It really is time to start watching my mouth around the house. Tonight after dinner Somnia came into the kitchen and uttered the phrase, “mama has jugs.” Wow, how do you react to that? You really retrace your language steps when confronted with such words from your child.
Can’t deny the truth in the statement and that I have probably uttered a similar phrase numerous times over the last few weeks with mama being pregnant and all. That said, and regardless of how true it may be, you really don’t need your kid going and repeating these kinds of things at day care. Personally, I find it innocent and true. I have no hang-ups about talking about such things with my kid. That said, many people do and I don’t want to impose my language on their kids via my child any more than I want their parents imposing habits or language on my child that I might find offensive (like racism, xenophobia etc…) via their children.
It brings me back to an even funnier episode when we were making an offer on our house at the real estate agent’s office. This was our first home purchase so I was a tad nervous about laying out an offer for such a large quantity of money. As we completed signing the papers, the agent went out to make photocopies. I don’t know if Somnia sensed my nervousness or what but the second the agent crossed the threshhold back into her office Somnia belted out “Papa, don’t fart in this lady’s office.” To this day, I can’t for the life of me even come up with a loose-fitting theory on why Somnia would have said such a thing at such an inopportune time. It was not like we were talking about farts while the lady was out making photocopies. I don’t think there had even been any fart conversations or episodes that whole day.
Dealt with that card of inappropriateness from your kid, you are really left with no escape. I really had not farted nor had I considered farting in her office. Yet, everyone takes for granted that kids repeat the truth, so that lady had to be assuming that I had truly heated a hole into her chair. I knew she was thinking this and that I had no way out so I simply looked at her and replied, “what do you say that?” Denial would have only made me look guiltier. I then turned to Somnia and asked aloud, “Why? What would make you say such a thing?” Somnia, knowing from my beet red face that I was affected by her outburst, was instantly aware of her linguistic faux pas.
I concluded the episode by looking at the agent and telling her, “tonight you have one hell of a funny story to tell your family at dinner.” We all laughed a bit and pressed on. Regardless of my real innocence, for the rest of her life she will tell her friends the story of the nasty pig that rotted in her office while she was at the photocopier. For the rest of mine, I will really try to watch my topics of discussion in front of kids.
There are just some things for which we will never get accurate data. One such unattainable number is the percentage of innocent individuals who have been successfully run through a death sentence to its completion. Human factors, most specifically, the human propensity to lie at all costs in order to save our own asses, will forever prevent us from ever obtaining true data on this and many other topics.
Most recently, officials in the commonwealth of Virginia ran the DNA of convicted rapist Roger Keith Coleman through a more sophisticated regiment of testing in order to prove or disprove the innocence that Coleman unwaveringly proclaimed right up to his ultimate roasting on the electric chair in 1992. Much to the frustration of Coleman’s small group of supporters, the DNA evidence re-proved his guilt beyond a conceivable doubt. Along with re-proving Coleman’s guilt as a rapist, the evidence also proved him a liar. Imagine that, a rapist who also shares the dubious distinction of being a really good liar.
This guy was a real scumbag, it was proven, but that doesn’t mean that even the most ethically sound of us would not lie with the same ferocity if it were going to prevent us from taking a permanent dirt nat. This is how a guy like Stanely ‘Tookie’ Williams could do seemingly charitable, and probably heartfelt deeds while at the same time never confessing to, or seeking penance for his original crimes.
A recent insignificant event made me think of yet another occurrence where the accurate compilation of percentages would be an impossibility. I walked out of a burrito place the other day and was greeted by the smiling mom of a college student stopping me and asking how the burritos tasted. It was a rare pleasant moment of friendliness from a complete stranger and I was happy to give her my overall thoughts on the burritos and suggest a menu item or two. At the same time, the look on her face was the look of “free pass.” She had just arrived in a college town for a weekend stay with her son or daughter and was feeing her youth and the unbolted freedom to talk to a stranger on the street, something she would never do in her normal everyday existence. I knew the look in her eye all too well. It is the same look shared by most 30, 40 and 50 somethings as they enter a bar at Put-in-Bay on a summer day, the look of location-induced rule revision pertaining to personal behavior.
Now here are the thoughts that the previous event triggered. Every year at the university, swarms of moms converge onto campus for an entire weekend aptly titled "Moms Weekend." Every year these same moms pack into the uptown bars with their kids and their kids’ friends and every year the stories of moms ending up in drinking induced “relations” with willing college boys abound. I have heard stories recounted from real witnesses of the debauchery on several occasions. The whole “married moms hooking up with college boys while on campus” phenomenon is something we could never get a real handle on numerically or percentage-wise. My guess is that such situations happen far more than we think and these women will take these secrets to their grave. It’s only speculation, but I highly doubt that confessions could be obtained even in an anonymity-guaranteed, organized scientific study partly out of fear of their husbands or family finding out and partly out of fear of having to admit their deed to themselves.
The bottom line is that there are some topics and phenomenon for which we will never know the true occurrence rate via quantified data thanks to the complexity of the human psyche and the need for humans to protect themselves via lies. I am willing to accept certain mysteries in the spiritual and religious realm but the thought of mere humans fooling science with something as simple as a lie is bothersome. Then again maybe all the crap that I am hiding will somehow save my ass someday. ;-)
This is from a post about the 2 drummers of the band Rush that I sent to an email distribution list:
A Friend wrote:
The one and only John Rutsey.
Rhymes with sucksy.
I wonder if he and Pete Best ever went on fishing trips together. If they did, they no doubt came home, talking about the one that got away.
Then I wrote:
If John Rutsey had remained Rush's drummer, we would know Rush as one of the all time great, smart and prolific songwriting teams from the great white north. i.e. a BAND. We would have refered to them as a BAND as opposed to the freakshow hey "what drum fill will Neil Peart do next?" show.
Neil Peart is selfish and drummers can't be selfish, otherwise they aren't drummers. Only guitarists and singers can make selfish personalities work for them. Drummers are at their best at a state of complete selflessness. Neil Peart's antics are fun at a party when everyone is loaded and wants to see their buddy play as fast as he can. It might even work at a jazz club where "The Neil Peart Show" opens up for the "Dave W(a)ckle Experience". Hell, you could almost even create an Olympic sport around Peartish style playing but music that will survive the ages...nope. Thanks to Neil Peart, Rush records will be carved from rock layers in 400 years while bands with real drummers like Charlie Watts, JOhn Bonham and Phil Rudd will still sell in stores.
Don't get me wrong, I listened to "All The World's a Stage" until the cassette tape fell apart. It was a fun era but so was Motley Crue's "Shout at the Devil" to my 5th grade self. With maturity I learned what could have turned Rush from a good band to a great band. Once they injected Peart into their collaboration they stunted what they really could have become.
After spending a substantial amount of time completely ripping apart and refinishing one of the rooms of our house, I decided that I wanted a different door. From a craftsman’s standpoint this is not the optimal time to add a new door. New doors always are at their most precise fit and function when the door and doorjamb are purchased and installed as a unit. Regardless, Ingrid and I purchased a raw, unfinished door and I began to work at installing it myself.
Fitting and installing a door into the original doorjamb of a 90 year old house is no easy task. The standard 32” wide, 79” high door just doesn’t fit. A great deal of custom fabrication is required put it in place. In the process of this door wrangling, I endured several splinter stabs, skin slices and a drill that crapped the bed in the middle of boring the door for the knob installation.
While my door is not perfect, it does have a personality that fits my house’s age of almost a century.
Places with this kind of imperfect personality, or what I would call “grit”, are where I find myself most comfortable. Perhaps this is why I find myself so at ease in parts of New York City and Appalachia. Perhaps this is why I found Haiti to be such a beautiful place.
This might also be why I consistently find myself so uncomfortable in Columbus, Ohio. We spend this morning and early afternoon at Easton Town Center picking up clothing provisions. For those not familiar with Easton Town Center, it is actually more aptly described as an “anti town center.” Towns or at least the towns that I like to be in grew organically out of a community of people who share similar location and needs. Their town center was where the community came together to fulfill their needs by buying objects found in the town center and to provide for their needs by offering services that others need to buy. New York’s various neighborhoods could be viewed as a congested collection of town centers that service the inhabitants of the respected neighborhood.
Everything about Easton Town Center is a cookie cutter attempt at creating “perfection.” From the sidewalks that you could lick, to the piped in music and even their website. (It’s designed from a template used by similar shopping villages all over the country) It brings a chuckle as I look at the apartments across the street built to look like East Coast brick row houses and stores like RUEHL whos entire exterior is built to appear as a mini version of a New York City or Boston Brownstone.
If you viewed a Pastrami sandwich from another planet through a telescope you could replicate that sandwich’s lines and colors but never the flavor. This is how I see Easton Town Center. They have replicated all the inconsequential elements of what makes a really great neighborhood or town center. They left out all the grit and flavor. On top of that, what good is a town center where you can’t find a bakery, fruit stand, pizza by the slice, butcher etc….
OK Keesey, if you hate this place so much, why did you go there to buy your clothes?
Guilty I suppose. I fall occasionally for the convenience of many clothing stores conveniently located in one location. As much as I hate the aesthetic of Walmart, I am guilty of shopping there too. Sure, I love New York, but I’m no Upper East Sider who can afford to shop at small designer Boutiques and I am too vain to go back to dressing in clothes from Sears or Kmart. My point is, I like the products offered by some of the stores in Easton, I just hate the time I have to spend walking through the Disney-like farce of Easton to get to the point where I buy my clothes.
What this all comes down to is a personal taste that does not run congruent with taste of your typical inhabitant of Columbus Ohio. I recently read a great essay by Paul Graham on American design. He notes that Americans are good with software innovation and Films, lousy with cars and city architecture. His essential premise is that Americans are most innovative when design requires speed to market in a messy process. We fall short in designing cars and cities because we consistently focus on short-term success by letting focus groups spec our end product as opposed to innovative design.
Regardless of its squeaky clean exterior, Easton Town center is a design disaster. It will succeed for 15 even 20 years just as City Center did. It is exactly what people in Columbus want RIGHT NOW. It’s clean, safe, with plenty of parking and a convenient location. In 20 years, when the suburbs of Columbus have moved into the next hip cornfield, Easton will finally start to take on some of the “grit” that will finally make it a “real” place. Unfortunately, once this happens, all the large stores will leave for the next hot development project, as will the middle class Columbus shoppers.
As for this shopper, I will have to temporarily shelve my distain for personality-less stores and shopping centers as I must head to Lowes to pick up a new drill so I can finish my somewhat imperfect door.
It was suggested to me by a good friend that I recount a funny and humiliating story from 2003 for the amusement of my blog readers. The story has three characters, my wife Ingrid, my friend Dave whose last name I won’t use (I will however divulge that you can find a link to his website at the bottom of the front page of this blog :-)), and of course the third character and victim in the story is yours truly.
The story begins with Dave sending me an instant message. What Dave didn’t know at the time was that Ingrid was on our computer at home which signed on automatically under my name so he was actually sending his message to Ingrid. So far, the situation is rather banal with Ingrid quickly enlightening Dave that she was on the computer signed in under my name. The subsequent minutes of online conversation between Dave and my wife are where the plan was hatched that would transform me into a bumbling fool in front of all of my co-workers.
My office was laid out in an open plan. Open plan is great for teamwork, not so great for having private, non-work related phone conversations. I took the call from my wife much like I took calls from my wife everyday expecting small talk and the typical “how is your day going” conversation. What I got was an angry voice asking:
“WHO’S LINDA?”
“Linda?” I said “she’s my regional manager, why?”
Again Ingrid with her anger apparently escalating asks, “WHO IS LINDA?”
At this point I really start reflecting hard as to whether there is something that I have done wrong that I should be confessing to. Nothing came to mind. Trying to infuse some rational discourse into the conversation I replied:
“Tell me WHY you want to know who Linda is?”
Ingrid then goes into the brilliant and devious backstory stating:
“Dave instant messaged me and he thought that I was you. He asked how everything was with the “Linda” situation. When I told him it was Ingrid not Chris and asked who Linda was, he started apologizing and trying to cover his tracks...”
As she finishes recounting this story she has a very convincing fake cry going and has infused a thicker Haitian accent into her speech which is the tell-tale sign that she is really angry.
At this point I am starting to boil and my voice is beginning to escalate as I desperately try to figure out what the hell is going on. This is also the point where my co-workers begin to notice that there is a rather serious “marital issue” type conversation going on.
“INGRID,” I interrupted, “there is no Linda, I for the life of me have no fucking clue what Dave is talking about. I can’t even imagine what is going on in his head at this moment”
Ingrid returns to her hard line of questioning, “WHO’s LINDA?” she says then hangs up the phone on me which is another tell-tale sign that she is deeply angered.
Now picture me sitting at my desk knowing that everyone in the office is doing their best to act like they didn’t hear what just transpired. The feelings at that point can only be compared to a public nudity that I had not volunteered for. Within five minutes my marriage has gone down the shitter, all my co-workers witnessed it, and worst of all, I didn’t do anything.
I called Ingrid back. She answers in the same state she hung up in again resuming her questions about the identity of Linda. She then ups the stakes:
“…And by the way,” she states “Your friends are nuts!”
I questioned this sudden revelation only to receive the following response that churned an already disturbing situation into one where I really began to question whether I had slipped oddly into some alternative reality.
Ingrid proceeded to describe what transpired after Dave dropped the “Linda” bombshell, I felt my face heating like someone had lit a fire in the room.
“Dave called me after he accidentally mentioned Linda.” she said “He was apologizing over and over then he said there was one way that I could get back at you and suggest that he and I get together sometime.” Ingrid then in a half cry / half scream bellowed “He’s FUCKED UP! All your friends are FUCKED UP!”
I was sweating at this point, boiling over with anger. “Is he drunk?” I asked. “Ingrid you have got to calm down and think this through. Doesn’t this just seem entirely too weird to be reality?”
Ingrid continued with proclamations about my insane friends and my apparent indiscretions with “Linda”
I had reached the point where I need to go to the source to get to the bottom of this lunacy. With the noise floor so heightened from crying and screaming everything I said was in a yell to get above it, “Ingrid, I am going to call Dave and see what the hell is going on in his head”
I dropped a final attempt at an assurance “This is not reality Ingrid. Dave has snapped. He has literally gone nuts. You have to believe that.” I then hung up to call Dave.
I collected myself quickly before calling Dave, who I believed had either gone stark raving mad or was in the middle of an intense bender. I had intense visions of what was about to happen playing in my head. What do I say to a guy who has gone off the deep end and made me a victim of his madness. Do I threaten him? Do I drive up to his house and demand an answer in person for why he would want to destroy my marriage?
I picked up the phone. Fingers shaking, I dialed the number. By now, I had briefed one of my coworkers on what was going on. They sat at their desk watching intently as to what events were about to unfold. Dave answered the phone:
“Hello”
“Dave, it’s Keesey”, I replied and then burst into expletive laden questioning. “What the fuck are you doing?”
Dave’s immediate response was to break into hyena-like laughter. This confirmed my suspicions that he was loaded or out of his tree.
“Are you loaded” I asked “What is your problem? Dude, you have totally screwed up my marriage”
Dave continued his evil laughter but now began adding “You didn’t really believe it did you?”
“Believe what?” I asked
Dave’s laugh became even more thunderous. “Ingrid and I put the whole thing together. We came up with the whole story” he said as he continued laughing uncontrollably.
The feeling was like bursting a humungous blister. Such immediate relief followed by a different kind of pain, the pain of knowing that after years of proclaiming to numerous people that I could not be “punked” I had indeed been “punked”…severely.
While I sincerely do get a periodic chuckle out of recounting this tale of being so thoroughly duped, I also am continually aware that there are two people in this world to whom I owe an equal if not greater repayment of sorts. Please send any ideas via email. ;-)