Vegan Part II

Dear Reader:

 

I feel as if I may have left you hanging. My apologizes. By now you must realize that the raccoon and I have much in common. We both struggle to open the dog food container (cussing as we end up ass over face into the flower bed), revel in pretending that we are being sneaky, despite the 50 lb. dog barking at us, and are easily distracted by shiny objects. Earlier in my blog I had professed a switch to a vegan diet, and then never followed up. So here’s what happened:

I lasted exactly 3 days, 7 hours and 14 minutes. What happened? Calder. You see, this boyfriend of mine happens to be a master chef. (Don’t you dare tell him I said that, the man has enough ego as it is, and my arms couldn’t take all the bowing down that would ensue). And by master chef I don’t mean that he has the ability to heat up mac n’ cheese. I’m talking banana pancakes with strawberry garnishes, Gorgonzola stuffed elk burgers, homemade crab cakes with a zest of lemon, apple and walnut salad with homemade vinaigrette, baked brie in a flakey crust with huckleberry sauce… quit drooling ladies. He’s quite taken, and I warn you that I am a master in the art of humiliating sarcasm.

So I wake up-which, let’s for a moment think about waking up… (see? Raccoon-like senses).  Thanks in large part to Hollywood; I grew up imagining that women wake up with perfectly refreshed complexions, long and defined gently batting eyelashes, and hair that is just so perfectly rumpled that it is endearing. I clung to that hope for many years, until I finally realized that not only do I wake up like a mole exposed to sunlight, I am highly prone to being crabby. Throw in a pillow mark on my cheek, hair resembling a Who in a bar fight, and mascara smudged on my eyebrow- and I am lucky anyone says ‘I love you’ prior to 8am. I have finally learned to accept that while some woman are blessed with an early morning glow; I am not one of them until I have married rich.

As I was saying, dear Chef-boy (who is either oblivious to my state, or has learned to not poke the bear- most likely the latter…) wakes me up with a homemade breakfast burrito. A chorizo burrito. An elk chorizo burrito. An elk that he shot himself. I frickin’ love elk chorizo. And not eating the meat that a man painstakingly provided for his woman is surely an insult to manhood. So I ate it. It was delicious. I didn’t even cringe.

“Is that an egg?” Our friend Tad looks at me quizzically, arms loaded with Doritos and PBR. 

“Yup!” I clutch the egg tighter to my chest so I don’t drop it.

“Your buying an egg. At a gas station. To go floating.” He cocks his head to one side, trying to decide if I am serious.

“Yup!” I purchase my egg and wander out to the Bro-stop.

“Is that an egg?” Calder looks at me, just making sure his eyes aren’t deceiving him.

“Yup!” I crawl into the backseat and joyfully begin peeling it.

“That’s gunna stink you know.”

“Yup!” I bite into it. Yum. Hits the spot.

Calder shakes his head and jumps in. Luckily, by now he is used to my eccentricity.

My vegan experiment definitely left me more conscious of my eating habits. Gone are the dinners of cinnamon rolls, and the lunches of pop-tarts. I’m not going to claim that I am super healthy- let’s face it, when Calder is working through the dinner hour I happily cart off a box of frozen mozzarella sticks as a meal. But I have forced myself to be a bit more aware of where my food is coming from. If I couldn’t locate the farm that provided my milk, then I probably won’t buy it. If I don’t know where that burger came from on my plate, then it won’t be as satisfying. Admittedly, it does make me feel better. I don’t know that I will ever make it to the elite realm of veganism, (holy chorizo burrito), but at least things are changing for me. And sometimes, the changes that take the longest are the ones that stick.

And did I mention my man can cook? Oh you lucky lucky girl Ashley…

Greener on the Other Side...

I am lucky. I am spoiled. I am blessed. It sounds ridiculous for a ‘glass-half-full’ kinda girl to have to remind herself of this, but I do when it comes to my home. We have a serious love/hate relationship.

By a bizarre twist of fate I ended up moving back into my childhood home as my parents vacated it. It was the perfect place for an only child with a vivid imagination to grow up. Trees galore, I developed this odd habit of climbing a tree to read a book. (Always the multitasker…) This habit was warned against after I fell out of the Aspen upon reaching a rather disturbing conclusion in an Agatha Christie novel. Mother ran out of the house with flour all over her dress, I was furious that the protagonist could be the murderer, and Dad told me that bruises were rather impressive but this didn’t mean I should search them out. There was a creek I could splash around in, animals I could tend to, swings to be swung, and flowers to pick. It was the kind of yard most parents dream of being able to provide for their children.

Now comes the hate. You just spent a week ripping off 60 years of wallpaper only to find that drywall was not in fact created when this home was built and thus you have scraped clear through to the beams. The toilet bubbles at an alarming rate when you take a shower. The electricity has to be rewired into the dining room- oh and by the way, your home isn’t grounded. There is an inch tall step into the kitchen that threatens you every time you want a snack. I swear this home is the one Dr. Seuss built.  On the bright side, when left to your own resources, one figures shit out. Bob Villa has nothing on me. I can rewire, refinish, re-plum, and redecorate anything you throw at me. The frustrating part though, is when you have a house and four buildings you are trying to keep from falling apart while working a full time job. Would you like some cheese with your wine? I can hear you saying. And yes. Yes I would. Preferably gouda.

Most people have 2 neighbors. I have over a hundred. Thanks to a densely packed subdivision and a developer that decided to have everyone’s back yard open up to mine, I have a consistent audience. I like to think I’m not that entertaining… but there was that one time when Erik got loose, and I was running around in a nightie and slippers. Thanks to one kind couple on their porch I was able to secure him after several yells of “LEFT! LEFT! He went behind the barn! Wait! No right! RIGHT! RIGHT! He’s by the creek!” And I am clumsy; I’ll give them that. More than once a fresh chicken egg has ended up on my shirt after unsuccessfully dodging a duck. I often wonder what they think… oh look at the horrendous condition of that barn, gah why can’t she fix her fence, why has the house been half painted for a year? Those chickens are SOOO annoying.

For someone who isn’t big on grudges, I have developed an immense dislike for that subdivision. Namely because people are idiots. Some guy was cross-country skiing through my back yard last winter. People walk their dogs on the property. Shoot randomly at buildings. Clearly I live on a public park.

So I have begun walking. I realize this seems to be a natural human phenomenon, but for me a walk was always a waste of exercise. I mean, why walk when you can run? Why walk when you can hike? It seemed silly. But the dog needs exercise, and on occasion I just don’t feel up to a run. And I rather like wandering without an aim. So where do I walk? On the 250 acres behind my house? Of course not. I walk in the subdivision, on the sidewalks, for one main reason: I like to creep. Now before you begin envisioning me crawling over backyard fences and letting myself into dining rooms (which frankly, almost sounds like something I would do), I mean the kind of creeping we all engage in. Don’t deny it. It’s the moment when you drive by a house with the lights on and try to peer through the windows. When someone leaves their private fence open and you peek to see what they have back there. My walks are an intense study of humanity. And admittedly, at times a judgment. I swear, if I ever have children that leave 18 neon Fisher-Price pieces of crap in my yard I will have the decency to live in a trailer court.

We usually take a random route that always leads to the back corner where someone is building a monster of a house. I keep thinking, why in the world would someone build that gorgeous house in this crappy neighborhood? Sometimes I fantasize about having a pigpen right on the other side of the fence just to piss them off, and giggle a little to myself. And then we move on and judge the people who failed to weed their flower gardens, whose children are screaming, or have tiny cages in their yards for their huge dogs.

On Monday’s walk we once again we ended at the construction site of the giant house. I stood and considered while Erik sniffed an incredibly interesting clover bush. I mean, why go to all that effort and money to live here? HERE of all places. And then I looked beyond the house. The sun was setting over the fields. My family’s fields. And it stuck me. Maybe they just want what I have. What I look at every day. Where I see a giant financial pit, things falling apart and to-do list, they see paradise. The funny part, the slightly pathetic part, is that I had to literally cross the fence to see how green it is on the other side. My family’s side. 

In this age where the media spotlights all the evil, all the problems, all the horrendous mistakes of society, it can be so easy to think that we have it so bad. To nitpick all the things that are making our lives difficult. When you’re upset, everyone is quick to tell you to get some perspective. And all you want to do is to tell them yours. I believe that perspective is often a physical act. Sometimes all it takes is removing yourself to see what wasn’t visible to you before. After all, it’s hard to see paradise when you’re standing in the middle of it.

Pigs however, would be quite fun.

Epiphanies and Otherwise

You know when you have an epiphany, and you’re simultaneously annoyed that you remember, and can’t believe you forgot about it in the first place? And then you end up both trying to remember more about it, and also attempting to shove it back down where it came from. Much to my chagrin, those memories, faded with age, and grimy from being left in the garage of my brain, have been getting jogged back out to the surface lately.

I was a rather cute child until about age 7, when an unfortunate lack of alignment to my teeth, failing eyesight, perpetually crooked glasses, and my mother’s love of perms landed me square in awkward-ville. And while I liked flouncing around in the poufy little dresses my mother carefully sewed for me, my love of tree climbing resulted in my habitually walking around with mud and leaves stuck to me. I realize everyone claims childhood awkwardness… but I ask you dear reader, to please reference the picture, which thanks to lighting, is one of the better ones.

My childhood was a happy one, filled with lots of daydreaming and adventures, an only child who was quite resourceful when it came to entertaining myself. I had two best friends, my beautiful blonde neighbor Julia, and the endlessly entertaining dark haired Britt. However, school life was a constant battle in which I was forever playing defense. Children are quite perceptive, and tend to use this skill to be horrendously mean to each other. Thus my hair, my teeth, my glasses, my clothes, my habitually late parents, and my love of books were all under attack daily.

When my father began teaching at my school, a man infinitely cooler than myself, I managed to earn a little street cred. But by the 6^th grade, more and more of my recesses were spent alone, splashing around in the little creek at the back of the schoolyard. The creek couldn’t talk back, or call me names; it would just gurgle quietly along and grow pretty dandelions that I could make into necklaces. My friends found infinitely more cool things to do and I faded into the background.

Growing up around adults I tended to be more mature than my age, and teen angst hit me around 11. I begged my parents to let me go to another school. I was sick of being at the bottom of the food chain. No one understood me here. Finally they agreed, enrolled me at Manhattan Christian, since that was where it was determined I would receive the best high school education, and even said I could start going by my middle name.

I took the fresh start eagerly. Got rid of the perm, discovered hair dye, convinced my parents I needed contacts, and switched to a shortened version of my middle name, Nicki. (Sadly it never quite stuck thanks to a stubborn Calvinistic teacher, but I gave it a valiant effort). I shut the door on my old school and friends, vowing to never give the place a second thought. And I didn’t… until recently.  

Now for an update. Since we last met, many things have changed in the life of this Vicky’s girl. Namely, I went out on a limb, and was rewarded with a beautiful change in careers. I gave the world of retail the boot, and jumped headfirst into finance. (I will fill you in more another time… but I promise the segway has a point). Namely, that the world has come full circle, and now, 20 years later, I work with Britt’s mother.

I always admired Britt’s mom. As a kid I knew she worked on a street called Wall, she was some sort of awesome, powerful, well-dressed woman that made her own living- but more importantly, she let us make sheet forts throughout the entire house, took us on trips to the family cabin, had the best sleepovers, and always had most excellent snacks.

I never dreamed I would one day wind up working with this woman. And the experience has been amazing… a small part of me wants to go bounding into her office and beg her to let me and Britt take out the BB gun- until I remember I’m supposed to be a fully functional business-minded adult and Britt is living miles away. She’s been introducing me to her clients as they come in, which has caused several of those dusty memories to resurface. Much sneezing has been involved.

Which brings me to my epiphany.

“Oh Hello Dustin! How have you been? Have you met Ashley? She attended Heritage with Britt.” Betty gestures towards me, while I’m digging through a file cabinet that I could probably crawl into and take a nap, it’s so massive.

I had talked to Dustin briefly when he walked in, but actually focusing on him I saw a tall, lean, younger looking man with an apparent amount of energy- like he was going to dart out of the office and jump on his dirt bike. Dustin refocused on me and I smile up from the mound of paperwork in my hands.

“Really? Heritage huh? When did you attend?”

When people ask me that about high school or college I’m prepared with a range of dates. But elementary school? I shrug my shoulders and grimace, trying to rally some quick age math before he wonders what I’m doing in finance.

Betty laughs, “Yeah it was a long time ago… but I think Dustin’s daughter and you are around the same age? Let’s see- 27?”

Dustin nods in agreement. I continue to look completely blank and slightly baffled this man has a grown up daughter. But what am I saying? This is a common fiasco with my parents too.

“Sasha?” he says, “Sasha Morris?”

Sasha. Sasha. I roll the name around in my brain. Morris. Morris… it just sounds so familiar, it’s in the garage somewhere, I just know it. I squint a little with the effort of recall. Suddenly it hits me like a bad burrito. Manolo Blahniks. Dad’s dime. Kissing cheeks. Skinny tall girl with long hair. Put together. 

Oh of course. That Sasha. The Sasha that I was quite jealous of in elementary school for being popular, well-dressed, and being the only person I ever heard of winning McDonald’s Monopoly.  And here I am twenty years later bitching about her in my blog. Good lord. This world gets any smaller and it’s going to collapse in on me.

Thankfully Dustin was whisked away before he inquired if I still knew Sasha, but I sat at my desk with a bewildered look for the rest of the afternoon, wondering how on earth I could forget such a thing. Then again, I seriously doubt she would have remembered it either. And here we think we’ll never see the people we grew up with again.

The world appears to have come full circle. But this time? I don’t feel like a fresh start. I feel like all my decisions, stupid, misguided, brilliant and otherwise have led me here. And here is a place I quite enjoy. 

Married People. Pfft.

Today, I take you into a small slice of my Ski Patrol world… a man’s world, a world where you have 4 things to do. Go on a mission (usually involving bamboo sticks or a drill), take a run, patch someone back together, or sit in the shack. This particular day I was stuck in the shack longer than I had preferred, where we entertain ourselves the old fashioned way- talking.

“So your Husband stopped by.” Frank cocked his head to one side with a slightly evil grin.

Clearly he wasn’t talking to me, so I glanced back at the new girl as I shook the snow off my coat. A rookie, she was required to follow either Frank or I around the mountain to learn the ropes- known as our shadow. Of course, we made a polite effort to get to know her, and had heard all about her boyfriend during the course of the morning. I sat down and collected my lunch, a little sad I had somehow only managed to shove a granola bar and Robitussin in my pack. 

“So you’re married then?” Frank found this highly amusing, and leaned back in his chair, ready for an explanation. I sighed and nibbled on the Oats and Honey, wondering if I could escape to the cafeteria without getting caught.

“Uhm, well yeah, he’s my husband.” She mumbled, looking ready to dart back out the door. She had already confessed to me that Frank scared her a little.

“Husband then? So why have we been hearing about your boyfriend all morning?” Frank was clearly enjoying the interrogation.

“Well he is- I mean was- well it’s new- I don’t like to call him that.” She scrunched herself into the corner and squished her face to the window.

“Hmm. Well I told him. You know. That you’ve been running around all day calling him your boyfriend.” This was Frank’s punch line, and he could hardly be enjoying himself any more than if he was in waist deep powder.

“Oooooo! Someone’s in the dog house tonight!”

The other patroller in the room chimed in. Oh wait. That was me. I tend to get a little mean when I’m hungry. Frank started laughing and I turned back to my pack, hoping perhaps a forgotten sandwich was in the bottom.

“Oh so he knows then- that you call him that.” A rather boring day had left Frank unwilling to drop the subject.

Miraculously I discovered a squished protein bar in the bottom of my pack, and pulled it out triumphantly. Bjork blew back into the shack after a lengthy sled run, and plopped down next to me.

“So you did find some extra food! Sweet, thanks.” He snatched my protein bar and took an enormous bite. I glared at him, but he was too busy checking out the noobie chick meat to be bothered with my peeved state.

“Well yeah, he knows, sorta. I mean, I just don’t like it.” She looked ready to leap out the window.

“Why on God’s green earth would you marry a dude if you don’t want to call him your damn husband!” I jerked upright, alarmed at myself. Glancing around I realized that for once, this comment had managed to stay in my head.  

Dispatch came over the radio announcing a wreck, and we all silently gathered our things together, ready to fly out the door. The subject was dropped, but I was still dying to ask the question.

Isn’t “Husband” like the perfect excuse? One actual advantage to marriage? “I need to take a run with my Husband.” “Oh sorry, I can’t make it tonite, my husband is expecting me for dinner.” “Sorry to ask for time off so late, but my Husband planned this last minute surprise trip…” It seems ‘Husband’ carries a little more weight with it than boyfriend. A boyfriend you can avoid. A Husband you have to answer to. I’d abuse the hell outta that one.

I complained about her attitude on the way home with my carpool buddy, feeling more and more like an old fart trying to preserve the sanctity of marriage.

Back at Victoria’s Secret…

“What can I help you find?”

“Lingere. And lots of it. I’m going to Vegas with my lover!”

“Fantastic! Well we have this piece here, and this is lovely, really sexy…” I lead her around the store showing off some of my favorite outfits.

“Ha! Perfect! He’ll love that. My stupid husband has no idea.” She triumphantly grabs at a negligee.

Oh geeze. I didn’t want to know that. So now I’m helping a woman cheat on her husband? I shook the thought away. Not my business. I just sell the stuff. I don’t need to know what they do with it.

“Yeah. Complete asshole. Dumb asshole.” She smiles, holding up a lacie thong.

I realize I sell intimates. And this means sometimes people feel the need to share their intimates. But really? Her teenage daughter is following her around, texting, and acting for all the world that this is completely normal. I don’t even want to know what has driven her to be the worst mother of the year.

She happily carts off $200 dollars of cheating material, while I wonder what possesses people to sign a marriage certificate they don’t really mean.

For me, the marriage category lives in the Switzerland section of my brain. Neutral things I don’t really feel the need to have an opinion on. Then again, when it comes to people you know- everyone has an opinion. Several of my closest friends are married, and at their wedding I felt satisfied, happy and quite tipsy for them. At others, I’m taking bets at the bar on their divorce date. (Don’t act like you’ve never thought about it… I mean $700 ice sculptures? Yeah, that one will last as long as the ice stays frozen…)

I suppose what peeves me are the obvious elephants trotting through the bedroom. Marriage is serious, scary business, and you people taking it lightly are only scaring me further by parading your elephants through my day.  

Back at the Condo…

 

I had made a grave mistake. While relaxing, watching a movie with Calder on the bed, I had let my hand wander off the left side. Little did I know- that hand was being hunted, stalked, and considered for the past 15 minutes. Two white ears twitched in anticipation, two white paws shot out their claws and sunk into my finger.

“YEOW! Good God! What the-“ I snatched my hand back and stuck my finger in my mouth to relieve the sting.

Calder raised an eyebrow and stuck his head over my side of the bed to search out the culprit, who had quickly maneuvered herself to the opposite side- where his unsuspecting foot now dangled. Two razor sharp teeth sunk into the ankle, with a couple quick hind foot kicks for emphasis, before escaping back under the bed.

“OOOWW! EVIL!!! I FEED you! WHY?” Calder tucked his foot back under his thigh, and we both subconsciously scooted towards the center of the bed.

“Why is your cat soo mean?” he whined.

“MY cat? Why is it MY cat when it’s being a bitch?” I narrow my eyes at him.

A paw snakes through the footboard, furiously swiping at the air as we both grab pillows to fight off the attack.

“More importantly, how am I going to retrieve my wine? I left it on the bathroom counter.”

“Babe. It’s a 10 pound ball of fur.” My white knight swings his legs off the side and stands up to head towards the bathroom.

Chardonnay zips from under the bed and latches onto his foot for a quick bite, and zings off into the dark corner. Calder leaps back into the center of the bed.

“On second thought, I don’t think you need any wine tonight.”

“Pfft. No wine? Yeah, that situation would be worse.” I glance at the cat’s glowing eyes in the corner and make a valiant attempt to reach the bathroom. Within a blink her claws were deep in my calf, long enough for me to really feel it, before zipping underneath the bed to avoid consequences. I scrambled back to the Isle de Bed.

I sniff, miffed at my failure. “Yeah, well 2002 was a terrible year in Napa anyways.”

Thankfully, in this relationship there are no elephants in the room. Only one incredibly evil cat.

Here Fishy Fishy...

 

“Can I keep it?!” I gripped the beautiful rainbow trout with eagle enthusiasm, enthusiasm that was not lessened by the fact this was the 5^th such fish I had hauled into the boat.

“No. If everyone thinks they can keep a fish we’ll be packing home 28 fish.” Calder carefully released the hook from my prize’s mouth and set it back in the water.

I stuck out my lower lip. “But I wanna EAT it!” I frowned and watched my potential dinner happily swim away.

Calder laughed and cast his line over the opposite side of the boat. “You want to eat every fish you catch.”

“Yup. And look what I have? No fish.” I haughtily threw my line over the side, determined that he’d have to wrestle the next one out of my hands.

Years before, not too long after we had first met, he had taken me to this lake, hidden away on his family’s ranch, an emerald sunk deep in the Crazy Mountains. It was paradise, and on that trip I had somehow managed to pull a mammoth of a fish out of it while we lazily dozed in the summer sun. We took it home and shared it with our friends, a delicious lemon soaked 27-inch trout. Since then, fishing the lake on Calder’s birthday was always the highlight of the year for me, and since we were the only people who ever did, the fishing was easy to the point of being ridiculous. I probably could tie a shoelace to my finger with a marshmallow and still catch something. However, that didn’t lessen the excitement for me, and every fish was potentially delicious trout puffs. A specialty that one of the friends we had brought along this trip was superb at cooking up.

As much as I appreciated his sincere compassion for the fish- fish was one food I had no qualms about eating. I loved fish.  And a fish from an unspoiled and largely populated Montana paradise hardly seemed wrong. Admittedly, I was known to have eyes bigger than my stomach, and if he let me have my way I’d sink the boat under a mountain of fish.

“I GOT ONE!” I squealed in delight and set to the task of wearing out my 6^th treasure before I brought it in. I watched its pink and silver scales flash through the water, and it gave a mighty leap on the surface, splashing back down to continue the fight. It really was beautiful. Minutes later and finally clutching it to my chest, I looked up at Calder with a giant grin. “Can I keep it?!”

He sat back and studied his pipe with all the thoughtfulness of Sherlock, finally rolling his eyes. “Yeah, ok. ONE. You can keep one. But I better not find it stinking up the cooler 3 days from now.”

I shook my head with eyes wide in innocence, as if I’d never dream of leaving a fish uneaten… that I packed carefully away to take home… that I promptly forgot about… that I left in his Tahoe for a week before remembering it.  No. Never again. Not this girl. “Nope! I’ll have Swaz help me cook it up tonight.”

~

I gazed up at the glowing flecks of wood shimming away from the fire. The smell of cooking trout wafted up from Swaz’s pan, his pug Jezebel at his side, just daring anyone to mess with the process.  Selby’s voice rang out from the tailgate as he strummed Willie Nelson songs, the firelight playing under the brim of his Indiana Jones hat. Calder’s laughter rang out as he stood next to his father, Frankie. A tall and thin man, he had a mop of wild hair and a buckskin poncho outrageous enough that only he could wear it and command respect. Serena magically produced a fantastic bottle of red from somewhere in the darkness, a magic trick that I always appreciated. Kline was making jokes as usual from the comfort of his camp chair, a mind that was always 2 steps ahead of everyone else and left you gasping for breath or spitting out your drink. Saghatelian, DJ and Tanner had discovered a snowy hill where they could slide down like penguins, making everyone laugh at their antics. I shut my eyes halfway, letting the firelight dance across my eyelids, wondering why life couldn’t always be like this.

The sudden squawk of Price’s voice startled me from my reverie, and the next instant the world was down, my feet were up and Jezebel was unceremoniously licking wine off my face as I lay in a crumpled mess, staring up at the swaying fabric. Price was doubled over in laughter about something… and as I took a mental step back from the situation, I realized it must have been me. Apparently I had managed to fall asleep in the hammock, startled myself awake, forgot I was in a hammock and catapulted myself and my drink a good 5 feet away.  

Price helped brush off the pine needles and dirt as I gingerly made my way back to the group, making a mental note about the dangers of wine and hammocks. I shook my head in amazement at Nordy, who miraculously was still going strong and had not tumbled into the fire despite his wobbly dance moves, punctuated by a friendly swing or two in the direction of Fursty, who was twisting his mustache and shifting slightly to avoid Nordy. I settled myself on a log and joined into song with Selby about the Traveling Man, dreaming of the fish I’d catch in the morning.

The next day I stomped around the breakfast table in impatience, waiting for Price and Toad to wake up. I was counting on the fact that a Bloody Mary bar was residing in the back of their van. Price always thought of things like that- extra socks, snacks, dry bags… a trait I was thankful Calder also possessed, since I pretty much just lived off of whims and leaping first. However, whims occasionally required a Bloody Mary to be launched into action. An adventure in lock picking briefly crossed my mind, but I decided it might be rude to crawl over a sleeping couple to commandeer their alcohol at 8 am. At 9am I might be justified.

“…possessed you to run around the tent like a banshee, shouting ‘ca-caw!’ at THREE AM…” I heard Price’s voice around the corner, while Nordy looked completely bewildered, casting a glance over each shoulder to see for whom the lecture was intended. I sprinted out the door to obtain access to the van and finally, with Bloody Marys in hand, we headed for the lake.

Calder taught me how to gently remove the hook from the fish’s mouth without hurting it. A process that distracted me long enough to forget my immediate need to keep every fish that ran into my Jake spin. However, unaided, it also gave me the opportunity to sneak a fish or two into the basket while he was distracted.

The rest of the weekend continued on in its usual peaceful chaos- and the afternoon of the last day, as we all gathered for the traditional group picture, we’re already looking forward to next year’s trip.

~

“Ugh. I have gotta clean out the BroStop.” ‘BroStop being the longstanding name for Calder’s Tahoe, as it has been the adventure vehicle for all the homies over the years. It stops to pick up the bros. ‘Nuff said.

“Yeah, it’s getting a little, uh, spicy”. I wrinkled my nose at the smell that was somewhere between whiskey, campfire, and mud. We pulled up to the condo, and as I hopped out, Kline’s voice drifted out of the garage with some information about a rabbi and a bar, which was received by LB’s deep loud laugh. Calder cracked open the back hatch to investigate the mess as I began to wander inside.

“HonEEEEY!”

Uh oh. I know that tone, and it isn’t particularly one of endearment. I froze in my tracks and turned my head to see Calder holding up a soggy bag, with a limp fish tail hanging out the side. Shit. Did I really---

“Oh! Ha! Knew I forgot something.” Kline sauntered past me to claim his prize. “Fish at my place tonight? Any takers? Crazy sonsofbitches. This is a delicacy! Straight out of the streets of Hong Kong! Rolled on the thighs of Puerto Rican woman!” Calder looked at him in amused disgust and shouted a string of commands at LB that involved Lysol.  

I beat a hasty retreat into the house. Thank God for Kline.

Queen M

In high school, Madeline was the Blair Waldorf of our private school. She always wore fashionable clothes, with headbands, and had a taste for high school social politics that always left me slightly suspicious of her. The family was from New York City, and ironically moved to the tiny town of Manhattan Montana. Still, they managed to succeed in having a house large enough that I could never entirely find her bedroom without wandering for 20 minutes and hoping to God I didn’t stumble into a section I didn’t belong. The women of the family were all in great shape, with designer clothes and thick brunette hair. The men were well built football stars with perfect teeth. Her father was an instrumental part of Wall Street- a man who always wore suits, constantly had a cell phone in hand, and beautifully styled graying hair. My invitation to her 16^th birthday party sealed my selection into the “in” crowd, and I went half crazy trying to find something in my closet that wasn’t an ode to punk rock. I even managed to drive myself all the way to her house with a cast on my wrist, in a borrowed car, through a giant snowstorm.

Later in the year she discovered I had become completely twitter-painted with a good-looking rebellious boy, (who had a motorcycle, and a fast car, and played the guitar, and the drums, and was constantly in detention… gah, some things about girls never change…). She promptly weaseled herself into his car for a ride, (because of course, the most popular girl in school couldn’t find a ride), and asked him out. He later relayed this information to me in amusement, the typical high school boy that couldn’t see what was right in front of him… namely the brown haired girl named Ashley who was trying ridiculously hard to listen and not think about that shaggy blonde hair… the way it always got into his eyes… those incredibly blue eyes… that lopsided grin he had when something was really funny… those fingers that never stopped strumming the guitar while he was talking… and God I hope I don’t have something in my braces. Yup. First love is a killer. And the most popular girl in school asked him out 24 hours after I had finally admitted my crush to her. I could have strangled her during volleyball practice, and vividly imagined a fantastically worded closing statement after I kicked her ass, that ended in the entire high school applauding my ballsy move with sexy boy sweeping me off my feet while I spiked the ball into her cute little nose.    

Unfortunately, the most I could muster was a cool avoidance of Madeline for approximately a week, until I realized that my crush had in fact turned her down- and thus, I momentarily had the upper hand. Then she started telling me “I was just sooo cute”. [Note to Men: Girls do not want to be called cute unless over the age of 60, or caught doing something potentially embarrassing. Hot? Sure. Sexy? Yes. Beautiful? Even better.] ‘Cute’ was condescending. It implied I was somehow her minion with pigtails. But I choked down my rebellion, and smiled back. Because really, I was tired of not being noticed, and Madeline was my ticket to parties, and dates, and for once, feeling important.

By Senior Year I had decided that complete and utter anarchy was really the only way to live, screw Madeline and her minions. And much to my chagrin, they only liked me more. After high school and inevitable heartbreak, I tried my best to sink myself into the counter-culture- wearing boys clothes so people wouldn’t think I was cute, perfecting destruction, flying the middle finger to society. Fences that eventually separated me from everyone and everything, while I wandered aimlessly around Europe trying to find what Ashley Nettles was supposed to be.

I ran into Madeline at a wedding this Summer. She’s living back in New York, dating some Ivy League prince. And you know? I still like her. Because Madeline will always be Madeline, and there’s some comfort in that. I, of course, had ridiculous hair that stood 8 inches off my head, (for once, not my idea, but that of the bored hairdresser). But you know, that’s me. And thankfully, I’m okay with that. Today, I’m still good friends with the girls I met on a trampoline in 6^th grade- nasty perm and all. One of my closest friends is a girl I never really bothered much with in high school because she annoyed me. It’s funny how things change, and how people mature. There will always be Madelines and Blairs in this world. But they exist because they allowed themselves to be what they wanted to be, and others accepted it.

Today, the lady at the grocery store carded me for some wine.

“Oh- yeah! I recognize this ID, sorry- you just always look so different”. I wasn’t sure where to be offended, that she knew my ID, (I don’t buy that much wine! Right?), or that I look crappy some days and not others.

“Uhm yeah… some days I have time to shower, and do make-up… obviously not today” I muttered while I furiously swiped my credit card.

“Oh no- that’s not what I meant! I mean, like some days you’re in a suit wearing glasses with your hair pulled back, and some days in a flowy dress with long hair, and then you have that NOFX t-shirt…” Apparently I have a fan at the grocery store. Either that or I have got to start buying a larger quanity of groceries at a time.

So I’m a little quirky. But that’s ok. Because my friends accept it. It’s a good feeling to just be me, a me that evolves a little every day. Some days a bit less elegantly than others. Welcome to Life.  

Ah. Retail.

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I’ve always said that everyone in the world should be required to work retail for a week. One week is all it will take, and suddenly you find yourself trying to carefully put that shirt you were looking at back, perfectly folded. You start looking for a sales associate to help you, being more sympathetic to the credit card schpeal, and then- you find yourself harshly judging all other stores on their lack of customer service. I mean why can I never find anyone in Target to help me? I swear that every time I’m in, it’s nothing but red shirts and khaki’s running in the opposite direction like they have high stakes poker in the back. And then I’m left to my own devices trying to shove a futon into my cart.

I recently had a quarter-century crisis moment, and while waiting for a pedicure, wandered into Hot Topic. A serious episode of punk rock nostalgia ensued, and I ended up walking away with $30 worth of shiny diamonds to stick in my lip. Only to get home, come to my senses, and realize that there was no way to shove something back in a hole that has been closed for 2 years. So after work today I shamefacedly walked back in Hot Topic to return said lip-rings.

“Uhm. We don’t do that. Like, you know, take back BODY PIERCINGS?”

“Oh. Well yeah, guess that makes sense, I mean one would assume that they had been opened huh? Geeze, sorry, it’s just- well uhm, my hole closed.” Gah what an awkward thing to say…

Then blonde tater-tot pipes in, “Yeah? Take ‘em back? Ewww.”

Eww?EWW?! I stand up to my full height, in all my I-work-at-Victoria’s-Secret-and-look-professional-scariness. Child, if you only knew the 15 year-old bra I had to take back today. “Uh, yeah, totally- thanks guys.”

And I slunk away, even more embarrassed at my crisis moment. Yes. I pussed out. To a couple of teenbots. But really, I hate making a scene. My boyfriend, on the other hand, will let whatever waitress, sales associate, or bartender know exactly how he feels and then some. Half of me sinks down in my chair and shares a thin-lipped smile at whomever is receiving the onslaught for the luke-warm lobster bisque, as if to say ‘sorry about him, it really isn’t that bad!’. The other half is sitting in awe at his boldness and fist bumping the soup.

Confrontation? Not my thing. And while I understand that Hot Topic provides a certain, there’s-no-way-you-can-understand-my-angst-and-i-don’t-give-a-flying-f#$%, vibe- I still cannot believe I got ewwed. If I overheard my sales associate ewwing a customer, I would instantly take over the conversation and call the employee into the office. Happy to say I have never had to deal with that, even though we will take anything, and I mean anything- back (and no we don’t resell it, for those of you twisting your nose up). But seriously, customer first eh? Like don’t make them feel even worse for something they probably already feel awkward about.

Granted, sometimes things slip out of your mouth before you realize it. An adorable little woman came in to be resized, beaming at me and announced she just found out she was pregnant.

“Mmmm.” I grimaced, tightening the measuring tape around her chest, and going about business as usual. For those that know me, such a response is standard. Like the Queen in Chitty-chitty-bang-bang, the idea of a child catcher sounds like a good idea to me. I’m terrified of children, and horribly awkward around them. I looked up and realized her cheery expression had come apart, as I was clearly the first person to not gush ooey-gooey enthusiasm over the prospect of wrecking havoc on the female body.

“Uhm- I mean, when are you due? How exciting!” I force the biggest baby fever smile I can manage to recover from my unenthusiastic comment. And then she was back to her bubbly self, talking about baby showers and bottles. I throw back the miniscule knowledge I have about the joys of parenthood (much in thanks to my friend Hannah, equally baby terrified, but a champion of a mother, with infinite patience for her baby-handicapped friend).

Retail is a tricky business. With it comes a responsibility to read people, to understand what they need, even if they are nothing like you, and make sure they leave happy. And working for Vicky’s? Well, there’s a reason they call them intimates. I never want a customer to leave embarrassed, or feeling stupid. That’s my job. Now, what on earth to do with these lip rings?