Today marks the month countdown until I take a massive road trip across country to spend the summer in Arizona. Yeah, the state I fought so hard to leave, I’m crawling back to for the summer. That’s right, I’m leaving the state of Michigan, where summer temps rarely peek 95, and its sunshine and long days to spend my summer in Hell. 100+ temperatures all the time… so what exactly am I thinking?
First of all, let’s talk about what I’ve been up to? Working, school, and running on empty in the scholastic department. I’m getting restless and I’m getting antsy. I’m also getting ready to quit. So, I need a break, a step back from the regular life stress. I also, more importantly need my friends. It’s not enough to have them a phone call away. I need the physical distraction to help refuel myself. There are more excuses I could go into, but really I just need the break and I miss my family. Put two and two together, and I’m Arizona bound.
But, don’t think this is just a vacation as I thoroughly intend to get a job, work the summer, do some more exploring, and get tan. I’ve become a weird shade of white that I’m not entirely used to nor do I want it. I want to swim as much as humanly possible. And take photos. Also, I miss good Mexican food.
So, Arizona, my camera and I will see you soon.
Monday, April 16, 2012
Saturday, April 14, 2012
The Kids are Alright
I haven't written in a bit and I suppose this is a complete cop out for writing, but here it is anyway. I had to write a story for my creative writing class so I decided that this was going to my by entry. It's a bit long. Some of it is made up, some of it is stolen from real life events. Names, events, places and all that jazz are not necessarily the same. Any relation to real events is probably coincidental. Maybe. I also stole the title from a movie that was released recently. It needed to be done, not everything I do can be that creative.
One time when I was seven-years-old I explained to the doctor how to inject heroin into your arm while he was taking blood from my arm. I learned that from my mother. It was just a routine checkup while spending the summer with my grandmother.
Shortly after that, my brother explained to an audience of great aunts and uncles how to roll a joint, detailing the exact precision it takes to truly make a good one. How you have to roll it tight. He learned that from my dad.
I imagine most parents’ worry about whether their children will repeat the occasional “shit” or “damn it” that escaped their mouths in a bout of frustration. But that’s thing about children; you really have to watch what you do around them don’t you? And even more so if you’re the kind of child I was, who thought everyone was a friend.
For show-and-tell when I was eight, I told people about the Kleenex boxes and cake. It seemed normal for me, but I was pulled into the counseling office and my mother was called.
I didn’t understand the problem with the fact that when Daddy wasn’t medicated it made him do strange things. Strange things like wearing Kleenex boxes on his feet for shoes and bringing me a birthday cake six months shy of my real birthday. Or the fact that one time to prevent my mother from driving he removed one of his own molars and shoved it into the ignition of our Datsun, but it was okay, because “They told him she shouldn’t leave.” And who were the “voices” anyway?
Schizophrenia and weed will do that to you though, people never realize that’s the number one reason schizophrenics fall off their rockers. Weed. They never care either, because they think the only hazard they’ll be is to a cake.
I know it’s actually quite awful when you look at it, horrifying even. But it was my childhood and every now and then it makes for some good stories. I suppose beauty of my childhood was that I was blissfully unaware. I didn’t fully grasp the horror of each of these stories until was much older. It was like how I watched Dirty Dancing every day for a year when I was 5-years-old. It wasn’t until I was thirteen that it actually clicked what the movie was about. It was literally an “Ohhhhhhh” sort of moment for me.
And then there was the day that Scottie died.
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It was a normal Friday for us, my siblings and I. We were at home and my mom was rushing about organizing things for when her friends would arrive. I was excited because I loved when her friends came over. It meant I could steal sips of beer, eat all the candy I wanted and stay up late. When her friends came over, mom didn’t care what we did as long as we stayed out of her hair. But mostly, I was excited because Scottie was coming over.
Scottie was my favorite of her friends. He was tall with sandy blonde hair and a mustache that ticked my nose when we he would pick me up and kiss my forehead. He was cute and he paid special attention to me. I even changed the name of my Ken doll to Scottie.
While most of moms friends would say hello then ignore me for their poison of choice, he let me sit in his lap while he drank and passed a joint around laughing and telling jokes. I loved sitting with Scottie. It made me feel special, but he also made me feel safe.
Sometimes I would ham it up in front of my mom’s friends and tell silly jokes. And they lapped up the sarcasm I had even at a young age. Being around the adults, while my siblings preferred to find solitude in our bedrooms watching ET or other cartoons gave me the center of attention most times.
This Friday was no different. I would crack jokes and ping pong between the kitchen and people gathering a beer for a quarter tip. It made me feel important and also, the drunker they got, the higher the tips became. Sometimes I’d end a night having collected twenty or more dollars. Which is a lot to a 6-year-old. It wasn’t long before the sounds of AC/DC, Poison, KISS and other 80’s hair bands filled the air and they were all sunken into their grooves.
Then out came the mirrors, the spoons, and razors and rolled up bills. This is when I would get pushed upstairs and tucked into bed. Scottie would always volunteer to take me to bed. He’s warm and funny. He makes me laugh. He also smells like beer and cigarettes. He tells me a story about a princess in a tower and a knight in shiny armor. I imagine I’m the princess and he’s the knight. And then he calls me sweetie and then tucks me into bed. “Goodnight Princess.” He says as he turns out the lights.
I smile as he leaves but I’m angry that I’m too young to stay up even later because I just know theirs something exciting going on downstairs and I’m up in my room missing it all.
Most nights I listen late into the night to their hushed voices. Their stories about how the world is spinning and other euphoric feelings. I can’t wait until I’m older and can try the spoon trick too.
Tonight the music is so loud I can feel the beat in my mattress, it lulls me into a deep slumber. To this day, I can be at a Mega Death concert and fall asleep. Loud music and metal has a lullaby effect on me, which people always find strange.
When I wake the next morning the house is still and in my Rainbow Bright nightgown, I carefully descend the stairs. Scottie is on the couch and other bodies are scattered around the living room. I skillfully maneuver around each of them into the kitchen pretending they’re lava before I pour myself a bowl of cereal. On the way back, I weave through the bodies before I climb on the couch next to Scottie and sit behind his bent knees. I turn the TV on low and watch Saturday morning cartoons. This is how I have my breakfast.
Most weekend mornings are like this. We make ourselves breakfast, lunch and dinner while mom sleeps through the weekend because she doesn’t feel good. My siblings and I are used to it and so weekends usually consist of Mayo sandwich’s, which is literally just mayo and bread, Cereal and on occasion Mac and Cheese if my older brother feels up to it, he’s nine.
We watch a lot of TV and try not to get into too much trouble. I’m the one that usually cause the most mischief because it’s hard for me to sit still and I get bored easily, especially if they wont let me watch Dirty Dancing and we’re forced to watch The Goonies or ET. I hate both of those movies and I just want to dance.
Every so often, someone will shift and grumble before getting up. They’ll croak a hello; pat me on the head and quietly slip out the door. This continues for a few hours until its only Scottie and me in the living room. I desperately want him to wake up, because he’ll watch Woody Woodpecker with me, and I’ll laugh just like the bird to get Scottie to smile.
And then I realize that there is no movement coming from Scottie and I’m horrified. I scream and then run upstairs screaming, “MOM! MOM! SCOTTIE’S DEAD!”
When I get to her room, she’s jolted awake, her eyes are wild and she seems confused. I take a deep breath and say it again as tears start to form in my eyes.
“Scottie is dead. He’s not moving at all! I don’t think he can breathe either!” I rush to her and shake her. “C’mon lets go!”
I sprint to the door and flee to the bottom of the stairs with my mom following at my heels. I run to the bowl near the TV as she begins to violently shake Scottie on the couch begging him to wake up. Her words are frantic.
“Scottie! Wake Up! WAKE UP!” She gives him a hard shake and he gives a cough.
“What? I’m awake. What is the matter?” He croaks.
I turn with the bowl in my hands and look at them, she’s hugging him, crying and he looks bewildered as he strokes her hair and tries to calm her. I stare at them mad that they aren’t focused at the crisis at hand.
“Mom, Scotties dead! Look! He’s just floating at the top! What are we going to do?” I sob as her eyes finally turn back to me.
“Jesus Christ,” she shouts, “Don’t ever scare me like that again.” She seems relieved as I clutch the bowl with my now dead fish in it and begin to cry violently, causing the water to slosh from the bowl.
“But he’s dead” I manage to whimper.
One time when I was seven-years-old I explained to the doctor how to inject heroin into your arm while he was taking blood from my arm. I learned that from my mother. It was just a routine checkup while spending the summer with my grandmother.
Shortly after that, my brother explained to an audience of great aunts and uncles how to roll a joint, detailing the exact precision it takes to truly make a good one. How you have to roll it tight. He learned that from my dad.
I imagine most parents’ worry about whether their children will repeat the occasional “shit” or “damn it” that escaped their mouths in a bout of frustration. But that’s thing about children; you really have to watch what you do around them don’t you? And even more so if you’re the kind of child I was, who thought everyone was a friend.
For show-and-tell when I was eight, I told people about the Kleenex boxes and cake. It seemed normal for me, but I was pulled into the counseling office and my mother was called.
I didn’t understand the problem with the fact that when Daddy wasn’t medicated it made him do strange things. Strange things like wearing Kleenex boxes on his feet for shoes and bringing me a birthday cake six months shy of my real birthday. Or the fact that one time to prevent my mother from driving he removed one of his own molars and shoved it into the ignition of our Datsun, but it was okay, because “They told him she shouldn’t leave.” And who were the “voices” anyway?
Schizophrenia and weed will do that to you though, people never realize that’s the number one reason schizophrenics fall off their rockers. Weed. They never care either, because they think the only hazard they’ll be is to a cake.
I know it’s actually quite awful when you look at it, horrifying even. But it was my childhood and every now and then it makes for some good stories. I suppose beauty of my childhood was that I was blissfully unaware. I didn’t fully grasp the horror of each of these stories until was much older. It was like how I watched Dirty Dancing every day for a year when I was 5-years-old. It wasn’t until I was thirteen that it actually clicked what the movie was about. It was literally an “Ohhhhhhh” sort of moment for me.
And then there was the day that Scottie died.
----------------------------------------------------------------
It was a normal Friday for us, my siblings and I. We were at home and my mom was rushing about organizing things for when her friends would arrive. I was excited because I loved when her friends came over. It meant I could steal sips of beer, eat all the candy I wanted and stay up late. When her friends came over, mom didn’t care what we did as long as we stayed out of her hair. But mostly, I was excited because Scottie was coming over.
Scottie was my favorite of her friends. He was tall with sandy blonde hair and a mustache that ticked my nose when we he would pick me up and kiss my forehead. He was cute and he paid special attention to me. I even changed the name of my Ken doll to Scottie.
While most of moms friends would say hello then ignore me for their poison of choice, he let me sit in his lap while he drank and passed a joint around laughing and telling jokes. I loved sitting with Scottie. It made me feel special, but he also made me feel safe.
Sometimes I would ham it up in front of my mom’s friends and tell silly jokes. And they lapped up the sarcasm I had even at a young age. Being around the adults, while my siblings preferred to find solitude in our bedrooms watching ET or other cartoons gave me the center of attention most times.
This Friday was no different. I would crack jokes and ping pong between the kitchen and people gathering a beer for a quarter tip. It made me feel important and also, the drunker they got, the higher the tips became. Sometimes I’d end a night having collected twenty or more dollars. Which is a lot to a 6-year-old. It wasn’t long before the sounds of AC/DC, Poison, KISS and other 80’s hair bands filled the air and they were all sunken into their grooves.
Then out came the mirrors, the spoons, and razors and rolled up bills. This is when I would get pushed upstairs and tucked into bed. Scottie would always volunteer to take me to bed. He’s warm and funny. He makes me laugh. He also smells like beer and cigarettes. He tells me a story about a princess in a tower and a knight in shiny armor. I imagine I’m the princess and he’s the knight. And then he calls me sweetie and then tucks me into bed. “Goodnight Princess.” He says as he turns out the lights.
I smile as he leaves but I’m angry that I’m too young to stay up even later because I just know theirs something exciting going on downstairs and I’m up in my room missing it all.
Most nights I listen late into the night to their hushed voices. Their stories about how the world is spinning and other euphoric feelings. I can’t wait until I’m older and can try the spoon trick too.
Tonight the music is so loud I can feel the beat in my mattress, it lulls me into a deep slumber. To this day, I can be at a Mega Death concert and fall asleep. Loud music and metal has a lullaby effect on me, which people always find strange.
When I wake the next morning the house is still and in my Rainbow Bright nightgown, I carefully descend the stairs. Scottie is on the couch and other bodies are scattered around the living room. I skillfully maneuver around each of them into the kitchen pretending they’re lava before I pour myself a bowl of cereal. On the way back, I weave through the bodies before I climb on the couch next to Scottie and sit behind his bent knees. I turn the TV on low and watch Saturday morning cartoons. This is how I have my breakfast.Most weekend mornings are like this. We make ourselves breakfast, lunch and dinner while mom sleeps through the weekend because she doesn’t feel good. My siblings and I are used to it and so weekends usually consist of Mayo sandwich’s, which is literally just mayo and bread, Cereal and on occasion Mac and Cheese if my older brother feels up to it, he’s nine.
We watch a lot of TV and try not to get into too much trouble. I’m the one that usually cause the most mischief because it’s hard for me to sit still and I get bored easily, especially if they wont let me watch Dirty Dancing and we’re forced to watch The Goonies or ET. I hate both of those movies and I just want to dance.
Every so often, someone will shift and grumble before getting up. They’ll croak a hello; pat me on the head and quietly slip out the door. This continues for a few hours until its only Scottie and me in the living room. I desperately want him to wake up, because he’ll watch Woody Woodpecker with me, and I’ll laugh just like the bird to get Scottie to smile.
And then I realize that there is no movement coming from Scottie and I’m horrified. I scream and then run upstairs screaming, “MOM! MOM! SCOTTIE’S DEAD!”
When I get to her room, she’s jolted awake, her eyes are wild and she seems confused. I take a deep breath and say it again as tears start to form in my eyes.
“Scottie is dead. He’s not moving at all! I don’t think he can breathe either!” I rush to her and shake her. “C’mon lets go!”
I sprint to the door and flee to the bottom of the stairs with my mom following at my heels. I run to the bowl near the TV as she begins to violently shake Scottie on the couch begging him to wake up. Her words are frantic.
“Scottie! Wake Up! WAKE UP!” She gives him a hard shake and he gives a cough.
“What? I’m awake. What is the matter?” He croaks.
I turn with the bowl in my hands and look at them, she’s hugging him, crying and he looks bewildered as he strokes her hair and tries to calm her. I stare at them mad that they aren’t focused at the crisis at hand.
“Mom, Scotties dead! Look! He’s just floating at the top! What are we going to do?” I sob as her eyes finally turn back to me.
“Jesus Christ,” she shouts, “Don’t ever scare me like that again.” She seems relieved as I clutch the bowl with my now dead fish in it and begin to cry violently, causing the water to slosh from the bowl.
“But he’s dead” I manage to whimper.
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