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Random, late Thanksgiving musings

14 Dec

Random, late Thanksgiving musings

First of all, I can’t figure out why there’s that ?> at the top of the page. Sorry. I think it’s a PHP typo. Not the first, not the last.

Secondly, my mother came to visit for Thanksgiving. I don’t think it would have been possible to please her more than I did this time, as I was afflicted with a brutal sinus infection. (Has since been downgraded to one that is merely debilitating.) She wasn’t exactly overjoyed to have a sick child, but she did seem to find great happiness in spooning Delsym into my mouth. I think it reminds her that I need her. To please her, I gave in and finally started using a neti pot as she’s been requesting for years. This is probably the sign that California has weakened my Midwestern practicality, making me now begin my days pouring salty water up my nose. Sexy.

The Southern Gentleman’s parents flew to SF, too. Our parents, bless their hearts, held off for one full day before the talk of wanting grandchildren began. Grandchildren, our parents agreed in between bites of turkey, would be nice. “You might want to get some orange juice from the store,” Betty advised me at one point. “You need to make sure you’re getting enough folic acid.” And when SG drove we Lady Tomlins home one night, my mother hopped out of the car and crowed, “I’ll leave you two lovebirds in the car so you can have KISSYFACE.” As you can imagine, that night’s goodbye kiss was the chastest in history.

Curved-letter cities

12 Dec

Curved-letter cities

Last night, Dylan asked me where I would move if we didn’t have to worry about practicalities. “Brooklyn,” I said. “Portland. Berlin.” Cities that start, comfortingly, with nice rounded capital letters. There’s almost some aural symmetry in their pronunciation, as though they might sound the same if spoken by a tipsy Frenchman with a speech impediment. These cities couldn’t be more different, but I like all three of them, and it’s not just the lousy weather patterns that unites this trio. I love cities that fidget with creative energy, mostly because I hope some of it will rub off on me. I love these cities because parts of each remind me of Chicago, of home, and because they have rusty run-down things along with the shiny new ones.

Lately I’ve been sculpting a romantic notion out of going to Berlin in the winter. When you don’t live around snow, it’s easy to think of it as a beautiful backdrop to wonderful scenes. And maybe it is for a minute or two, but then it’s cold and your nostrils feel like tiny igloos, and you feel like you’ve been walking the tundra for weeks even though all you’ve done is take a three-block walk to a coffee shop. But I keep thinking that a Berlin winter cannot possibly be as brutal as its wicked Chicago sister. Wikipedia temperature information confirms this theory.

Realistically, though, it’ll first be Brooklyn in February and Portland in March; the Southern Gentleman and I need to save up some shacking-up costs anyway, so big trips are not in my near future. Berlin will have to wait, as will a more thorough explanation of why I like that city so much in the first place. (Been sick for six weeks, and can’t stay awake past 9 so well these days.)

A boy named Jesse

10 Nov

A boy named Jesse

Yesterday I went looking for the Man in Black. I was at the Country Music Hall of Fame, anticipating mountains of Cash memorabilia. In the end, I found only a spotless black suit, nothing else. I thought of Jesse Morris, and how I’d have to tell him about it.

Today, while flying home from Nashville, I heard the sad news that Jesse had died. I didn’t know him very well, yet he was one of my favorite people in San Francisco. He’d been busking since his teenage years, tossing in Fear and Black Flag covers along with the Johnny Cash covers that made him famous around here. The first time I heard his voice in the 24th Street BART station, I was convinced that someone was playing a rare Cash record on excellent speakers. Instead, I rounded the corner to find an inked-up, baby-faced punk belting out “Folsom Prison Blues.”

I tossed a few dollars into his guitar case, and over the year or two that followed, we developed a friendly rapport. He was a truly nice guy, funny and opinionated — and talented, too. I bought his CDs and gave them to my brother and the Southern Gentleman; I pitched him as a profile for This American Life. I was often late to work because Jesse and I’d start talking about 999 and Fear, moving on into discussions of love and joy and sadness and living, and before you knew it, 20 minutes had passed. He told me that he was engaged — or at least he’d officially be so when his lady finally accepted his many proposals — and he was clearly in love. We talked about his attempts to stay clean, his ongoing struggle against illness, and how music helped him cope.

We talked about depression, too, which is eventually what led to his death. He and I had commiserated about well-meaning folks who don’t understand despair, who tell others to smile their way out of crushing sadness. We talked about our fear that even when things were good, depression would always be hiding behind a corner, ready to pounce on any contentment we could find. I remember feeling corny, because I touched his arm and felt like a mama bird when I said I believed he deserved happiness.

Embarrassed, he tried to toss my sentiment aside. I remember touching his elbow and making him look at me as I told him: You bring joy to so many people and you don’t even know it. He smiled then, a broad and bright smile. And for the first and last time, I saw a glimpse of the little boy he’d once been.

The news

7 Aug

The news

I called Betty last week. “Mom,” I interrupted. “I have news.”

“Oh, let me guess,” she squealed. “You and the Southern Gentleman went to CITY HALL!”

The older I get, the more it pains me to disappoint my mother by being a childless singleton. I can tell how happy she would be if I were married. Which I’m not. “No, Mom,” I said. “We did not go to City Hall and get married.”

Betty backpedaled. “Well, who’s talking about MARRIAGE? People go to City Hall for lots of reasons!”

“Uh-huh,” I said.

“Well, maybe you and the Southern Gentleman were getting a permit for a yard sale,” Betty argued. “I didn’t say anything about marrrrrrriage.”

Technically, this is true, but no mother becomes breathless over her daughter potentially having a yard sale. Besides, the idea of a City Hall wedding was probably more exciting to my mom than an actual engagement announcement would have been. Why? A rushed, shotgun wedding would mean that I was pregnant with SG’s offspring, which would make my mother extremely happy. (On the subject of babies that don’t exist: SG and I both have prominent noses, which means that any child we had would probably be 80% schnoz.)

Midwestern nice

26 Jul

Midwestern nice

This is one of the things I really love about Chicago and the Midwest in general: the land is enormous, but the sense of community makes big cities seem like overgrown small towns. I’ve been in San Francisco for four years, and do you know how often I run into someone I know here? Maybe once every two weeks. Maybe. But we go back to Chicago, and within the first day, there’s Christopher in Millennium Park, and John and his family at Lula. We go to Detroit for BBQ (at a place owned by a former Annie crush) and who works there but Zach? I miss this sort of coincidence, and Midwestern Nice, a lot.

I also find that when I’m home, I’m a much nicer person. Obviously, a lot of that has to do with not juggling 12 tasks at once while at work, but it’s also a reflection of the people around you. SG and I continued our tradition of renting bicycles far too small for him, and the woman who rented them didn’t even ask for a credit card. And sure, we were mean mugged (I forgot about that phrase!) in Detroit a few times, but we were also greeted warmly there. My point is, it’s easier to be more Betty than Veronica back home.

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