pro-life

"I dinn think I could get pregnant, all these years...then this little shit comes along!" Whap! she smacked my biological brother on the arm.

They sat at a dining table with a smoked glass top, metal tubing for legs and puffy chairs with wheels. It was from the discount furniture warehouse on State Highway 313; Chuck's Big Bargain Warehouse. Above the table hung a lamp that had a chain entwined with the cord. The chain/cord hung from the wickeresque lampshade in a sweeping fashion toward the corner, down the wall and over to the middle of the adjacent wall where it was plugged in. If you sat in the chair in front of the outlet, you had to be careful not to smack into the wall or get the wheels of the chair tangled up in the chain/cord.

The girl was trailer-hard. She wore a lace trimmed tank top emblazoned with "Ted Nugent" in November in the Midwest. Her jeans were worn Levi's. Her shoes were moccasin style boots that laced up to her knee. Her hands were large and muscled with thick fingers and nails stained yellow from nicotine. She had thick dark hair with "feathered" bangs and the most split ends I had ever seen. The bottom of her hair glowed in the light with millions of frayed filaments. You could tell she used no styling implements on her hair. She combed it into place wet and let it dry. She was quick to smile a big genuine smile that exposed her yellowed, crooked teeth and the one fang that was sideways, lodged between her other teeth. Her nose had been broken more than once, her lip split and her eyes had dark circles beneath them. Despite all of these things, she was attractive. She looked like a beaten up, worn out version of Tawny Kitaen after a lifetime of hard luck.

I was always a little alarmed by the affection my mother showed these girls. My mother hadn't hugged me since I was four. I don't remember her ever kissing me. But she grabbed up these white trash gap toothed chicks like they were her long lost children and kissed them and hugged them tightly and sincerely. This one was number four. The fourth mother of yet another of my brother's children. He had five little girls. One in Arkansas, one in Kentucky, one in Illinois and twins in Indiana. Now this one on the way; another little blonde blue eyed girl who wouldn't know her father and would be better off for it. Another little girl on welfare and food subsidies provided by the state who would never see a penny of financial support from her criminal father. In the coming months her father would beat her mother on a regular basis while she floated in the woman's womb. He would toss her naked mother out the door of the trailer into a twenty degree night to tumble down the makeshift wooden stairs, clutching her swollen belly. Her mother would consume a six pack or more of Budweiser and a pack of cigarettes on a daily basis while she formed.

My mother accompanied this one into the delivery room. When the placenta was delivered my mother swears it smelled like beer and the Vietnamese doctor exclaimed, "Ah! anothel Rittre beel baby!" She bore the physical signs of fetal alcohol syndrome; skin folds at the corners of her wide set eyes, a short nose with a low nasal bridge and a small midface.

Within two months of her birth, her father would kick her and her mother out of the ramshackle trailer to make room for the mother of his seventh and eighth daughters. This woman was employed at the Naughty But Nice Adult Bookstore. She was a booth girl. She sat behind a curtain in a small room seperated from a booth by a pane of glass. A man would enter the booth and insert money into a slot. The curtain would open and depending upon the amount of money, the booth girl would perform different sex acts up to and including penetrating herself with a sex toy.

I saw Number 6 for the first time when she was four months old. I was the youngest of my family and a teenager when I laid eyes upon her. I had never felt a pang of motherhood or obligation toward another person in my life. When her eyes locked with mine, the love I felt for her nearly knocked me over. I thought my heart had literally stopped. She was the most beautiful precious thing I had ever seen and I would stand in the wake of a hurricane, the path of a speeding locamotive, a charging tiger, anything to protect her. I knew I had to a good example for her, because she had no one else in the family who could show her a different way of life.

She is 16. She has a criminal record, is addicted to drugs and had a baby last year. She didn't finish high school and probably never will. Her baby is a boy. He will survive on welfare and state provided food subsidies. It is unlikely he will know his father and will probably be better off for it. His chances of finishing high school are low. His chances of going to jail are high.

Pro-Life.

assimilate

"I just told you that an hour ago!" Candy's mood turned from overly sweet and kind to irritable and rude on a dime. I was trying to learn an antiquated Frankenstein's monster of a software program out of sequence, out of context and from a menopausal drunken barfly.
"I'm sorry, Candy, but I am not going to retain all of this information in a week. I really need to learn the process in sequential order. I also need to be given the time to take some notes, so I have something to reference." Candy was sitting in a chair next to the desk, holding her head in her hands. To her credit, she had been trying to train somebody with no experience, without the benfit of a manual or reference materials as well as do the job for three locations. None of the previous hires had worked out. Rumor was she had been training people for almost a year non-stop. I almost felt sorry for her.

"You the new girl for Ted Lane's department?" an old man eating a bear claw in the break room stared at me through big plastic safety glasses.
"Yes, I'm Katherine." I extended my hand.
He switched the bear claw from his right to his left and shook my hand.
"I'm Bob. I work in Production. I sure hope you can stick it out. They've had a bunch of 'em try it out. None of 'em stay."
"Oh..." I didn't know how to respond. I made a face at him.
He laughed. "Did I scare ya? It's not that bad. Just that damn Candy's crazy. Nobody can stand her long enough to learn the job. I don't envy you." He called the last sentence over his shoulder as he headed out to the Production area.
Over the next week, versions of this scenario would play out no less than eight times.

"There's just no time for that! When I started here, I had nothing! You just have to remember what I tell you!" She was getting kind of shrieky.

"Candy, everybody learns differently. It will take twice as long for me to learn this if I don't learn it in some kind of logical fashion. I need to start at the beginning and proceed through the steps sequentially. That is the only way I will assimilate this information." I want to punch her in her pink shiny alcoholic face.

"Fine! JUST STOP SPEAKING TO ME!" There she went. She lost it. She raised her voice so loud that all work and conversations in the adjoining cubicles stopped.

I turned to the phone on the desk, picked up the receiver and dialed.
"What are you doing?" she asked me. She looked over my shoulder to see the extension on the screen on the phone's base. It read, DIALING LANE, T.
"WAIT JUST A MINUTE HERE! YOU DON'T HAVE TO CALL TED! WE CAN WORK THIS OUT!I am just very irritable. They think I may be becoming diabetic. It causes mood swings..."

"Hello, Ted Lane."

"Hi, Mr. Lane. This is Katherine."

"Hey, Katherine. How are you?"

"Good, Mr. Lane. I was wondering...I think maybe I need a break from training, and Candy needs a break from me. Would there be anything else I could do for the remainder of the day?"

"Yeah, I think so...why don't you come to my office? We can find something for you to do."

Like you, I thought in my nasty naughty bad girl mind.

"Thank you, Mr. Lane." I picked my bag up and walked out of the cubicle. Candy was still yammering about not needing to involve Ted, blah blah blah.

'bud

Today is Rosebud's birthday. The world is better with her in it. I don't say that about many people. I thank her mother and father for bringing her into being. She is good and decent and true. I have known her now for 11 years, and she's helped me through some of the worst times in my life. So much so, that when something bad happens to me, I often want to speak to the 'bud more than anybody else. Everybody who reads this today, please put out a positive mental birthday vibe into the universe for Rosebud.

Happy Birthday, Dear Friend.

statements

Sometimes I think I am constitutionally unable to function within this world's systems.

Then, I think, "Hmmm, maybe I am trying to change the world to conform to me. That is insanity."

Einstein said insanity is doing the the same thing over and over again while hoping for a different result.

Psychologists say addiction is doing something despite negative consequences.

The Dalai Lama says discipline is not hurting yourself.

What do you say?

consolation

Monday. Nine o'clock a.m. Eastern time. I meet with the very unprofessional closet case Human Resources Director. He is snarky, sarcastic and condescending. I usually like those attributes in a person. Just not in a person who is making me feel uncomfortable about my resume. "Your resume....is....different."
I look past him to a portrait on the credenza. He, an average looking woman with dust colored hair and three kids, all wearing white t-shirts and jeans, seated on the floor of an Olan Mills Studio in some kind of very contrived attempt at randomness. "That portrait...faced out for my benefit...is...not foolin' anybody in this room, you hairy-backed Mary!" I wanted to say it, but I did not. I needed a job. I needed to work with hottish mannish Ted Lane. Finally, Liberace gave up on the charade of an interview. An offer of employment had already been extended to me from Ted. He could have rescinded the offer, but there could have been a liability issue. He took me down the corridor to meet with the woman who would be training me. As we approached the cubicles, maniacal female laughter broke out. It was shrill and piercing and irritating and over the top.
"The musical trill of laughter that you hear is Candy. And yes, she is always like this." He stopped at the last cubicle. She was a faded red head with the pink shiny skin of an alcoholic. Her haircut was home made and she wore a dress that one could find at Goodwill; a blue/gray sack of a thing with a windowpane stitching pattern and a matching short sleeved jacket. She was wearing 'suntan' hosiery. The kind you buy at the grocery that comes in an egg. Her shoes were shiny Payless pumps circa 1984. They were sky blue, oval toed and decidedly plastic. On her squinchy eyelids was orange (think Crayola orange) glitter shadow. It had run into the crevices of her crow's feet as if she had been performing under hot stage lights. She was, in the words of my favorite black transexual make-up artist from Saks Fifth Avenue, Xaviana, a hot mess.
"HIIIIIIII!" She screeched at me with the most forced manic smile on her face. I thought of the pictures I have seen of children whose parents have documented thier every move from conception. When told to smile, they robotically break into the biggest smile possible, eyes clenched shut, lips stretched to breaking. I also thought of those waitresses and retail workers who have a super forced cheery demeanor that masks an seething raging murderous contempt for humanity. I am always afraid they are one customer service issue away from flipping the hell out and gouging your eyes out with a fork or a hanger, respectively.
Her cubicle was jam packed. Every surface of her desk was covered with ...stuff. She had crammed four filing cabinets, a shelving unit and a small table as well as her desk into the tiny space. Everywhere you moved, you touched something.
Her computer had an image of kitten hanging onto a rope with the saying, "Hang In There!" for a screen saver. On top of her monitor was a little angel figurine with "I Believe in Angels" painted on the base.
This was it. I had secured a job. In Hell.

desperation

Ronald Reagan's voice was speaking to me. "Katherine, this is Ted Lane. I received your resume and would like to speak to you about the position. I will be in the office until 5 pm eastern. You can reach me at ###-###-####, extension 179. I look forward to talking with you."
Ted Lane's brother is the owner of the Palookaville Butcher Shop. The Lane family is from a tiny little town nearby. Coincidentally, my mother's younger siblings grew up with the Lane Boys (all five of them; Theodore, Edward, Fredrick, Jedidiah and Zedekiah. You got it; Ted, Ed, Fred, Jed and Zed.). My cousin Bill happens to be best friends with the brother/butcher, Ed, and mentioned to him that I was looking for a gig. Ed knows me because I got his daughter a summer job at the coolest clothing store in town, and because I always bug him to carry organically fed free range meats.
The Lane boys I have seen are a somewhat goofy looking lot. Gangly tall, large featured and oddly mannered. I was surprised at Ted's polished delivery on the phone. Trips to the butcher shop usually entailed some very badly disguised oggling from Ed and blatant oggling from Zed, who works with Ed and seems to have sustained a head injury or was born with some kind of developmental disorder. Upon entry, Zed greets most female customers with, "Hello. You are very beautiful."
Should you happen to go to the butcher shop and ask if Ed is in, Zed will say, "NO! BUT I'M HERE!"
I arranged to meet with Mr. Lane, who I assumed was the oldest and most accomplished of the lot given his professional and articulate demeanor and Gipper-whispery voice on the phone. I drove forty minutes to North End, where his business was located. It looked impressive, with several large trucks arriving and departing. I approached the receptionist and told her my name and that I was here to speak to Mr. Lane. She rang him and asked if I would like to sit as Mr. Lane would be just a moment. I looked at the bas-relief wall coverings depicting historical images of the indigenous peoples of North End. A tall older gentleman with white hair appeared in the lobby. I smiled and started to approach, but he frowned ever so slightly at me and looked perplexed, so I stopped. Obviously not Mr. Lane. The indigenous peoples of North End continued fishing in the St. Joseph river. The lovely receptionist acted like she didn't notice my faux-pas. Gracious. Just like a receptionist should be.
I turned to see a tall man approaching. He was 6'4" with dark hair graying slightly at the temples. He had large brown eyes and a prominent, but not beakish nose. He was well-proportioned and still had the remnants of his former college basketball player physique. He was oddly familiar. He had a passing similarity to Ed. If you stood them next to each other, you might think they could be brothers. Oh shit. Oh no. My potential new boss was hot.
"Katherine? Ted Lane." he extended his hand and smiled. white teeth. The Ronald Reagan voice now sounded more like Jack Nicholson. Younger Jack Nicholson. I placed my hand in his.
"Yes. Nice to meet you, Mr. Lane."
"Thanks for coming in on such short notice." He turned to the receptionist, "Martine, please hold my calls."
Martine smirked at me. "Don't let him lead you astray" she said.
Mr. Lane laughed over his shoulder.
"I'll call you if I need any assistance." I replied.

stay tuned

I have recently become employed. I will post again soon. I promise. I love you people.

wayward bats

"Something's in here." I said.
"I think you're right. I think it's a bat."
"Oh, my God! You have to get it out of here."
"Don't worry, I've done this before." he rolled off the side of bed onto his feet. "I need a broom, a trash bag and some rubber gloves."
"I'm not leaving this room."
"Tell me where they are again."
I explained the location of each item. My hero went about finding them in the dark. He emerged, all 6'4" of him, wearing boxers emblazoned with Chicago Cubs logos, my yellow dishwashing gloves, his red hair and freckles and brandishing a broom like a baseball bat.
"You stay in here." He closed the french doors behind him. I watched the bat fly crazily along my ceiling. My protector bent his knees slightly and swung the broom. Smack! Thud! The bat landed on my antique table. I screamed. My bat slayer picked him up and tossed him into the garbage bag.
"Do ya wanna see him?"
"No."
"Were you afraid he was going to attack you?"
"No. I was afraid he was gonna poo on my expensive stuff. Did he poo anywhere?"
"Naw, I don't see any bat poo."
"I am so glad you were here."

That was one of the best times of my life.