Letters to Myself

Dear Six-Year-Old Me, 

I know that people think it's adorable when you answer the phone singing "Somewhere Out There," but it's not going to jumpstart your singing career. I know you'd like to think you're a "prodigy" (thank you, Oprah, for the term), but you'll learn pretty soon that you're pretty much average. But you keep doing your thing and having fun! Dream your dreams and soak in that imagination!
I'm glad you love Godzilla. In fact, you love him so much, he's your imaginary friend (though you'll rename him "Gadzilla" so as not to be "blasphemous" by your definitions). Sadly, the other children on the playground aren't as in awe of him as you are (meaning you can't threaten to have him eat them--they won't believe you). Don't say I didn't warn you. They also, tragically, will not appreciate your ten minute bathroom renditions of "Part of Your World." Sweetpea, just because the stall door is closed doesn't mean it's soundproof.
Also, just a sidenote, the boys your age do not want kisses. They enjoy them even less when you decide to use it as a weapon. Just a thought.

Dear Ten-Year-Old Me, 

I'm not sure if you've picked up on this, but the other girls your age do not drop everything to chase lizards and frogs.  Of course, you won't pick up on this for like three more years, but whatevs.
You've become obsessed with Star Wars and that is awesome. Keep up those action figure games with your brother. You'll be joking about those seventeen years later. "Bail out! Bail out! BAIL IN!! BAIL IN!!!!!"
Also keep writing those stories but avoid the blatant Disney ripoffs.
Oh, and, um P.S. Contrary to popular belief, middle school is going to be awesome. Seriously, they'll be your favorite academic years before college. So don't be afraid of turning into a teenager--you don't turn into a jerk. You just get super nerdy and have fun with it. It's fantastic, seriously. You won't have that much fun being a geek for a long time afterwards. Embrace it and enjoy it, kiddo!
P.P.S.  Use the talking storm trooper to barricade your room. Catherine hates it, and the two of you will share lots of laughs over it later. "HEEEEELP!!! THERE'S A STROOM POOPER!" Yep. Just like that.

Dear Fifteen-Year-Old Me,

Boys are stupid.
High school hierarchies are even more stupid.
Really, really, REALLY stupid.
I'm sure you've started to figure out that high school is not like those ridiculous Olsen Twin films you binged on over the summer, but, allow me to reiterate: high school is not a fairy tale.
At least you've stopped stalking lizards in the church landscaping. That's a plus.
Eventually, you'll cut your hair, get your braces off (then partially on, off, partially on again), and you'll ALMOST learn to not dress like a homeschooler. You will, however, keep on singing, playing the piano, scribbling, doodling, and you will soon have your life changed FOREVER in more ways than one:
1. You start reading Lewis again, and HOLY CRAP SO GOOD
2. You read Lord of the Rings for the first time. HOLY CRAP SOOOOOOO GOOD. Obsession material, even.
3. You decide you absolutely MUST study in London and visit Oxford because um, Eagle and Child pub, and um THE INKLINGS. And accents. Yes, definitely accents.
4. You'll finish your book, spend a year editing it, and then leave it alone for eleven years debating on whether you'll actual rewrite it or not (the jury's still out on that one . . . )
5. You meet your future husband.
No, it's not who you think it is.
Be ye warned: if male classmates ask for help with English homework, they're not doing so because they sincerely want a conversation for like the first time ever. They just want you to explain the symbolism in the poetry assignment they didn't read. You are being used. Smile coyly and ignore them.
But you won't.
You'll be too excited to be noticed to care.
And I suppose that's okay.
Oh! And you get to be a big sister again! Next year, you'll meet the first of your two new sisters. It's amazing! And, just a plus, they're pretty stinkin adorable. If you can, find an age-defying solution now. They just keep growing up . . .

Dear Eighteen-Year-Old Me, 

Well, now, we've had some adventures, haven't we?
You found the alcohol stashed in your roommate's dirty clothes pile (that's the last time you surprise her by doing her laundry, isn't it?), read Harry Potter, got your ear cartilage pierced (Dad argues he never gave you permission to do that but you know he TOTALLY DID), skipped classes, spent weekends on the beach in Pensacola without adult supervision, and have found yourself one of the few sober almost-adults on campus.  You've also discovered that there is way more of a culture gap between Florida and Mississippi than you ever expected.
Sure, your new experiences are mild and, all-in-all, fairly harmless. I mean, you don't do drugs, smoke, drink, or even date, but the fact that you're even in the presence of alcoholic beverages is such a scandal for you.
Keep up your gig, though. Your standards are weird, but, as much as you get teased for them, your friends adore and respect you. You'll be pals for ages. Plus you're getting a bunch of awesome stories you'll remember even if you wish you didn't. 
Also, take that link to your Xanga blog off Myspace. 

You know, the one with all your angsty, pubescent rants?
Mom finds it.

Most awkward Thanksgiving break EVER.

Dear Twenty-Two-Year-Old Me, 

Welp, you did it.
You studied in London (life goal! CHECK!)
You got your Bachelor's a semester early (life goal! CHECK!!!)
And you married that man. ( CHECK CHECK AND CHEEEEEEECK!!!)
HUZZAH!!! WHOO-HOO!!! HECK YES!! and all other cheering sentiments.
Don't worry--you guys will figure out how to work out the stuff that seems impossible. You'll go to counseling for it, but you'll make it. In fact, you learn stuff, get better at that communication thing. It's all good. It gets better.
Keep track of all those crazy library incidents--they make great stories. Like the woman who cast out the demons who stole her DVD, the fellow who wouldn't read the Bible because he'd seen the movie, the cockroach in the DVD case, the gentleman who told you that you should model for Black Man magazine, the flasher, and many more. Also, remember those ridiculous romance novel titles: From Here to Paternity and The Playboy Sheikh's Virgin Stable Girl especially (I mean, REALLY?!?)
Also, stop buying pregnancy tests.  Just because your period is two days late does not mean your birth control failed. Stop peeing on that stick! No, not another one! STOP IT!!!! You're ridiculous.
But don't worry about it right now.
Also, when Chris recommends hiking Lake Jessup instead of Blue Springs (because, um, MANATEES), tell him you will hike Blue Springs and ONLY Blue Springs.
Five miles is only a small number on a computer screen. Also, fourteen-foot alligators. Like lots of them. AVOID LAKE JESSUP.

Dear Twenty-Seven-Year-Old Me, 

Well, we've made it this far. Now what?
It's been the most challenging and rewarding year so far.
Sixteen-year-old Sarah, I hear you whining and I will kindly remind you that your hormonal teenage crap ain't got NUTHIN' on my twenty-six-year-old crap so SHUSH.
Maybe it doesn't get easier.  Maybe Chris's job never quite fits, maybe his ears just keep getting worse, maybe you never get this whole maybe-one-day pregnancy thing figured out. Maybe those relationships you're struggling with are never resolved, maybe you never get to say everything you've ever wanted to say.  Maybe there's never a house, never deep roots, never the standard American Dream nuclear family thingamabob. 
But you know what? That's okay. Who ever said you're defined by those things anyways? That they make you valid and valuable? They don't. 
Because life is an adventure, and any adventure worth its salt has tears and dark tunnels and the kind of uncertainty that makes you sick to your stomach.
But it also has sunshine, and a Hero who comes to your rescue, because, really, as hard as you try, you just can't save yourself.  Your swords are twigs and your battle cry is a whimper.  But you've got that Hero at your side, and He's holding you up, making you of sterner stuff that no dragon can withstand.
So drink in the sunshine.  Breathe in the beauty around you. Treasure the good relationships blessing you. Take the sweet, laughing moments with that hubs of yours and hide them in your heart. Pocket all these shining things, take them out when the road is dark, and marvel at them. Aren't they lovely? Isn't it worth it all just to hold these things a little closer? Oh, so very, very lovely.
The road is long and hard, but you've been given such gifts. There are always good things in the bad.  There's always light in the darkness, even if it's peeping through the cracks. 

Because God is good, so good, and He is so much bigger than all of life's question marks.

Part III: Eighteen Over Par (or something)

Part One and Part Two brings us here, Part three, in which we make speeches, struggle through mini golf, and discuss the deeper meanings of life. Or something.

Anyways . . .

It's my high school graduation, thank the good Lord, hallelujah, thank you Jesus, huzzah, woot woot, heck yeah, pwned, and all those other exclamations of sheer glee.
Because we had made it. Finally.  It's a joyous occasion, people. JOYOUS.

And there's a part of me that wonders how I tell this bit.  How do you make a story out of a high school graduation, even one like mine where they did EVERYTHING they could to make it interesting. I mean, really--we had slideshows, speeches, prayers, musical performances, and handing out each diploma took about ten minutes because it featured a message from each parent to the student and a "right back attcha" message from the gleeful graduate. It's the kind of thing where parents cry and the freshly-freed teens roll their eyes. We had bright blue robes, yellow tassels, and all antsy to get off that stage and out of those shoes. Heels. God, why? WHHHYYYY HIGH HEELS?!

Oh, and I got to talk. I did. I was aiming for Valedictorian (in a class of fifteen--no that's not a typo, FIFTEEN--people, three of which were named "Sarah," it shouldn't be too hard, right?), I missed out by one thousandth (as in 0.001) of a point.  So, here I am, second place, trying to give a first place style speech.


I don't remember the speech exactly. I remember my opening though . . . or part of it . . . I stood up there, sweating under my robe, hating that hat because it wanted to slide off my head, hating my heels because my toes hurt, but THIS was my moment. I made gazed out into the audience, smiled through my terror and glee, and said, "There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done,' and those to whom God says, in the end, 'Thy will be done.' C.S. Lewis. [slight dramatic pause for emphasis and GO] When we were kids, all of us knew what we wanted to be when we grew up. Some of us wanted to be firemen, mommies, astronauts. Me? I wanted to be a mermaid, but that hasn't worked out yet."
Cue audience laughter (good, I was hoping for that).
From there, it's all a blur.
I remember one of my notecards got mixed up, but I didn't stumbled. I had practiced in the mirror too much. Anticipating this moment, this hope that I could be my best just this last time.

My friends Tarisha, Allie, and Julie, Chris's sister.
My mom still hasn't forgiven me for ripping that robe off before she could get a picture.

 I break a public speaking rule: I make eye contact, a human connection, with the audience that should terrify me. I need to see their faces, that focused glint in their eyes that tells me they're listening. The confirmation that I am interesting. In the third row, I found the person I had been looking for, sitting next to his grandmother, clutching a tissue and trying to keep back proud tears.  There he was, bright-eyed, staring back, his lips faintly curled.

Chris had spent the last year in Idaho, following his best friend on scholastic adventures in the great Northwest. This was the first time I had seen him since he left.
He had a girl beside him, a pretty little thing in a blonde ponytail. So it had happened. He had found himself a sweetheart at university. Well, let's show him what he's missing, right? Maybe? Was I worth missing? But I stealed myself and I spoke. Then I sang, because I had one of those special music slots.
Don't laugh. I didn't realize how geeky it was then.

Chris has no memory whatsoever of the blonde girl. He doesn't remember what I said in my speech, but he says he liked it better than the valedictorian's . . She did a lovely job, but the mic went out, which would throw ANYONE off . . . and she loved the high school so it was one of those "I love you guys" kind of things popular kids do . . . He thought my voice was wasted on a cheesy song, that it had potential, but the whole thing was . . . cheesy. Chris abhors cheesy.
"But you did a good job," he told me, later. "Were you looking at me? I thought you were looking at me."
"Oh, my gosh! I totally was! I didn't think you cared!"
"Sure, I cared. I really liked you."

Chris with his sisters, Julie and Mel, that night.

The ceremony ends, we throw our hats, we shake hands gives hugs.
At some point, Julie catches up with me, "You're coming, right? Putt-putting?"
"Yeah, yeah, let me change . . .again . . . "
"Chris is driving us."
Pause.
"What?"
"Will your parents care? That Chris is taking us?"
"They'd better not."
And they didn't. Well, Dad did because all boys within spitting distance of his daughter were pure evil. Mom was far more lenient. So off I went, out of my pretty graduation outfit and into shorts for mini golf in the hot, humid, smothering Florida night. There were seven of us: the three graduates, three younger friends, and Chris, trapped in a astro van filled with over-hyper teenage girls. We fought over the front seat. For one round, I won.
And I spoke to him. And he talked back. We talked Star Wars. We were trying to find a midnight showing of Episode II, before we knew what a gosh-awful trainwreck of a movie it was ("Hold me like you did by the lake on Naboo" and several nerds vomit simultaneously). Luckily, there weren't any showings we could make, so we stuck to putt-putt and Steak 'n' Shake.

Me, Mel, Kelli, and Lydia, trying on sexy faces . . . we all needed lots of practice  . . .

And then we never stopped talking, me hanging slightly back to talk to this dark, handsome fellow who, shockingly, wasn't telling me to shut up.
"So . . . how's Idaho?"
"Really good."
"Cool."
"Yeah . . . um . . . You know . . . I um . . . I took a C.S. Lewis class while I was there."
"REALLY?!?! Oh my gosh, I would love to take a class like that!"

Chris had struck gold, bringing up the man he KNEW was my hero. Years later, he'd tell me that's what he liked about me: I loved Lewis and Tolkien like he did, like his friends did. He hadn't met a girl who loved those things like I did--obsessively, passionately.  And so we talked Lewis.
For the rest of the night.
Until, sitting in Steak 'n' Shake, while we were engrossed in philosophical discussion, everyone else finished eating, and, suddenly, I heard Julie burst out, 'Well we would leave if CHRIS AND SARAH WOULD STOP TALKING!! GOSH!!!" And they were waiting by the door, staring at us. 
I think they might have been suspicious, maybe, but the next day, Kelli imitated Chris saving her golf ball from the asparagus-colored water and proclaimed her love, so I stayed quiet.
For another year. I said nothing to ANYONE about how my heart pounded when Chris came into the room.

Teenage Kelli and Mel are judging me

At Julie's house, while the other girls got ready for bed, Chris and I kept talking.  He wanted us to watch a movie with him (Fifth Element--aaaawwweeesooooome), but, before that, his paternal grandmother had gifts for him and Julie. For Julie, it was a tiny clock shaped like a painted Russian egg.  For Chris, a tiny clock set into a silver set of die. On the inside, there was a tiny picture of his grandmother and grandfather as a young couple. "Oh, wow, Grandma, thank you so much," he said, turning it over in his hand while I watched, standing beside him. "Wow! That's you and Grandpa, huh?"
"Yes, and maybe one day, you can put a picture of you and a young lady there instead," and she smiled, and, I swear, she looked at me.
I remember blushing then disappearing because I felt like I had intruded on something very special.
Maybe she knew. Maybe I imagined it. I don't know.  Within ten minutes, I had pushed it out of my mind, focused on the movie.

"Do you remember that I sat on the floor while you and Julie sat on the bed?"
"Yeah, I do. I thought that was so weird."
"I had always been told that boys and beds were a bad mix. Never ever get anywhere near a boy on a bed."
"Good grief, Sarah."

But we kept talking.

Two days later, I begged my mom to go shopping with Julie, her mom, and her grandmother took her shopping for her graduation and her birthday. Oh, and Chris was going, for some reason. When I found out it was his birthday, I dug through my stationary set, found a birthday card featuring a black and white photo of an orangutang, scribbled a note, and gave it to him with my stomach in knots. I felt like such an idiot, but Chris smiled like I had really done something wonderful. I had also brought a book to lend him, and he gave me one of his--Lewis's The Discarded Image--to read. It seemed like a small action, but, as book people, this was HUGE.
That afternoon, while Julie tried on dress after dress in Anthropology, unsatisfied, Chris and I were making fun of displays, giggling, before we disappeared into a book shop.  That was the first time I discovered that Chris hated any kind of movie spoilers.  I found a newly updated Star Wars encyclopedia, and Chris refused to look at it.
Maybe if he had, he would have avoided viewing the insult that is Lucas's Episode II.
"I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere. Not like here. Here everything is soft and smooth."
And hundreds of nerds withered away and died in howling agony.


When they dropped me off, I said my goodbyes. I forced myself to say Chris's name, and, to my shock, he looked me in the eyes, and said goodbye right back, smiled even. He had only done that once before, when he was home for Christmas and had tagged along when his mom dropped Julie and I off at a movie. Looked right at me, smiled--really smiled.  Little did I know that Lisa had teasingly asked him if he were interested. He objected with the fierceness only the justly accused possessed, but Lisa let it go.

All these little details, they don't matter to most people. But my brain remembers details. It remembers these tiny things that made my heart skip and my palms sweat and my mind go into a fumbling blank.  I remember, because, back then, they were shreds of hope.
Hope that he saw me like I saw him.
Hope that, one day, just maybe . . .

But I was young and naive and little bit stupid. I knew I was goofy, with limbs too long, no sense of style, and a social awkwardness no one could make out and I couldn't destroy, no matter how hard I tried.

But Chris thought I was sweet.
He thought I was different, interesting, with long red hair that, when wet, made me look like a mermaid. He didn't think about dating me, really--that was preposterous, but he said I didn't leave him alone. He'd see a pretty girl, and, suddenly, my face was there.

I'd see a handsome young man, and I'd think of Chris. How did he compare to my dark-haired musician, my king of the nerds who loved his mother and sisters? Who let me borrow his sunglasses and lent me a book by our favorite author. Why was he still there, in my mind, when I knew this could never happen? Why?

So he flew back to Idaho and, after two months and a ten-day trip to Tokyo with a home-stay recruitment program, I drove off to Mississippi.
That's where it should have ended.

But it didn't.

Part 2: And the Moon Danced

Read Part 1

It's my sophomore year of high school, 2003, and summer is approaching.
I think it's spring but it feels like summer. It's hard to tell in Florida. 

I'm in Julie's room, changing into my pajamas after swimming, when Julie bursts in. "Julie! Gosh! I'm not dressed!"
I'm too modest for my own good. No, really, I won't even change in front of my own sex. It's pathetic. Thank God I get over that after a week in college.
"Get over it! Put clothes on, quick! If we're fast, Chris will take us to go watch a lunar eclipse!"
"THERE'S A LUNAR ECLIPSE?!"
"Yeah! So hurry up!"

I scramble into my clothes, try to comb my hair, and follow Julie out into the living room where Chris and Joe are waiting.  "See! I told you we could be ready!" Julie says. "So, we're going now, right? Right?"
Chris smirks. "Sure, fine."
"Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!!!"
Julie squeals when she's excited, like a child at Christmas. She's almost sixteen, but she's so petite she looks twelve, maybe younger.
Then there's me--everything feels too long, the wrong shape. But my braces are off, finally. At least  I have that going for me, if nothing else.

At the surprise party for my sixteenth birthday.
You know, I really loved that hat.
And, funny story, see the fellow in the top row on the left? That's my future brother-in-law.
More on that later.

 Boys don't speak to me so I assume they don't see me.
Apparently, I'm a bit wrong.

Because, you see, Chris has seen me. Something about my eyes caught his attention that first night, when he woke up from a nap on the living room couch and saw this stranger with his sister (he tells me years later). Suddenly, whenever I'm around he grows bewilderingly nervous and shy. He hides it well--cool, collected, uninvolved--and he makes a habit of staying out of sight. The day I meet Joe, he hopes that Joe doesn't see me, too. Joe gets all the girls, you see, with his charm.  Usually, Chris doesn't mind, but, he thinks this time he might.
I've been told I should like Joe, and, in all honesty I do.  Julie has convinced me that he's everything I had hoped for in a guy. She's talked him up something lovely, even though she said he looks like Orlando Bloom and that was an outright lie.
But there's something about Chris that makes my heart pound and my palms sweat. Something I can't push out of my mind. He's all wrong for me, with his gaming and his quiet.  I need noise, don't I?
Maybe. Maybe not.

So . . . one day, Chris's female friends were super bored and decided to clean him up, take off the glasses, style his normally scruffy head of hair, and make him model.  For him, it was torture of the highest level. That smirk? That's his "I'm going to kill you all when this is over" face.
He would kill me dead several times if he knew that I had posted this picture.
But I love it, so I'll take that risk.
Do you see why I couldn't resist, people?

"Well, if you're ready hurry up. We're meeting Ande and Alyssa. I don't want to miss it," Chris says, and we follow him outside to his Ford Bronco. It's an army green clunker, but I haven't seen a car that cool before, not ever.  Climbing inside that bucket of bolts was like entering hollowed ground.  Sheltered as I was, I had never been in a boy's car before. What a little thrill it gave me. 
I still hold a soft spot in my heart for Broncos, just because of that night.

The moment the doors close, Chris hits the gas, and, man, can that truck move. Joe fumbles with the dials on the dash, and music roars out of the stereo.  He and Chris are yelling and headbanging, fists held aloft, like men charging into battle.
It's not the music you'd expect twenty-year-old boys to mosh to. It's not death metal, punk, or rock 'n; roll.
It's an Irish Penny Whistle.
Screaming its cheery little tune. And the boys are screaming with it.

I want you to picture it, picture that moment. Here we come around a corner, far too quickly, Julie and I tumbling into each other, Chris and Joe's collection of empty Yoohoo bottles rolling and clinking under our feet. Joe is chugging from a bottle of Canada Dry pop, and the music is so loud it's pounding in our chests.  Celtic music.
Music you do a pleasant, skipping jig to on a happy day.
They've turned it into a testosterone-charged battle cry.

I'm scrambling for my seatbelt, laughing, because I have never seen anyone act so wildly  but be so cool at the same time. 
In that moment, Chris and Joe are the coolest boys I've ever seen. No one could compare to the road warriors of the penny whistle.

They didn't speak to us, but we fussed at them for the driving. I can't remember what I said, but I was so nervous and excited that I'm sure it was idiotic.
Probably entirely true, but sounded idiotic.

Chris and Joe being Chris and Joe
He still has that orange vest and the afro stashed in our closet.
Because you never EVER know when you'll need to pretend you just escaped the 70s

We finally pull up into an empty field in the middle of the woods, but you can hear the highway on the other side of the trees.
I know, it sounds really bad. If this were a horror film, this is the moment when some serial killer pops out and destroys us all.

Luckily, it's not a horror film. It's my life, which, apparently, is less exciting and considerably less bloody.

Instead of leading us to our doom or slaughtering us, Chris hops onto the roof of the Bronco and begins drumming.  Joe accompanies him, beating on the hood of the truck. It's like a weird moment from that musical with the trash-cans, Stomp. Different tones, perfect rhythm. Oddly musical.

I applaud. I can't help myself.
I say something stupid about liking all music except Michael Jackson, and Joe refutes me saying that, if I like all music, then I would like the King of Pop, because disliking him would make my previous statement false. He's logical and philosophical and all that jazz.
I'm mortified so I shut up for the rest of the night. Actually, I'm still embarrassed about it. My former humiliations cling to me for years. It's been ten years, and I'm still, "Gah, why was I so awkward!?!"

And, before you stone me, let me be clear: at sixteen, I had only ever heard one song by Michael Jackson: the music video for the "Free Willy" movie. I was so encased in an anti-media bubble that I didn't fully understand who he was, only that he looked like a bug-eyed corpse in a wig. That scared me.
As an adult, I fully recognize his musical genius.
But he still looked like a scary bug-eyed corpse in a wig.


We wander to a clearing--their old backyard, I'm told, and, one day it is my backyard--and I stub my toe on a pine cone. I can still smell the damp, swampy air, hear the mosquitoes buzzing in my ear and the frogs chorus. I don't mind though.  I stand close to Chris, just to try it, feel him almost smiling, staring into the night.
And a woman jumps on his back, hooting like a banshee.

Moment ruined.

Ah, he has a girlfriend. Or an almost girlfriend, I think, and inch away, hovering closer to Julie. We are outside observers, after all, tag-alongs on an event not intended for our company. I best remember my place.

Chris catches the excited female--Ande--and tries not to grimace. Alyssa appears quietly at her side, and the four young adults begin to chatter,  the two high schoolers forgotten. These four have been friends for years, a friendship that continues to this day. Good people.

Ande just happened to have jumped on Chris when we were both unconsciously trying to make a move on the other.
Kind of.
Almost.
LOOK--if you're shy, breathing the same air as your crush is "making a move."
And I was doing all kinds of moving that night.

Adam, Chris, and Joe, then Alyssa and a girl who is not Ande . . . I'm not sure who that is . . . aren't I dreadful???

We wait and watch for the eclipse, but it's an overcast night. Tonight, the moon appears, disappears, appears once more, and disappears again. I don't know how long we waited, sweating through our clothes, sucked dry by insects.  It may have been hours, it may have been twenty minutes.  But the eclipse never appears.

Or, maybe it did, and you couldn't tell because of all the stupid clouds. The moon winks at us again and again. It knows what's going on even if we don't.

I have no idea that Chris finds a "brightness" in me, something he can't keep out of his mind.
Chris has no idea that I can't push him out of mine either, that I'm beginning to wonder if Julie is rooting for the wrong crush. That I like his sweet, thoughtful quiet more than chattering charm. That, for once in my life, I find myself liking green eyes more than blue.

Chris and Joe drop us back off at Julie's house, where we scurry off giggling to bed.
The next morning, Chris's door is shut, as it usually is.  I stand there, wanting to knock and say thank you. Thank you for such a very fun night . . . but I can't make myself do it. The words catch in my throat, and I just can't.
So I do what seems the next best thing. I tear out a piece of notebook paper and begin to scribble a thank you.  I sign it, "Your sister's twerpy friend" and slide it under the door.

What I don't know is that he sees it.
That he reads it.
And then he keeps it.

He doesn't know that I never forget that night, that little kindness.
That, in our following English class, I write about it as one of the best nights of my life.

I write him several notes over the next year--thank yous for driving us, for lending us things, for treating us like people and not pests. Thank you for seeing me, I keep trying to say and can't. 
What I don't know is that he tucks them all away in a safe place.

And he saves them all.

"See the mountains kiss high heaven, And the waves clasp one another . . ."

Discovered this gem by Percy Bysshe Shelley, and I might just need to frame it and put it on my wall. It fills me with all kinds of happy.

Sorry for the brief hiatus after last week's post . . . I didn't mean to leave you guys hanging after all the gloom, because, honest to goodness, we're doing really well.  There are soft spots, now and again, but, for the most part, life is normal and joyous and everything is grand. I just wasn't sure how to follow that with a silly "Friday's Letters" and then, Saturday, I chained myself to my hand-mixer and proclaimed, "THERE SHALL BE COOKIES!!!!"
And, BEHOLD! there were cookies.
Thirteen dozen of them.
When I go big, I go REALLY big.

Ok, so they weren't ALL for the hubs and me.  Chris had requested chocolate chip cookies, and there was a church picnic Sunday night, so I decided, "What the crap? Let's make cookies." And so I did. Despite their massive success and subsequent exodus at the church beach picnic, there are still WAY too many cookies in my house. Somebody else please come over and eat them all before I do. Please and thank you.

Anyways, this post was supposed to be about the ocean, but, per the usual, I had to rave about sweets first.

I don't always realize how much I miss the sea until I see it.
Growing up in Florida, the beach is a pretty regular experience.  I didn't go as often as I would have liked, but I loved it.
When I was little, my favorites were building drip sand castles with my mom, hunting mole crabs, and pretending to be a mermaid.
As a teen, I loved boogie boarding and swimming out to the sandbars, delightfully ignorant about the swarms of sharks that probably accompanied us. I still choose to be delightfully ignorant. Sharks are awesome, and, really, nothing so much as touched my leg all the years I swam in the warm, murky Atlantic. I've never even seen one.
As I grew older, I grew to appreciate the lonely ocean walk, drinking in the sights and the smells, feeling the waves lap at my toes. I'd still wade, but I swam less, walked more. Some of my favorite memories with Chris are chatting as we walked hand-in-hand along the stretch of beach.  I think that's why he proposed on the beach at sunset after the space shuttle had soared through the sky, leaving a pillar of orange and red in its wake. That's why we took all three of our previous anniversaries at Sanibel Island, in the Gulf of Mexico, where the water is still and clear as blue frosted glass. Because I love the sea, and Chris loves that I love it.

I always remember how big the world is when I see the ocean, a creature all in its own right with moods and passions.  It's calm, soothing, and then roaring rage. There is an ENTIRE world hidden inside it, a world of which humans have barely scratch the surface. There are so many creatures, so many places, that fascinate and terrify us.  It speaks to me. Water has always spoken to me--in the ponds, rivers, and the seas. I have always loved water.
One day, I am determined to be a mermaid.

When we moved to the West Coast from the East Coast, I knew that the ocean would be very different. I had grown up on the shores of the Atlantic--they're smooth, sandy, and the waves predictable. It grows cold enough in our sparse winter months, but, during the long, hot summer, the water's perfect. Cool enough to be refreshing but not cold enough to freeze.  As a kid, we learned the danger of riptides and how to escape them.  We learned the value and the risks of sandbars, how to cure jellyfish stings, all that jazz. We learned how the Atlantic brings hurricanes and how to properly prepare, but, in the end, we flocked to it in droves to lay on the sand in our bikinis and drink in the sunlight. The Atlantic is easy.

The Pacific is an entirely different beast.  It is glorious in its fury.  I do not ever see myself wading in the Pacific--it's too cold, too rocky, too wild. Mostly it's just plain COLD.  When we go to the beach here, we go fully clothed with no expectation or illusions about wading. Sure, I'll take off my shoes and walk along the shore, but I tease the waves. Sometimes, I'm brave enough and it's almost warm enough. This weekend the picnic took place at a West Coast beach that, for the first time, reminded me of my old East Coast haunts, so I walked where my feet were constantly kissed by the dying stretches of the waves, damp and soaking. I think I was only able to do that for two reasons:

• One, I was DESPERATE for some oceanic connection.
• And, two, I didn't realize my feet had gone numb. 

The Pacific  holds the absolutely most stunning shades of blues and greens I've ever seen. There are mountains to one side and a seemingly endless expanse of blue on the other. I love the rocks that form tidepools filled with tiny creatures. I love the wildness of it. I love the contrasts--the sandy beach against rocky cliffs.  I am completely in awe and in love. I can't help it.

 When I see the ocean, there is an ache inside me. I don't know if you have a place that does that for you. For my husband, it's the mountains. For my sister-in-law, it's her favorite clothing stores. For me, it has always been the sea. I stand there, gaping at it, everything inside me all aflutter and bursting.  It was the same feeling on my wedding day, right before we marched down the aisle. Bursting. A joy that aches in its beauty. I can't get enough.

Sometimes, I just sit in silence and want to be perfectly alone.  Most times, however, I'm a bundle of energy. I quite literally frolic. I'm all gasps and squeals at the littlest things because I am in awe. The world is so big and I am so small, and the ocean is glorious.  I can't find anything ugly in the ocean. I'm sure I could, if I really looked, but, quite honestly, I find everything about it glorious, especially after a long hiatus.
"Chris, even the corpses that come out of the ocean are lovely!" I burst out during our last trip, gathering up the shells of deceased mollusks and sand dollars.
"There are so many things wrong with that statement, I don't even know where to start," he replied, and limited me to two sand dollars and two shells, because, otherwise, I very likely would have brought home buckets.
But that's what I'm like at the ocean: a child in a treasure chest.

 

New, Old, and Gray Days

 Outside, it's a gray, breezy kind of day.
It's July, but, for the first time in weeks, I had to pull Black Hoodie out of a pile of laundry to take the dog out for a walk.  The window's open, again, for the first time in a long time because it's finally not pushing 100 degrees outside. There's no air conditioning in the townhouse, and the only fan's downstairs, so the air stays thick and stiff unless the windows are opened. Chris got sick of it and bought a window unit air-conditioner so we can stand to be upstairs. 
But we don't need it today.
Today, when the sky began white and gray and melted into blue, when the wind hums little tune to itself, and the world is somehow, miraculously, mourning and joyful, and I remember how very much I love a good cup of tea.

It's a writing kind of day, and it's long, long overdue.

Adulthood grows into a bit of a lull.  It's not that it's not pleasant or challenging or exciting, in its own little grown-up ways, but it's different. What thrills me in life sounds perfectly mundane on paper (screen?). I get excited over David Attenborough documentaries and updated episodes of Doctor Who on Netflix (STILL WAITING FOR THOSE, UGH).  A clean kitchen just about sends me into giggles, and don't get me started on baking. Nothing makes my weekend like whipping up a batch of muffins.

Being unemployed lends its own bundle of dullness, I suppose, though I am not complaining. It's lonely, though.  I've had more conversations with my cats than I care to admit. It's not that we're not trying to make friends--we are.  There's just not . . . You know when you meet someone and there's that click? Like puzzle pieces locking? Where kindred spirits meet and you can't wait to see each other again? We haven't found that yet. We have met plenty of nice people, the kind you meet with once for lunch, and then don't see again because they are busy and lose your number and forgot to give you theirs. So we drift. The nice thing is that Chris and I grow closer than ever, grow content with the quiet pleasures of life.  Not stagnant--we don't want to be that. We're striving for new things, but, things like time and money and gas and pets and money . . . Adulthood. Responsibility. All that jazz. It's no surprise that there are so many movies nowadays glorifying the quarter-life crisis.  As a kid, the world is your playground. As a teenager, there's drama and hormones and endless possibility. As a college student, you're a go-getter with the world on a silver platter.  Then, you leave it all behind, and life begins to mellow and settle.  It's frightening and it's lovely. You grow into it.  All right, so I might not do "exciting" things like clubbing till three a.m. on the weekends, but, wouldn't you know, I've learned to balance a checkbook and can make a mean lasagna and even better peanut butter pie.  I like being a grown up. I was always an old soul with childlike fascination. I think I was sixty when I was sixteen. Or maybe that's just introversion at its finest.

We feel very in-between things.  Or, at least, Chris does.  I feel slightly between, but I am happy with the quiet little town where we live and I can't stop gawking at the scenery even driving to the grocery store. I adjust easily to places.  I can be happy almost anywhere, even if I don't like it much. There's always nice little treasures hidden in every dreary place. I miss family, but I do long distance well because I know that times come to see them again, because long phone conversations with my parents and siblings are great, because seven-year-old Ellie and I can play Pass the Pigs over Skype and it's all lovely. I've lived away before. You get used to this sort of thing. You learn to make any place home, so long as you have at least one person to share it with. I have Chris, so any place where we're side by side is home.

Photo courtesy of Isaiah Eyre
From one of his last hiking trips with his roommate and friend, Isaiah, to Washington before leaving Idaho to come back to Florida in 2006

Chris has lived away from family, as well, but those were on adventures with this second cousin twice removed slash BFF since high school. Joe is the kind of person who gets carried off on the wind and manages wherever he lands.  He's the ultimate bachelor hipster. Truthfully, Joe was hipster before it was a word, and, as it gets more mainstream, he is only more hipster without knowing it. At thirty, he sports a handlebar mustache and a devil-may-care wardrobe with an odd mix of . . . what? Bill Murray? Lumberjack? Struggling musician? Homeless?    He's just Joe. He looks like Joe.  That's the best way to say it. If you ever meet him, you'll understand. He's Joe. That's all there is to it.
He floats from place to place, seemingly without a care in the world and nothing to tie him down--no woman, no mortgage, just himself and his whims. At least, that's how it seems.  Perhaps it's not accurate . . . but I wouldn't be surprised to hear in a month, six months, a year, sometime, that Joe has moved yet again for a new venture, and Chris will report the news with a wistful glimmer. 


When they were twenty, after several years of a close, easy friendship--that odd kind that men have, where you can talk about every and nothing or say nothing at all for hours, just drive nowhere in particular and listen to an awesome mix CD--Joe and Chris ran off to Idaho to attend college. Made the drive in three days and began a life Chris now sees as his golden years.  For Chris, Moscow, Idaho, remains a sort of Promised Land.  When he gets lonely or frustrated here, Chris starts looking at houses in Idaho because, maybe there, things will feel like home for him. He'll have his favorite coffee shop again, and, hopefully, fall right back into his old crowd. He'll have Joe again, and the two will catch up like they always do--having hardly spoken in a year or more, they'll begin a conversation as if it's only been a day. Music, movies, theology, philosophy, the same quirky humor that swings from laughter to very serious then back to laughter. Because that's who they are.

Photo courtesy of Isaiah Eyre
Joe and Chris's great-grandmother, Ninnie, at our wedding in October, 2009.
Joe had just started teaching in Indonesia and showed up as a surprise for our wedding, which led one of the groomsmen--the boys' other college roommate--to offer his position as best man to Joe because "it just seemed right."
Joe, Chris, and Ninnie have a very special relationship. They visited her frequently when they were growing up in Florida, and it's a relationship all three continue to treasure.
And, quite honestly, this photo sums it all flawlessly.

 I have no Promised Land . . . Well, London, maybe. I miss London terribly, almost daily . . . but would I settle there? I don't know. I am simultaneously a wanderer and homebody. I can set down roots almost anywhere then yank them up and start somewhere else.  It's not that it's not difficult--I miss the relationships of homes past, but I understand that some things are temporary and some things never really end, even if you can't touch them any more. There will be reunions filled with hugs, warm wishes, and reminiscing. Or maybe I'll just have memories, and those get brighter and warmer as time goes on. The mind likes to store things in extremes, I've found--you remember the very good and the very bad and very little in between. Or maybe that's just me.
I like roots, but I like change, too. I guess maybe I haven't found a place that's not worth changing. Well, that's not true--I could see myself here for a long, long time. I adore it. But maybe that won't be the case. Maybe it will. The trick is to hold all things loosely, isn't it?  

To be perfectly honest, there have been happenings here.  We've had outings and visits and all those things that are a lovely break from the ordinary.  There have been a couple things that change everything, where nothing is ever quite the same.

I'm trying to find the words to write about those, find the way to tell the stories.  It's still very fresh. Maybe that's when it's best--when every day hold a reminder of it all, where things still bleed if you poke them. Or maybe you wait until it's older, tougher, and, perhaps, you see things more clearly.  I don't know.

Soon. 

I've missed you all here in Blogsphere. I don't know if I've been missed, but that's ok. I've missed all of you. I can't wait to get caught up in your stories and pictures again.  It always makes me smile. Thank you.



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Pups and Flowered Strolls

The past couple of mornings, I've woken up to a gentle rub on the shoulder and the sweet nothings of, "Sarah, sweetie, the dog pooped on the carpet . . . and I have to go to work so . . . Could you, um . . . "
I tell you what, there's no other wake up call like it.
Way to get out of it, honey bun. I'll get you back, one of these days.
Also, one day, I will find a way to teach you to clean up pet puke without your turning green. Maybe.

She loves to cuddle in my lap while I'm on the computer . . . and then she starts nosing my hands until I use BOTH of them to pet her . . . Ham, much? Maybe a bit.

Pup's been sick with the runs for four days. Considering that she has delightfully fluffy thighs covered in long, long hair, this posed a slight problem. Let's just say that you can now add "dog butt barber" to my resume. Please and thank you.
Good news--I'm not a terrible furchild parent. I DID take her to the vet and he sent us away with smile, reassurance, and antibiotics.  She never acted sick, except for the obvious, so, now, we wait with a happy dingo and hope the runs solidify a bit. Or something.

Spring has arrived in San Juan Bautista--everything has begun to bloom and it is stunning. Just stunning. There are drizzles, now and again, that go off and on all day.  Sometimes, the sky is bright blue, and others gray, hovering foggy over the mountains the way breathe hangs in cold air. I adore it.  Gray, damp chill brings me back to London.  The fact that the town is small enough that I can walk everywhere brings me back there as well, and makes me think of college a bit.  As a new student, more than anything, I wanted to find a coffee shop, just some little place where I could have a cup of chai and study, a brief walk from campus.


Mississippi, where I attended university, does not have seasons the same as some places, but it has more than Florida. On winter nights, there was a cold that bore into you but no snow.  In summer, the air was thick, heavy with heat and no relief of sea breeze--stiff, smothering.  But springtime, oh, springtime was heaven.  For the first time in my life, I knew was Spring Fever was.  Even in my favorite classes, I'd stare out the window at the Quad strewn with students laying on their blankets, tossing frisbees. Spring was the only time the Quad wasn't as mucky as usual.  The sprinklers never turned off, even in the rain, leaving the dirt beneath the bright green grass perpetually black, damp, slimy, and slick. It nearly stole several pairs of my flip flops and, more than once, nearly had me falling on my bum. Spring time it was alive--all of us were screaming for sunlight after fleeing winter.  I'd wear skirts--the long peasant type--paired with tank tops or t-shirts and flip flops, looking like I stepped out of the 70's. My hair was long, and, sometimes, I'd put flowers in it, plucking them as I walked around the tiny Southern town where nothing happened.  It was the only time that I adored my campus.  My roommate, Emily, and I would lay out on blankets and read, soaking in sunlight.  Then, we'd walk to the local coffee shop, Cups, a lovely, artsy place filled with work of local artists and built in a little yellow house a friend of mine once lived in.  I didn't visit as often as I had dreamed, but my friends did.  I took a full load of classes and worked 18 hours a week at the university library, so I didn't get out much.  Still, very little beat sitting out on that little deck, sipping hot chocolate or chai, with my books and sunbeams.

Sometimes, town wasn't enough to satisfy our hunger for fresh air. We'd go driving out to the Natchez Trace, this beautiful stretch of land with all these little historic spots and pretty, hidden places like my favorite: Owen's Creek. We'd wander the woods, play in the stream. Once, we found a pair of graves from the Civil War.  I might not miss Mississippi a great deal, but I miss Owen's Creek.

Do you see the tiny trickle? The creek ended abruptly in this shelf that, most days, was the tiniest, most pathetic "waterfall" you'd ever seen. the shelf formed this awesome "almost cave" and then continued into the rest of the creek through the woods.  It remains one of the prettiest wooded spots in the Southeast that I've ever seen. I'm sure there are prettier places, but this little spot seemed like a fairytale to me.
Photo credit to my pal Rhyno. :]

I couldn't walk places in Florida.  Not really. Everything's very spread out, built for commuting.  When you do walk, it's brutally hot, suffocating.  You begin to sweat just walking to your car, but it doesn't dry, won't evaporate the way sweat is supposed to, cooling you. It just sticks, drips. Make-up melts, hair deflates, and clothes begin to stink of musk, deodorant essentially useless.  Residential areas are rarely within walking distances of super markets or restaurants. If they are, we drive anyways because it's too hot.  You melt and the milk risks spoiling.  It's dreadful.

Here, in this town, it's different.  I can go for a walk in the cool--almost cold--air and be downtown in roughly five minutes. From there, I have my choice of antique shops and independent restaurants of various tastes and persuasions. If I want to go to an actual grocery store, yes, I have to drive ten minutes or so on a highway, but, to be in town, to see little sights and enjoy an afternoon out, I merely have to put on my shoes and walk out the door. I love that. I have always preferred walking places.  That was one of my favorite things in London. I do not think I would like city life. There's not enough green.  I do, however, adore the commute system.  You walk, you ride the Tube, hop on a double decker bus, swipe your Oyster card, and you're off. I could go anywhere on my own two feet.  I loved that. I love it here, in this tiny, mission town with its buildings straight out of a western film, hidden in the hills from the outside, modern world.

So far, I have found a favorite burger spot. I'm on the look for a coffee shop, now.
Maybe I'll even start wearing skirts and flowers in my hair.

In which I nerdishly rave about one of my all-time favorite books EVER!

In true nerdish fashion, we have tickets to the midnight premier of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.  I’m ridiculously excited.  I didn’t do midnight premieres for any of the LOTR films, so this thing—this is huge.  Everyone has SOME book they’d love to see turned into a movie, but this book literally changed my life.  

I remember, as a little kid, dusting my parents’ bookshelves and coming across this large, beautiful, green book with a dragon on the cover.  He was red, with one golden eye glaring out at the world, smoke curling from his nostrils, as he clutched at the mound of gold that was his bed.  I wasn’t allowed to watch movies or read books with magic or dragons, so I would stare at it in wonder before putting it back, wondering why my parents had something “evil” in their bedroom.

(source)
Illustration by Michael Hague

Week after week, I dusted, eying the strange book, until finally I pulled it off the shelf and, stealthily, began turning the pages.  Inside were the most beautiful illustrations of a small man with curly hair and stocky fellows with beards. They carried swords, fought wicked goblins, talked with a pale, shriveled thing in caves, soared on eagle wings, wrestled giant spiders, and, finally encountered the great dragon.
I was in awe.
I’d read little snippets, trying to understand the pictures (especially the one of the skinny creature with giant eyes in the cave), then shove the book back on the shelf, terrified of getting caught, wondering if it really was a very bad book. 

(source)
Illustration by Michael Hague

The secret picture-gazings became a habit; until, finally, I took the book off the shelf, put it under my arm and carried it away.  I was going to read it, dagnabbit, and no one would stop me.    

I swept away in a world that I knew, then, had always been calling to my heart.  It had sung to me from that dusty bookshelf, forgotten.  Sometimes, you find words that unlock something inside you, something secret even to you.

(source)
Illustration by Michael Hague

I’ve read it maybe a dozen times since that first time, thirteen years ago.  I have taken it with me everywhere, like a security blanket, and it has been present for so many life changes.  After my family moved, I sat down on my frameless mattress that was my bed for a week, and I read the book through in a matter of hours, finding comfort in the familiar.  A paperback version traveled with me to Nicaragua, and was lost somehow on the bus taking us home from Miami, after I proved I knew the book so well I could read it upside down. I took my beloved green hardback to college then to London, despite the luggage weight limit—I just couldn’t imagine going to its birthplace without it, without the guarantee that I had something brilliant to read when I was lonely. Finally, I took it out of my parents’ house into my own when I was married.  

(source)
Illustration by Michael Hague

 Technically, it’s not “mine.”  It was a Christmas present from my mom to my dad during their early married years.  She thought he had read it, and bought it for him hoping to read it with him.  This is an incredibly sweet offer from my mother, who, until this past year, is such a realist she couldn’t get past the third sentence, in which the hobbit’s glorious, round green door is introduced.  “There aren’t round doors,” she said. “He’s a little person who lives in a hole. No one does that. I just can’t, Sarah. I can’t.”  As it turns out, my father had never read it, and, really, has shown no real interest in reading it, though I get my love for the imaginary from him. I think the LOTR movies’ Ringwraiths put a bad taste in his mouth.

Still, I see it as part of my inheritance. I was the first to read it, after all.  I read it aloud to my little sister at bedtime when she was six.  I will never forget how she ran from her room to my mom’s, begging for a later bedtime so I could read the last chapter to her, then darting across the house, squealing, “SHE SAID YEEES!!!”  I passed it on to my brother, and, from that point on, we were true nerds together, in love with Star Wars and Tolkien.  It led me to one of my great heroes, John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, the father of the modern fantasy epic, who has so hugely influenced my own writing and creativity. 

One day, I hope to read it to my children—to laugh with them as the dwarves demolish Biblo’s kitchen, to shudder at Gollum’s riddles, to feel the fear, the curiosity, the wonder, the tragedy, and the victory of one small man’s journey from a predictable dud to a wielder of swords and riddles, a legendary hero who changed the world.

I know that there are “greater” books—books upheld by literary scholars, by people far smarter than I am—but this has earned a very special place on my shelf and in my heart.  It opened the world of fantasy for me.  We met in secret, and we fell in love.  “In a whole in the ground, there lived a hobbit,” and the world grew a little bigger, a little brighter.

(source)

So, yeah, I'm a little excited.
Just a tiny bit.
And I'm a nerd in love with a book. Yeah . . . . just a tad . . . but, to be fair, I'm in love with lots of books . . . they're just not midnight premiers tomorrow ;]

Flashback: The Thing About the Library . . .

No place affords a more striking conviction of the vanity of human hopes than a public library.--Samuel Johnson

source

When people find out I worked in a library, surrounded by the glory of literature, they are absolutely boggled when I said I left quickly and happily after only a year. Why on earth would I want to leave such a wonderful place? Well, I'll tell you. You see, you collect a lot of stories working in a public library on the wrong side of town.  Before I start with my stories, I do want you to know that, for the most part, our patrons were very normal people, and some were even very, very sweet.  Sadly, it's the nasties who stick with you.  It's the ones that are so rude or so strange you see them more than anything else.  Try as I might, I see a couple of faces who were pleasant, kind, but most of the faces and events are things that leave me either laughing or with a bad taste in my mouth.  The library is a strange, strange place . . .

• There's a couple that comes in often. The man is all skin, grease and angles with the same American bandana and slick, weasly pony tail. Both of them slur so badly you wonder if they've been drinking since dawn. He smells so strongly of cigarette smoke and unbathed human that you have to hold your breath (we have LOTS of people like that). . He asks for religious movies. Why? "I keep trying to get him to read the Bible," the woman says, "but he says 'I don' haveta. I've seen the movie.' "
  "Yeah," he calls from the DVDS, "they need to hurry up and make the rest of em so I can see the whole book."
  Hmmmm.


• A lady brings a DVD up to the desk. "There's something wrong with this. No matter what I do, it just won't play in English."
  A coworker and I examine it. "Well, ma'am. It's a foreign film. It doesn't speak in English."
  "Naw, it's just broken."
  Despite the "Foreign" label, every DVDs first language should be English, apparently.
• One day, a fellow decided he wanted to chatter while I registered him for a library card. He asks, "So what school are you going to?"
  "Oh, no, I graduated."
  "Which high school?"
  "College."
  "Oh. You look really young. What was your major?"
  "English."
  "Oh, so this is like your DREAM job."
  I should have shut my mouth right then. I should have agreed with him and said, "Yes, sorting books, shelving DVDs, and registering library cards is all I've wanted to do with my life" -- don't get me wrong, the librarian is an extremely NOBLE profession, but it just wasn't in my list of life goals. But I didn't. I said I wanted to be a writer, which sent him into a speal about the video game he's creating and how he'd love to collaborate. I wish him best of luck as he leaves and begin organizing returned books. Fifteen minutes later, he's back at the counter.
  "Well, I'm leaving now."
  "Umm . . . ok. Bye. Have a good day."
  "So, when do you want to get together to exchange stories?"
  I am flabbergasted. I mean, seriously. "Um . . . I'm sorry, I'm really busy."
  "I'm flexible."
  "I'm planning a wedding!" I burst out.
  "Oh, you plan weddings, too??"
  At a loss for words and completely frazzled, I hold up my left hand sporting a brand new engagement ring. "My wedding."
  "Oh . . . uh . . . ok then. Bye."
  That was day two of my employment.
•  A very pregnant girl came to the front desk asking for a baby name book. Her boyfriend, a skinny fellow with a mullet and jean overalls (no lie), came up behind her and said, "She don't like the names I'm picking for my boy. Every one in my family has been named Billy Bob or Joe or somethin' but she don't like none of those!"
  I really, really hope that it was a big prank because, oh my golly . . .


• Once upon a time, our power went out and our system went down. Power outages are common in thunderstorm-ridden Florida summers, but it's a big deal, here, because suddenly everyone's fussing because his or her computer went down and they want more time NOW. Well, this time, not only did our computers go out, but our system . . . OCLS could not check in any items anywhere by the main branch. For a day and half. the afternoon following system failure, it suddenly decided to start working. A regular, a perfectly round fellow in a wheelchair with Jehovah Witness pamphlets in the pocket, zoomed up to the desk. "Did you check in my DVDs?"
  "No sir, we--"
  I was cut off by his sudden collapse onto the counter head in his hands, wailing, "WHY DIDN'T YOU CHECK THEM IN?!?! THEY WERE TURNED IN YESTERDAY!! I GAVE THEM TO HER!!! NOW I CAN'T GET NO MORE MOVIES!!!"
  "Sir, the system just started working again. We will check them in as soon as we can."
  "I don' wan' no late fees," he mutters glaring at me from under his arms.
  "You won't have them, sir."
  He sits there, despondant, glaring at me in an odd mix of anger and pitifulness, until he finally sighs and wheels away, stacking more movies in his bag.
  DVDs are a serious life or death matter here.


• I don't remember his real name. Paul or Donald or something. I know him simply as "Spittle Man." It's a horrid name, but it was the first title that came to mind when we met--I was mesmerized by the over-abundant ammount of spit in his mouth, and I have been unable to rename him. He's a regular. Everyday. He comes in, wearing that same gray polo with the stain at his paunch, and holds his computer reservation receipt up to a clerk. "This thing says I have a fifteen minute wait, but there's an empty computer now. Give me that one."
  "Well, sir," the unfortunate clerk answers, "the system assigns you the computer with earliest availability. The empty one is either out of order or someone has logged off early and it holds a pending reservation."
  "Well, if there's no one on it now, I should be able to log on. I'm just curious as to why your system won't let me." Thus begins a 20 minute agonizing arguement of policy and system.
  Here's a recent incident . . . a boy has told me his mom is having problems logging onto her computer, so I go to help her, and realize that it is ten minutes past the log-in time, so she probably lost her reservation. Simultaneously, Spittle Man storms up to our customer service lead, proclaiming, "Some woman is trying to get on my computer! I have a reservation for 4:45 and I'm losing my 60 minutes! I want her off! She says someone at the desk gave her a reservation for MY computer!"
  As I am attempting a log in, I hear the smug spittle-filled voice behind me. "So YOU'RE the one who started all the trouble."
  "Is there a problem, sir?" I say as coolly as possible, my face flaming.
  A receipt is shoved under my nose.
  "Her reservation is for 4:30."
  "But mine's for 4:45," he says.
  "I signed her up at 4:00 for a 4:30 reservation." I then turn to the boy. "I'm really sorry, but I think the reservation expired. I can get her another one at the desk."
  Spittle Man is already there, demanding a brand new reservation because he has lost three of his sixty minutes and that is totally unacceptable. He continues to rant while my lead tries to get him his reservation but she can't because she can't concentrate over the noise.
  DVDs are life and death . . . computers equally so.


• I used to open Tuesday mornings, the new DVD day, the day patrons lined up two hours before opening so they could rush they door and snag every title. When I had time, I mixed up some of the titles so they were harder to find while patrons pressed their faces against the glass, desperate for a glimpse of the DVDs invisible through the distant tinted windows. Maybe I was a meany for hiding them, but I was trying to give the nice people who came in after work and school a chance to see new movies, too. Tuesdays made me sick.
•  One day, an older African-American woman entered wearing a red hat and rage. She came up to the counter, "Did you check in my DVD?"
  "Ma'am?"
  "My DVD. I turned it in, but you're chargin' me late fees. What did you do with my movie?"
  I take her card, look up her account, and begin the search and filling out the claims form--a form sent to several branches asking to locate lost objects. Sometimes, it worked. Sometimes, the patron really HADN'T turned in the item. Other times, it's just so lost there's no hope.  While I type, she begins o describe all of her woes, how the world is out to get her. How they shut down her power just to spite her. How we open at nine just so she has to ride her bike in the heat to get her.  Then suddenly she grows very quiet, leaning on the counter, face turned away from me. "Do you know what I'm doin'?" she asks solemnly.
  "No, ma'am."
  "I'm praying to Jesus. I am renouncing the devils here and telling them to give me back my movie. You find it. No more tricks now. I'm renouncing all the evil spirits here."
  I almost laughed except that we found her movie shortly after that.  She had been asking us to look at the wrong branch.  She had turned it in, just like she said, and all fees were removed.  Demons or not.
  
  
• Each night, we had to check the bathrooms for stragglers after closing. One night, we found a giant penis wearing a superman cape scrawled on the wall. I mean, mural-sized. Genitalia in a super-hero cape. I laughed and I laughed.


• The hoverers make my skin crawl. All of our DVDs are in security cases, and, when we've checked in and double-scanned returned DVDs we case them on a cart near the desk so patrons can check them out. The moment they hear the CLICK SNAP CLICK of the security cases, patrons are suddenly at my side, with no sense of personal space, craning to read the titles or snatch a DVD before anyone else. They react to the sound the way my cat reacts when she hears me pouring food in her dish. It's just a movie, really.
•  One time, I opened a DVD case, and a little roach crawled out. Another time, I watched a small roach scuttle out of a patron's cloth bag, look around, and then scurry back inside like it was going home. The patron tried to smash it, but I'm not sure there was any success . . .
• One evening, I was shelving, when I heard someone call my name. I turned, and our shelver's boyfriend was relaxing at one of the many tables used by the Saturday chess club.  "Sarah, why are you working at a library? Why aren't you modeling or something?"
  "Ummmm  . . . I like it here? I've never really had any interest in modeling. Don't want to lose all that weight."
  He laughs, saying, "Oh, no, please don't lose weight!"
  The next week, he's there again, and says, "Sarah, I've been thinking about what you said the other night, about not losing weight to model?"
  "Uuuuuuuuh . . . "
  "And I was thinking, maybe you should model for men who'd appreciate your figure. Like Black Man Magazine."
  "Uuuuhhh . . . no, thank you, I'm fine."
  I'm still reeling over that one. And, might I mention, I had my WEDDING RING on???


• We had a flasher in, once. Apparently, there have been a handful of flasher stories before my employment, but I was privileged enough to be on the clock for this one. -_-  Oh, and there was a drive-by shooting across the street one night shortly after we closed . . . and the Dollar General next door was robbed at least twice during the year I worked there. Classy spot.

Like I had said, these, sadly are the NEGATIVE stories. There are several good ones--all the nice people I met, the ladies and gentlemen who greeted every clerk by name every time they came in.  There was nothing quite as sweet as helping someone find something or solve a computer problem and having them sincerely thank you. The library was a wonderful service to so many people, and, as you all know, people come in all kinds of conditions with all kinds of attitudes.  Oh, and I loved my coworkers--seriously a GREAT group of people.  Plus there were the books.  Always books. Support your local libraries. Really, do it. There are so many people who NEED their services -- the free internet access, the aid in studies, the education programs, the ESL and citizenship classes -- they offer SO MUCH and can be such a bright light.

But by summer 2010, the time came for me to pursue a teaching career, and that brought on a new mass of stories. Still, the library will live in a special place in my heart, a place of infamy and fondness, in its odd little way. There's always light in the dirty places.