We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We. We.

All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out. All in. All out.

You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You. You.

Face me.

Daria calls from that Sherman tank she drives, on her second return trip from the pediatrician in two days. Her children are squawking. Though Daria’s voice cuts out often, the kids’ complaints sound like they’re beamed via satellite straight to my living room.

Daria: I now understand why there are songs about housewives taking drugs.
Tata: Boy, you are a slow learner!
Daria: The baby had an appointment for shots but Tyler had a fever and we were going to the pediatrician anyway. So the baby feels wretched and Tyler’s got Fifth Disease.
Tata: Fists’ Disease?
Daria: Fifth Disease. First. Second. Third. Fourth. Fifth.
Tata: You made that up!
Daria; So we’ve all been exposed to it and it’s harmful to fetuses. We couldn’t go to the reunion, which I’ve been looking forward to for months. And this morning, I found a spot on Sandro’s back and back to the doctor we went. He’s got Lyme Disease.
Tata: You’re in Hell!
Daria: Specifically, a McDonald’s drive-thru with my diseased children. It’s medicinal. Don’t say a word!

Far be it from me to advise. Since Miss Sasha was born a great deal seems to have changed in the sport of childrearing. For one thing, “parent” became a verb. Also: electricity was discovered and signals from the Law & Order planet are received on mysterious talking boxes in our living rooms. Miss Sasha and I became two separate monograms in Hartford, Connecticut – at that time, one of the three poorest cities in the country, where I lived with street kids, landscaping rent boys, and the very elderly during a recession nobody remembers anymore. The three days I was in Hartford Hospital were three days I had enough to eat. Until Miss Sasha was four and I got a state job, taking her to the pediatrician depended entirely on whether or not I had enough cash to pay the doctor. So when I’m standing in Daria’s kitchen and she spills another nutty edict issued by the pediatrician, I’m always shocked that she listens.

Daria: Babies cannot sleep on their bellies.
Tata: What?
Daria: The pediatrician said. There’s a special pillow. Babies have to sleep on their sides now.
Tata: You had to go shopping to comply with that rule, didn’t you?
Daria: I had a coupon.

Or:

Daria: No raw fish during pregnancy or breastfeeding.
Tata: What?
Daria: Mercury. No tuna, either.
Tata: Aren’t millions of pregnant Asian women eating that every day? If they’re lucky?

Or:

Tata: What…what are you doing?
Daria: I’m writing down everything the baby does.
Tata: At this age, they…don’t do much, Dar…
Daria: Every sip, when she sleeps, diaper changes.
Tata: What if you had a job outside your home?
Daria: I’d have to quit.
Tata: Don’t you have enough to do without obsessive record keeping?
Daria: The pediatrician said!

Or:

Daria: I wish I could have a glass of wine with you.
Tata: What? Why can’t you have a glass of wine?
Daria: I’m PREGNANT.
Tata: European women drink wine during pregancy.
Daria: There’s NO EXCUSE.

In my brain, the doctor looks like Russ Tamblyn in Twin Peaks. Too many rules! Half make life harder and the other half make life less sensible. I couldn’t be this kind of parent. For one thing, I didn’t have the attention span for a second pregnancy. For another, I’m more of a “Bring Mommy the scotch, darling,” kind of parent. In fact, when Miss Sasha turned 21, Mamie and I sent her out for booze and porn.

After the divorce from the Fabulous Ex-Husband(tm), Miss Sasha spent Sundays with me and a then-internationally syndicated college radio comedy troupe. The comedians took an active interest in Miss Sasha. They quizzed her on geography. They taught her to roast a chicken. They explained vocabulary conundrums like what ‘blow job’ and ‘turning Japanese’ meant. She asked. They explained. I was grateful for the help. Their children should be grateful the comedians had an unspoiled little psyche to practice on.

Tata: So, what did you kids do while I was recording in the basement?
Mamie: I taught her to play cards for money and drink Zima.
Tata: That’s practically vocational training!

I may be an annoying Mommy, but I will make the best Grandma.

This weekend, most of my relatives pile into SUVs and head to Moscow, Pennsylvania for a reunion of my stepfather’s family. While I would love to compare Jell-O mold recipes with distant relations I usually only see at funerals, I’m staying put. Last night, I started throwing away stuff in anticipation of moving. That means I have to find a place to move to. This afternoon, I’ll see a studio apartment in Highland Park. If it works out, I can stop grinding my teeth and my friends – to a fine sheen. I like my friends smooth and attentive. And smooth. Yes.

Horoscopically speaking, I’ve been keeping secrets from myself. How that is possible for a mental blabbermouth I do not know, but I decided to sit myself down and demand the truth.

Me: What is it you’re not telling me?
Me: I can’t tell you.
Me: You sound like half my Exes after visits to the Lower East Side.
Me: After an unnamed event I can’t hint about that will change something you’re not aware of I won’t need to tell you anything and we can forget all about this non-moment.
Me: Will you tell me after it happens?
Me: Nope.
Me: Tell me!
Me: No!
Me: Tell me!
Me: No!
Me: So what is the purpose of telling me you won’t tell me?
Me: Are you worried now?
Me: Yessirree, Bob!
Me: Were you worried before?
Me: Not…that I recall.
Me: I give you focus. Now, sit up straight and fret like you mean it!

Right…so last night I started throwing things away. Who needs copies of CMJ from 1999 still in the mailing plastic? Who needs paystubs from 1996? Out they went! It got a little dicey when I found drafts of poems I didn’t remember writing because the 1990s have disappeared from my memory. A bunch of crumpled up napkins I guessed I could keep. All the rest: out!

Tonight: maybe I’ll get to the closet with my costumes and the old bottles of body paint. It’s not like I’m going to slather myself with bronze goo and stand on a pedestal again in public anytime soon.

Not until your check clears, anyhow.

“I don’t really miss God
but I sure miss Santa Claus.”

Hole, Gutless

People ask you for things all the time. You ask for things. These interactions form parts great and small of daily life. You may not even notice these sticky obligations.

Tata (on your answering machine): You have the idea you could have something more important to do besides call me back. That’s so…misguided…

I am not a nice person. I am a good person – sometimes – and there is a big difference.

Tata: Are you going to ask out that girl who no longer works for you? The one who quit this morning and did everything but tell you where she’d be holding a menu at 7:30 tonight?
Shocked Co-Worker: I…I can’t…I can’t ask her out…
Tata: And that, my friends, is why God gave us email.
Shocked Co-Worker: What…what if…
Tata: She will absolutely do you. Pick up the check and she’s yours. Bon Appetit!

Some people need a shove and my hands happen to be free; some people need patience. On my best days, I can be patient with small children, the elderly, the infirm and hapless local drunks. If a guy on the street tells me he needs $3.85 to get a train home and I have a buck, I’ll give it to him – the first time. The second time, I lose patience when his imaginary plight fails to entertain me. He needs a new story! I need a new harrowing tale! It’s selfish, and I don’t care.

Recently, a friend asked me to be patient with a Difficult Situation(tm) while he worked out what to do. I’m just a bystander, here. I agreed to try keeping my trap shut on the subject for a while, which you might think would be as simple as hanging up the phone – except I obsess. So. I didn’t say, “HAVE WE MET? I’m the least patient person you know without an assault conviction.” I didn’t say, “Tick tick tick time’s up.” There’s nothing I can do about that Difficult Situation(tm), so I am trying to go about the business of preventing other Difficult Situations(tm) from compounding my worries.

1. I need a microscopic apartment I can afford LAST WEEK, ALREADY.
2. My driver’s side door seems intent on bashing itself shut permanently. How can my mechanical nemesis despise itself through and through?
3. Do I need a land line anymore?
4. It’s back to the Wonderful World of Multiple Jobs for me! How will I do it?
5. Audrey proposed a book of themed poems. The project appeals to me. Hmm.
6. Miss Sasha and the new Mr. Sasha moved to Pensacola last week. Perhaps I’ll knit them a rowboat and a GPS transmitter.

Fortunately for me, there are only 24 hours every day I can be sick with fear. At least that hasn’t changed. Developing patience is no fun but having it might be helpful. So. Can I keep my hands so busy I don’t shove myself off a cliff?

The other night, I said, “I am a terrible judge of character.” Six people rushed to assure me that yes, I was a fine judge of character! I wasn’t fishing for compliments and wouldn’t accept any on the subject.

Tata: No. Statement of fact: I am a terrible judge of character and you as my friends should suspect yourselves of having monstrous character flaws.
Friend 1: I’m a drug addict.
Friend 2: I watch the Travel Channel to disguise my xenophobia.
Friend 3: I teach second grade.
Tata: Arrest each other immediately!

Johnny and I met when I was 14. Though that’s 98 in dog years, it’s mighty young by human standards. His last wife hated my guts so this one will probably never meet me. This shouldn’t be funny but it is:

They have roadrunners here. Actual live ones, running across the, as you would imagine, road. And tarantulas. And foxes. I think I already mentioned that they have coyotes.
****************************************************

Miss Sasha, not impressed with the season’s first hurricane on Pensacola, sets in motion a linguistic storm of her own:

Soooo, how was ur trip? did it go great? what did you do in WI? Oh, by the way, the knot.com…the website I used for the wedding now has a new cite for newlyweds. I have been setting up my blog and new webpage the last couple of days…I will send you the link when I finish updating everything.
****************************************************

A newlywed blog? The April-freshest of fresh Hells! Yesterday, we had a mother-daughter discussion of hanging laundry outside and the perils of folding flying insects into one’s sock drawers. I can’t wait to read more about what my advice sounds like to Miss Sasha.

What I Might Actually Say:
Baking soda softens hard water but you should look into the condition of the pipes in your house or apartment. Salts corrode. Maybe. Or maybe plumbing disasters have all been a terrible coincidence. We should ask someone who knows.

What Miss Sasha Might Hear:
Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels. Squirrels.

We don’t know! She could be listening! But we don’t know! I’m a terrible judge of character.

Yesterday, I was standing in a friend’s foyer discussing the current furor in the reality-based blogosphere. If you don’t know what happened or is happening at this moment, it’s not likely that linking to the participants’ blogs will help. On Saturday, when the first shots were fired, I was at the bottom of a pile of refreshing beverages and cats with medical conditions and catching up has proven remarkably difficult. Mamie joins us in the foyer, takes one look at me.

Mamie: You’re talking about Shakespeare’s Sister?
Tata: Yeah, how’d you know?
Mamie: That’s the expression your face gets everytime.
Tata: What? I have a look just for a person I’ve never met?
Mamie: At least she makes you think!

Life is short, unless you’re in prison. A gal’s got to pick her battles and fewer of them as age creeps up and metabolism slows. For instance: that I get to work in the morning is a daily miracle; there’s no way I’d have the time or energy to pick a fight with a bigtime blogger and pin him to the mat. So I’m watching the fracas with the expression on my face that says, “Look at that girl go! She’s gonna run out of stomach lining before she runs out of opponents.” This is how I know I must be nearly old enough for a red New Yorker and the early bird special: the fire that drove me for decades has burned down to embers.

Plus, Vanessa Marcil is on the cover of Maxim. And I love Vanessa Marcil.

The initial fight was over an ad on a progressive website, and that degenerated into the bigtime blogger calling feminists tired, tired insulting names, dismissing the point, and backing up so, so close to dismissing women altogether. What I see here, and what the dozens of women participating in the story see is nothing new: many men, no matter what they say, want women to stop challenging them.

Personally – because that’s where the political stream meets the ocean of day-to-day results – I have watched affection and interest disappear from the eyes of men who chased me when they realized that what they caught was just as smart as they were. Men who really liked me tried to keep me a secret from their friends because I wouldn’t shut up. I have seen men who loved me lose their nerve and break things off, and I hate them for being such cowards because the only love worth having is brave love.

Personally, I have a band of female friends who say the exact same thing. We have a mantra: “Maybe this one is different. Maybe this one is brave.” Over and over, we find that no matter what his politics, the new man is terrified of vivacious women with their own opinions and ideas (the utterly fearless Paulie Gonzalez being one exception.) The more single women I meet, the more often I hear this story.

Menfolk of the Left: women are watching you, and every. last. one. has heard some form of the old horseshit about spreading her legs for the Revolution. You are not slick. You have to take us seriously whether you like it or not. We simply will not behave for you. We will not be quiet. We will not go cook you something.

The best thing you could do is cultivate a shiny-new steel-reinforced spine where your smart female counterparts are concerned. Plenty of us are going on with lives without you because you’ve lost your nerve. Wouldn’t it be better for everyone if you grew the hell up and we could go on together?

Warning: This true life adventure contains a lot of breasts! I mean lots of ’em! If this is a problem for you, please go directly to the phone book and pick a therapist for a long-term relationship.

You met my thirteen-year-old sister at the wedding. Her name – as far as you’re concerned – is Dara. Dad’s third wife – also as far as you’re concerned – is Darla. Sister #1, sixteen months younger than me and preceeding those other two on the dirt path we call family life is named Daria – as far as you’re concerned. While you’re sick of being concerned, Dad, whose fault this is somehow, realized the error of his ways in the produce aisle of Kroger a few years ago.

Dad: This is my wife Darla. These are my daughters Daria and Dara. Oh my God.
ThreeDs: What?
Dad: That sounds like a set of plate-spinning Italian triplets.

Daria calls me at work.

Daria: Did the airline deliver your luggage?
Tata: Yup. My bedroom looks like it snowed clean laundry.
Daria: I need the bag back. I’m going to Aruba on Saturday.
Tata: With a brand new baby?
Daria: The boys are staying with their Long Island grandmother who currently has no air conditioning. Maybe I’ll call and ask if she wants to stay at my house…
Tata: You’re taking a brand new baby on an airplane?
Daria: Yes, I’m taking my brand new baby on an airplane. What are you getting at?
Tata: I just flew from Milwaukee to Newark two rows from a squawking troupe of Christian children who made me nearly homicidal with their chatter about how microbiology flew in the face of God’s Creation.
Daria: Children?
Tata: Earnest teens.
Daria: Ooooooh.
Tata: Good thing your husband’s a Marine.

Nine times out of ten, our conversations include whole rapid-fire sections of no words at all. This would be unintelligible to anyone with fewer than three Jersey sisters.

Tata: And then I read the words “I’m lying” across his forehead.
Daria: [full-body Jersey chick gasp, manicure at high air-flutter, if she were driving she’d be in a ditch.]
Tata: Shaaaaaaaaaa!
Daria: Uh ahhhhhhh.
Tata: Mmm hmmm!

In person, it’s as if we read the Times Square news crawls across one another’s foreheads. There is no possibility of lying or pretense. Thursday night, I drove over to her house and found our Mom’s unique vehicle parked in front. Daria lets me in. Her hair is flying all over the place as she leads me upstairs to the master bedroom where, as I enter, nearly all Hell breaks loose. The new baby is crying her eyes out. Mom’s changing the baby and changing her and changing her – Mom generally moves slowly and deliberately and thoroughly and though babies usually like that, this one’s not having any of it. Daria’s two boys are floating in the bathtub and squealing delightedly. Bathtime is their favorite. They are hooting like monkeys on two-for-one banana day. The TV’s on. Daria’s vast wardrobe fills a walk-in closet, covers her bed and spills from the expensive luggage on the floor. This room is so busy I walk laps around one side of the bed just to keep up.

Tata: Hey Mom! Show us the battleship!
Mom: What?
Tata: Your new tattoos! Show us the battleship!
Mom: Truly, you were raised by wolves…

Current radiation treatments involve tattooing little dots on the patient. I hadn’t heard of this before yesterday, but now Mom and I finally have ink in common. Mom hands the in no way calming down and now irate baby to Daria, who stops running in tight circles, plunks down on her bed and hikes up her shirt. Apparently, the baby’s hungry. The boys continue splashing each other and pretending to be invisible. Mom checks to see the boys can’t see her and shrugs off her tank top to show me the dots. And then, my lecture begins. Look closely. You see me standing in front of a chalkboard in Daria’s closet, whacking the chalkboard occasionally with my extended pointer.

Tata: Mom! That bra does NOT fit you.
Mom: It fits me! I want it to fit me!
Daria: I saw this on Oprah…
Tata: That bra does NOT fit you! Remember we used to go to the corsetier in East Millstone?
Mom: Yes…?
Tata: The back of your bra should be –
Daria: – Even with the front! That was on Oprah this week, too!
Tata: And while this is a nice design –
Mom: See? This is a good bra!
Tata: – it gives you four boobs, and that’s two too many.
Daria: What are is she talking about? Turn around, Mom, lemme see.
Mom: Um…the boys…
Daria: You’re right! The boys will never bring home –
Mom: – Girls. “I trace this back to the moment Grandma…”
Daria: I will never have grandchildren because my sons were emotionally scarred by three women in ill-fitting underwear. “I thought my sons’ girlfriends were so nice. Turns out they were their long-term therapists.”
Tata: Sometimes your weight redistributes. That happened to me recently after I stopped lifting weights and my ribcage narrowed.
Mom: Really? I’ve always worn either a 32 or 34 –
Daria: STOP RIGHT WHERE YOU ARE –

Mom and I freeze. Daria’s pointing urgently down the hallway. Oh. My. God. Her husband’s home and no one heard him shut the front door! The chalkboard disappears. I dart around Mom, grab her shirt, turn it right-side-out in one motion and put myself between her and the doorway.

Daria: – OR YOU WILL NEED THERAPY FOREVER.
Tata: You have the Stealth Husband? How is that possible? He’s much too big!
Daria: He is in fact the Stealth Husband. See?

I turn the corner. There he is. I decide seven people in one bedroom is at least one too many. On my way out, I tell Daria I left a couple of recent issues of International Gymnast in the bag for her, should she miraculously have a minute to flip some pages. Daria likes that idea.

Well…now we know that writing imaginary dialogue and talking to the narrator is a family trait.

Poor Impulse Control, this modest endeavor, this vibrant equivocator, is the kind of blog you read because I am engaging, and you haven’t yet found a way to give me jewel-encrusted gifts. Let’s face facts: I amuse you, and I’d be a bargain at twice the price despite the many moments I tick you off or leave messages on your cell that’d make sailors blush. Or perhaps because of them.

So. There we are: Me, me, me. It’s all about me.

Thus, I have been surprised and perturbed to find myself staring at PIC’s stats and noting that someone has added the 12.23.04 entry Pointy, Bitey, Sharp Sharp Sharp to their reading list. Several smart people I trust to tell me the absolute truth because they fear my ability to find cutlery anywhere have been unable to track down who’s linked to this causerie. The strange, silent attention is creepy. I can’t tell whether I should bake brownies or boobietrap my kitchen window – though anything involving boobies is bound to be fun, isn’t it?

I’ve met me. In fact, most of the time I recognize me right away. Who’re you?

Hi, honey. I’m home!

My manicure’s a wreck, my luggage returned from Luggage Hell, my inbox is stuffed with suggestions that my erections could be just like when I was twenty-one. If by that spammers mean those erections are someone else’s they may be onto something. Where do I sign?

Larry, the little black cat bent on stealing your soul, cried the whole time I was gone – so says Paulie, who apartment-sat and cat-sat while I was camping in the Midwest. A three-year-old beagle decided she was my best friend. Cats, big busybodies, know all about who you’ve slept with, so Larry wouldn’t speak to me last night. Today, he’s much friendlier, having forgiven me for bedding down with with dogs even if I didn’t get up with fleas.

The thing I wanted and needed was a week away from TV, phones and computers, not to mention blood relations waving guest lists or co-workers issuing demands as my employer takes away money it promised – but why should I be special in this Fuck You, I’ve Got Mine economy? There’s only so much a person can do for simple peace of mind when the mind in question is in endless pieces.

Where’s the express line for a new life?