of quiet will erupt in the back seat.

Coloring books get us through the first hour. Then Mama and Daddy cave and put in a movie. Three hours in, things have gone pretty well. (Mama's not looking for liquor stores just off the interstate. Yet.) We watch How to Train Your Dragon, a universal favorite. 

HtTYD finishes and we have not quite enough time for another flick plus the kids need to start winding down since we are spending the night in a hotel. You know, exotic and exciting for the six and under set who have not yet developed volume control for the larynx and cause disturbances for other guests.

So the Pirate invents a travel game. 

"Mama, I have a dragon in my head. Know what he looks like?"

The swollen, rusty remnants of the blue harvest moon wink at me from just over the Blue Ridge mountains. Time was the moon and I would flirt with each other in quiet until it grew too silver and important to talk to the likes of me. No such luck tonight.

"No, sweetie. I have no idea. Tell me about the dragon." Pleasepleaseplease don't let this be one of those topics he gets looped on.

"His tail is two miles long and his fangs are one mile long. The moon looks kind of like his eye."

Ha! The moon has often been my dragon's eye. A sleepy dragon, waking just enough to open one eye and look me over. It's kind of a cool moment of connection.

"Do you have a dragon in your mind, Mama?"

"Yes."

"What does he look like?"

"SHE is sometimes glittery black, but sometimes she is copper, like a new penny. Her eyes look like the moon, too. Her wings are like bat wings but very beautiful."

"Daddy? Do you have a dragon?"

"Yep. He has a fluffy blue tail, he is blue and white, and he has a blue button nose."

Pirate giggles. Then he asks the Princess what her dragon looks like.

"Pank." (Really, I swear we say "pink" despite any and all claims of redneck heritage but Princess persists in "pank.") "Wif pank polka dots and pank wings."

"My dragon is born in a thundercloud and that's where he lives. Where does your dragon live, Mama?"

Mama's dragon lives in a volcano. Daddy's lives in the dryer lint. Princess' lives in a pink castle.

"My dragon's weakness is rain. He doesn't like it." An unfortunate circumstance for a dragon who resides in thunderclouds, but there you have it. "Does your dragon have a weakness, Mama?"

"Ice. That's why she lives in a volcano."

"What about yours, Daddy?"

"Dryer sheets."

Pirate asks Princess what her dragon's weakness is. I wait with bated breath, wondering what could possibly threaten such a terrifying amalgamation of Pepto-Bismol colored horror.

"Two seven eight," Princess replies, deadly serious.

Fifteen minutes of that road trip were high quality family fun. I even felt like a pretty good mom. And despite meeting Grandpa and "Auntsy" (the three year old contraction of "Aunt Nancy"), pony rides, and a house full of cats and musical instruments, Pirate's favorite part was the road trip. Because we were all in the car together.

It melted my grinchy heart. Or maybe that was just the seat heater.

Animal Dialogue

TBIM is out of town. He usually lets the dogs out last thing at night and they get a "cookie" when they come back in. He trained them or they trained him. You be the judge.

Stage: Dark. Quiet. Kids in slumber, house at peace. Quiet rumblings of dryer and sussurations of dishwasher.

Mama: Okay! Everybody out. Get busy!

Dogs exit stage.


Dogs re-enter.


Lulu: Snuffle, whuff, snort, happy dance. (Dog-ese for "I love you! Love, love, love you! Love ya, mean it! Good stuff comin'?"

George: Elegant, dignified wave of gorgeous plumage he calls a tail. ("Yes, milady, favor us with a courtesy.")

Mama (oblivious): Good dogs! Good job!

Lulu: BIG happy dance!

George: Happy shuffle.

Mama moves to stage right, the living room. Mama reclines. Dogs follow in disbelief.


***


Scene: Mama at ease on sofa. George resigned on floor. Lulu darting back and forth to the door in the universal code for gottago gottago GOTTA GO!

Mama: You just went out! You can't be serious. No. Uh-unh. No way.

Lulu: Squirmy wriggles.

George: Sad gaze of the betrayed.

Lulu: More squirmy wriggles. ("No, srsly, I mean it!")

Mama: Fine. But take care of business this time.

All: Hustle to the back door. Dogs exit.

George and Lu: Promptly return to door. 


Mama: OOooh! I coulda had a V-8! Cookies!

Crunchings and munchings for George and Lu, tranquility at last for Mama.

The End.


OH! Except for the cat, who tried to follow my roastbeef sandwich INTO MY MOUTH. Saucy little minx.

Grounds for Divorce

That Boy I Married took the princess shopping yesterday while the Pirate and I spookified the yard for Halloween.

They returned with a pinky-purpley-sparkly make-up kit. With NAIL POLISH.

I've endured four applications of saccharine flavored lip gloss already this morning. I am assured that I look very beautiful. Nails have been painted to glittery perfection. The campaign to paint again is now officially launched.

Oh, Lordy! She's eyeballing the dogs with a bottle of nail polish clutched in her manicured fist. Signing off now.

Pray for us.

Banned Book Review: Speak

A day late and a dollar short, but The Rejectionist's call for banned book reviews has been heeded!

I read Speak last week just because it was banned. I didn't think I would like it because everywhere I looked this book was described as the story of a girl who was raped and kept silent. In this regard, proponents of Speak are making the same mistake that nay-saying book banners are.

It is not about rape. It is not about a rape victim who chooses to remain silent.

IT IS NOT ABOUT RAPE.

Melinda, the main character, is raped. She does not choose to remain silent, she simply can't speak. Her trauma has left her so isolated and depressed that she can't bring herself to speak of it, or much of anything else. The inciting incident could have been any trauma, the point is that this girl withdraws so abruptly and so far that no one can figure her out and furthermore, no one tries to. She has no support. She is representative of so many marginalized kids that she is practically a poster child for why the high school years are NOT the best of your life.

It is about a girl who is drowning while no one notices.

Now that I've gotten that off my chest, on to the review-y portion of the show.

First: This book is side-splittingly funny. I'm like most of the unwashed genre-reading masses. I'm unlikely to read a book because it tackles a tough issue but I will devour a book that keeps me turning the pages. Every synopsis, every reference to Speak makes it sound downright bleak but Anderson does a masterful job infusing Melinda's voice with an authentic, sometimes acerbic commentary on high school life.

On the first page Melinda applies her full concentration to where she will sit on the bus. Again in the cafeteria. Her friends have judged her a narc and abandoned her and the only person who will sit with her on purpose is a transfer student with no friends. Really takes you back, doesn't it? Who doesn't remember the crushing importance of where you sit and WHOM you sit with?

Heather-the-transfer-from-Ohio is now Melinda's only companion. Heather is quite the joiner, looking for any entre onto the high school social ladder. Drama club, the Marthas (a clique of seasonal sweater wearing, crafty, teacher supportive types), pep rallies, all of these represent inclusion to Heather. Melinda gets swept along for the ride because she lacks the energy to object. She harbors no hope or ambition of being included.

Meanwhile, Melinda's ex-best friend Rachel is carving out a new identity for herself:

Rachel is with me in the bathroom. Edit that. Rachelle is with me in the bathroom. She has changed her name. Rachelle is reclaiming her European heritage by hanging out with the foreign-exchange students...She can swear in French. She wears black stockings with runs and doesn't shave under her arms.

And later:

She puts a candy cigarette between her lips. Rachelle wants desperately to smoke, but she has asthma, She has started a new Thing, unheard of for a ninth-grader. Candy cigarettes...Next thing you know, she'll be drinking black coffee and reading books without pictures.

Melinda's observations on her teachers are equally funny and insightful. Over the course of the year we see her first impressions of her art teacher flesh out, but he is the only teacher who makes an effort to reach her. He is also the one who comes closest to getting her to talk. She has stretched enough in his class to create a truly disturbing sculpture of a mute Barbie trapped inside a literal skeleton- the remains of the turkey her parents failed to render edible for Thanksgiving.

Her art teacher and relationship with art evolve in a fascinating way. She struggles with expression. Her teacher recognizes this and encourages her to keep trying, to find what works. He gives her a book of Picasso sketches. The disconnect from reality in Cubism speaks strongly to her own view of herself and her reality. Melinda's struggle with expressing herself through art proves her need to communicate even though conversation is beyond her grasp. It's delicate and subtle, but this detail underscores the idea that Melinda did not choose silence. She needs to be heard and lacks the tools to make it happen.

The remainder of Melinda's teachers seem uninterested in her frequent class-skipping, satisfied with the stolen hall passes she provides. Her grades are terrible, a huge departure from the previous year, and as a result her parents decide to tighten up on discipline. Heather eventually abandons her because she is such a downer. Not once has anyone asked her what is wrong or if they can help. When she tries to tell anyone anything more than "yes" or "no", her throat closes up to the point that she cannot talk. Her parents schedule a conference with the principal:

We have a meeting with Principal Principal. Someone has noticed that I've been absent. And that I don't talk.

They want me to speak.

"Why won't you say anything?" For the love of God, open your mouth!" "This is childish, Melinda." "Say something." "You are only hurting yourself by refusing to cooperate." "I don't know why she's doing this to us."

Melinda observes the conference, removed and imagining the entire thing as a scene in a musical. Her mother is concerned that the principal will think there are marital problems. The father threatens to call the school board. The guidance counselor institutes a carrot-and-stick plan whereby negative behavior has "consequences" and positive is rewarded.

At the end of the conference Melinda muses:
"Do they choose to be so dense? Were they born that way? I have no friends. I have nothing. I say nothing. I am nothing. I wonder how long it takes to ride a bus to Arizona."

By the end of the school year, Melinda's need to speak is so urgent that in one or two passages I felt my own throat tighten, trying to push the words out for her. She also has meaningful conversation with two people, both of whom show an interest in her. Her classmate David reaches out to her with a note first, supportive of her, indicating that her parents should have taken action against the teacher who forced her to do a report in front of the class. He follows up with conversation at her locker. It is the first meaningful dialogue she has outside of her head and occurs in the last quarter of the school year (and the book).

It stood out for two reasons. First, it was the first time I realized how little dialogue there had been. That's damn hard to pull off and keep a reader interested. Second, all it took to get her to speak more than one word at a time was a kind gesture and indication of true interest. It cracked her armor and the next person who speaks to her instead of at her is Ivy, another former friend. They talk in the bathroom and Ivy gets her to open up just enough to engage in bathroom graffiti against her attacker.

So little was required to free her enough to speak at all but she has passed through almost the whole school year with no one noticing or caring enough to reach out.

Suffice it to say, the ball is rolling and Melinda is finding her way back to the world by the end of the book. It's a great ending, redemptive, realistic, and hopeful.

But this book is not the story of a rape. It is the story of an epic fail on the part of a community to recognize Melinda's crisis and try to understand instead of force her to conform.

I will absolutely recommend this book. I will recommend it because it is a great read, compelling and funny. I will admire it for being important in spite of those things. And I will tell anyone who thinks it should be banned that I think that is a great idea. That way, more people will read it.

Adventures of a Part-Time-Never-Was-Beauty-Queen

In honor of the spirit of The Rejectionist's public humiliation post, I offer the following. All my spiral bound, purple inked attempts at fiction met their demise during a year of exceptionally fierce spring cleaning on the part of my mother. Apparently, she assumed that if I had not even lived there for ten years that meant that not every single item, decayed corsage, and hello kitty note was essential to the fiber of my being.

In the darker times of a slower place, back in the day, there once was an awkward girl who did something drastic. She tried her hand at living up to social expectations.

Girls who wanted to do a team sport tried out for cheerleading. This girl- the awkward one, or Miss A for short- was not cheerleading material. Not even a little bit. It's good to know your limits.

For the smart but cool anyway crowd, there was Leader's club. Miss A had the GPA but lacked whatever other elusive quality got you selected for Leader's club. She was aware enough to know that it wasn't the sort of thing you could lobby for. Very mysterious, the Leader's club. Thus far in her high school career, Miss A's club exploits were based solely on grades. Math honor society, Spanish honor society, stuff like that.

But Senior Year there was one thing, one major thing, that was judged by people that did not already know everyone at Jefferson Davis High School, where Miss A took the most AP classes in school history but did not attend many dances. It was a big deal coming-of-age ritual for twelfth grade young ladies in the cosmopolitan hub of culture known as Montgomery, Alabama. So big that even the girls from Luverne, which was practically Crenshaw County, turned out for it. Everyone started from the same place. Your GPA, talent, and interview counted just as much as anybody else's. No extra points for cheerleaders or Homecoming Queens. That's right. The ultimate level playing field. A truly egalitarian selection process. The Montgomery County Junior Miss Pageant.

Miss A examined the Herculean task of entering the pageant. She knew she wouldn't win, but placing in something might look good on college applications. Just like the Junior Miss people, the college people liked applicants who were "well rounded."

She took stock of the judging categories and how she might fare in each:

Academic: One area with no cause for concern
Appearance: Acceptable
Interview: Who doesn't like to talk? And how different can it be from college entrance interviews?
Talent: Hmm. Problematic. Don't sing. Don't dance. Refuse to do a Gone With The Wind monologue. I never should have quit trumpet. What to do, what to do?

All she could do reliably was perform well on standardized tests, which did not translate on stage unless people enjoyed watching someone completely fill circles with a number 2 pencil for 90 seconds. Well, she could also draw. But that wasn't much better than filling in circles for entertaining an audience.

Miss A's speech and drama teacher came up with a genius solution for the talent problem. She suggested drawing to music. In time to the music, an image from the song. So that's what Miss A did. She rocked her way through a giant cartoon frog, timing the strokes to "Jeremiah Was a Bullfrog."

It wasn't great, but it sure beat the girl who played the piano in a hot dog costume, finishing with a flourished version of the "Oscar Meyer Weiner" song. Another girl walked on her hands, for Heaven's sake. In a clown costume. Really? Drawing to music…not as good as the girls who could sing but in the grand scheme of things it was not cause for massive embarrassment. And Miss A's primary goal, first and foremost, crucial to her estimation of a successful experience in this brave new world of "normal girl life," was to not humiliate herself.

During pageant prep she faced two major hurdles. One she was used to. One of the coaches plain old did not like her. She couldn't put her finger on it but she suspected he felt that she lowered the standard median of candidates for Montgomery County Junior Miss. He liked the girls who were the local rock stars of their high school lives. This was annoying but how seriously should you take a middle aged MAN who devoted three months of every year to coaching teenaged beauty queen wannabees? The other hurdle, though. Well, the other proved her downfall.

Miss A knew the second she laid eyes on the Poise and Appearance outfit that she wanted no part of that particular portion of the program. It was a hyper-feminine monstrosity of soft white chiffon with sleeves so puffy that they might have rendered the wearer airborne if she flapped her arms fast enough. And it had tiny sparkles on it. Anne Robertson, a much more traditional participant for Junior Miss, had been hand selected by the coaches as the outfit model. Anne couldn't even make it look reasonable and she was a good six inches shorter than Miss A, who was guaranteed to look ridiculous in it. Outside of a four year old on Easter Sunday- a four year old with indulgent parents who let her pick her own dress- nobody could have pulled it off.

Miss A groaned, sucked it up, and resolved to do her best anyway. Her mother bought the material, found a seamstress, and had the dress made. At least it zipped up the side. The zipper went from hip to bust, leaving the dress accessibly wide open until every frill and ruffle was ready to hug the appropriate virginal curve. That disallowed unfair advantage to cheerleaders, who were by their very nature limber and better equipped to handle quick costume changes with zippers in the back.

She learned the stupid Poise and Appearance dance. This was not a bad attitude on her part. It was stupid. Everybody knew it. The song was Michael Jackson's I Just Can't Stop Loving You reformatted to elevator music and the choreography matched. Not even the Miss Congeniality types could find anything good to say so they were the only ones who did not say anything, having been raised better than everybody else. Miss A secretly bet they prayed about it, though.

She practiced enough to be reasonably certain that she would not flub it, confusing or possibly knocking down anyone unfortunate enough to dance near her on stage.

The night of judging rolled around. In the Montgomery County Pageant, Judging takes place the day prior to the public at large show. The audience is the judging panel only, not even family. This stroke of genius on the part of the pageant organizers creates a dress rehearsal that matters and eliminates crowd induced stage fright on the part of any particularly fluttery participant. Pageant people might have lousy taste in clothes and music, but they're good at event coordination.

Miss A did not suffer debilitating stage fright but she did get a little nervous. The Poise and Appearance routine went smoothly, though, with no forgotten steps or unfortunate episodes. Everyone finished in triumphant relief and flowed offstage like so much sparkly ice cream melting under the stage lights.

"What were the judges laughing at?" Ann Summerville asked as soon as they entered the stage wing. She was a veritable sprite, so tiny she looked like she might live in a mushroom. The dress almost worked on her.

"I didn't notice they were laughing," Miss A said. She had been concentrating too hard on NO MISTAKES.

"I don't know. Did somebody mess up?" Hot Dog girl asked.

"Are you kidding? They were laughing at the dresses," Shelley Garrison said. Shelley had an awesome talent. She did a dance routine to the theme from "Mission: Impossible" in a nude colored leotard that somehow looked more cute than sexy and therefore slipped through the approval process. She would make the top 10, for sure. Plus, Shelley was always nice to Miss A. Even though she had been a cheerleader in 10th grade AND was in the Leader's club. "Uh, Laurel? Please tell me you just now unzipped your dress."

Miss A glanced down to her left side, which was completely exposed to the world. Well, damn. No wonder she didn't get too hot on stage. Too bad they didn't award points for matching your underwear to your bra. Because make no mistake about it, everybody would have seen both.

"Whoops," she said. The stunned silence and sympathetic pats assured her she had officially knocked herself out of the running for anything. There are places where showing your goodies on stage is rewarded, but the Montgomery County Junior Miss Pageant is not one of them.

Sure enough, show night they announced the top 10. Miss A was not among them. Shelley wasn't either, surprisingly. Anne Robertson made it. And Crissy, the girl who walked on her hands for her talent. In fact, Crissy went on to win the whole thing, including a $500 scholarship to one of the local colleges. They had a few more consolation scholarships to hand out after the illustrious Junior Miss was crowned but the girls were all tired, a few of them weepy, and pretty much over it. Everybody but Crissy, anyway.

And for the next five minutes, Miss A did not get a chance to sit down. One college offered her a full tuition scholarship. Another stepped up with room, board, AND tuition. A third sweetened the deal with an additional $500 a semester stipend on top of the free ride.

Her suspicion that pageants might be a socially acceptable form of displaying goods for consumption was confirmed. She was the object of an outright bidding war. Being objectified was rather appealing after the previous day's fiasco.

Miss A became a lifetime supporter of pageantry that night even as she vowed never to do it again. She had learned a very valuable lesson:

If you flash the judges at the Junior Miss pageant, you probably won't win. But you get to go to college for free and that is even better.

Banned Book Week!

Yay for banned books! Banned book lists are the best place to find good stuff to read. If it weren't for the nutjobs out there trying to make sure we didn't get to read anything, you know, fun- or even worse, challenging- I would never have read Harry Potter. So cheers, guys! Thank you for highlighting the greatest books out there. Saves me lots of time.

I'm going with Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson. It is way off the beaten path for me since I avoid books with major downer topics like the plague. Sorry, lovers of issue and important books, but I get plenty of drama in my real life. I want my book life to be a predominately happy place. Hence, YA Fantasy.

I'm making an exception for a couple of reasons. After the internet kerfuffle over the Op-Ed piece by the idiot in Missouri I grew curious. Looked up the book, read the excerpt. I feel for this girl. I was this girl but with a different issue. I remember being the one in the cafeteria that everyone assumed must be contagious if pariah was a communicable disease.

I'm also reeeeaaal tired of blame the victim/cover it up. A rape survivor is entitled to do whatever she (or he) needs to in order to cope. Even if that is keeping it private. We shouldn't force or shame people into telling their stories. But we sure as hell shouldn't shame them into keeping quiet, either. For the quiet victims out there, the ones who are too scared or too private to talk to an IRL human about their experience, there has got to be a venue. A place. Nothing is safer than a book. It won't tell anyone your secrets even though it pours its own out. Books like this one are a lifeline.

People like the man who believes recounting an attack is equivalent to soft porn are a perfect example of why we need books like this. Can you imagine being the daughter of someone who thinks like this? You would be terrified of telling your family what happened to you. Speaking of it makes you dirty (dirtier?). You can't tell the truth because then everyone will know you are damaged. Your stock will go down. Who will want to marry you?

Where would you turn for understanding? Solace? Recovery?

So I'm going to read this book. I imagine my kids will, too, eventually. I'm good with that. I'd like them to be sympathetic, have some way to understand or relate to anyone they meet who may have experienced this. And God forbid they have personal experience with it, but if they do, I want them to feel not so isolated. I want them to know their parents don't think they are dirty or at fault. I want them to trust that I won't see them as less than they are because someone else did something very wrong.

We can't ban rape victims. Banning their stories, their truth, doesn't make the criminal part of this saga not happen. It returns the power to the aggressor again and again. Enduring a rape does not make you dirty. It makes you a survivor. Telling the truth does not make you pornographic. It makes you brave.

***UPDATE***

Since posting I done hauled myself to the libary and read this book. Holy crap. Phenomenal. It is hugely funny despite the immense weight of the issues Melinda is dealing with and a very redemptive ending. It is also artistically damn near perfect. So, so, so glad this book got some book banner's dander up enough to catch my attention. I tore through it.

Save the Cat!

Blog buddy Lydia Sharp highly recommends
Save the Cat! by Blake Snyder as an instructional resource for all sorts of nifty writing tools like tag lines and pacing. The title is explained in a character development section. You have an unapproachable, bitter, or otherwise unlikeable character who is actually a good guy. The first inkling of inner goodness comes in the save the cat moment, when this character runs into the burning building to rescue the cat from certain incendiary death. Through one act of kindness, this person is now redeemable in the context of the story.

Well, cats and kittens, I have my very own real life Save the Cat story! For realz!

An acquaintance/BFF/relative (anonymous person) I know has been dating a guy who insists on acting like a teenaged asshat a lot of the time. To the point that people who know better (me and all her other friends) are killing the sacred cow and advising her to be rid of him.

So she got engaged. C'est la vie, right?

A week ago she received a phone call from someone claiming to represent an attorney seeking to claim an outstanding debt. Should she ignore/refuse said debt, she faces jail time. BUT. Lucky her. They would settle for a bank draft...immediately...and consider the matter clear.

Our heroine did not just fall off the turnip truck. She knows something is fishy but is concerned about identity theft. So she wastes a goodly portion of the workday contacting her bank, credit card companies, and credit agencies to get to the bottom of the matter. Turns out the whole thing is a scam designed to intimidate people into getting robbed.

Since she has a phone number for this "attorney", she traces the number to California. Eureka, California. She alerts the appropriate authorities in Eureka and the Great State of California but is none too optimistic that anything will happen to shut this shady operation down.

So. The formerly mentioned asshat calls the number. He somehow hacks into their voicemail system. He changes the outgoing message to say:

"If you received a call from this number it is a scam. Do NOT send them money. Do NOT give them any information about your bank or your router numbers. You do not owe these people money. They are THIEVES."

And then, for good measure, he changes the password so they can't get back in to their own voicemail. It has now been their outgoing message for several days. Boo-YAH!

He is getting phone calls from many a grateful soul who were terrified they faced some prolonged legal battle or emptying their liquid assets in an effort to avoid jail. He is now promoted from asshat to asshelmet.