The Sound of Home

I missed another family gathering, this time my little sister’s one year wedding anniversary, and housewarming party, at their new organic farm in Pennsylvania. To ease my guilt and make amends, I make a phone call. Immediately, a lump crawls into the back of my throat. If home had a sound, it’s what I hear next.

Grandma squeals my name when she realizes it’s me on the line. Grandpa gives a warm “helloooo” from what sounds like a short distance.

It’s no understatement: without these idyllic grandparents there would have been a void, the size of sugar and spice and all things nice, in the lives of at least three Roberts children. Time spent with them was a reprieve from our early admittance into the Adult World of Divorce.

These days, my siblings and I are fascinated with their personal histories, but the Greatest Generation is a tight-lipped one. To get story gold, we apply two rules of thumb: don’t miss an opportunity and start with a very specific inquiry.

On this occasion, I ask about a ring Grandpa made for Grandma.

“I don’t know how he made it or where in the world he got the idea,” says Grandma. “It’s amazing what your mind can come up with.”

Grandpa explains: he made the ring while deployed overseas during the Second World War. He used only a hammer and a knife. It took him one week to turn a George Washington quarter into a ring for a wife he’d not seen in months. (Before 1965 the coin was made of 90% silver and 10% copper).

I mistakenly remembered the ring as Grandma’s wedding band. They correct me, but no matter, this got us onto another story from the archives: their wedding.

Grandpa, an Army man, was stationed in Wisconsin; Grandma, a nurse in training, was in Maryland. The two had been engaged for a couple years. A ceremony was staved off so Grandma could finish school. She would have been forced out if she were married. Married women didn’t belong in school.

In January of 1944, during a furlough, Grandpa traveled to Fort Mead to visit his fiancé.

It was there, just outside the Fort, they were married.

“Nobody was there, except two people we didn’t know,” says Grandma. “They stood up for us,” Grandpa pipes in. They have me on speaker phone. Grandpa is at the stove sautéing zucchini from his garden. Grandma is, no doubt, perched inches from the phone’s mic. I can hear them both perfectly.

On the night of their wedding the newlyweds rented a room at a boarding house where they would spend only one night. Under the bathroom sink, there was a small space heater. Grandma’s bathrobe was too close; it caught fire.

I imagine Grandma: young, happy, tousle-haired, scared, in love and wrapped in a bathrobe with a burn hole.

She’ll go on to have seven children and later, dozens of grandchildren. This young bride will grow to be a vigilant protector. She’ll take every precaution with these children. Not one of us will escape her waterproofing method of bread bags over our socks.

But in this moment, nothing is certain for these two. The following day Grandpa returned to Wisconsin, Grandma to Fort Mead Army Camp. A portrait of the times: a husband and wife readying for war. Three months after their winter wedding, Grandma was deployed to Europe. Grandpa went shortly after.

It would be more than a year later, in April of 1945, before they would see each other again, this time in Paris. I know my grandmother to be notoriously sentimental; her grey-blue eyes can turn to glossy pools in an instant. I ask if this reunion was a weepy one. “I was too happy to cry,” she says.

But, of course, the tone was somber. “The president had just died." Grandma is talking about the American president: Franklin D. Roosevelt. "Everything was closed. All entertainment, the whole time: CLOSED! There was nothing to do but sight see. So we sight seed. We saw all of Paris and the Cathedral of Notre Dame,” Grandma recounts.

I can’t wrap my mind around the juxtaposition of this love story and the short-lived one belonging to my parents. In one generation, the narrative see-saws from a near-tragic romantic epic to, essentially, what amounts to John Cougar Mellencamp lyrics.

I have a lot of questions, I keep interrupting. Grandma says “I know it’s hard to understand. We'll tell you more when you come home.”

I want to tell them, as long as they are talking to me, I am home.
###

Yuk is invited to the party!

We've been invited to an Alter-Ego party, which of course has sent me to day-dreamville, where I usually like to start with a little logomachy.

Alternate: occurring or succeeding by turns.

Ego: the self especially as contrasted with another self or the world.

Alright, we're looking for my different self here; not to be confused an alternate can of worms: my opposite self.

My instinct is to attend the party personifying a rock star. I've long held the belief that if I could sing, "I wouldn't be here right now." Which is meant to say, I'd be touring or getting a tattoo or having a ton of casual but really intense sex.

After some examination, I decide that fantasy is just an angsty rebellion against reality. More of an alternate lifestyle than ego. I'd be navigating that world with my current ego intact.

So what's my other self doing when my self is running the show?

This is the voice that I've been trying to snuff out my entire adult life. It's jaded, cynical and usually judging you. You? You mean me? Yes, you, the you that is her alt-ego who rarely shares the light of day with her.

Most people are about 20 when the development stage of life ends, and it's about then when the battle for center stage between my alternating egos ceases. This is when Yum finally prevails over Yuk for dominate ego. But Yuk doesn't go away. The attached bell-curve (click to enlarge image) best demonstrates the relationship between the egos over the last eight years. The curve trends upwards measuring rejection and loathing of the alternate ego until age 26. This is when I come to terms with Yuk (convenient change in perception since this is also when I accept her permanence), and the curve bends, if not towards self-love than at least towards acceptance. Alt-ego says, "whatever hippie."

Ahhh, now I've got my alter-ego in the cross hairs:

Yuk ignore most grammar rules. i reject conformity in general. i only eat and wear things that others have thrown away. it tastes and looks better to me if an entitled or wasteful person has cast it aside. i don't own a cellphone and despise being subjected to half-conversations when i ride public transportation. i mostly travel by bicycle. i roll my own cigarettes with organic tobacco and i don't think that is ironic. the only modern medium i have an affinity for is blogging. and no, i don't see the irony. My blog: "everything sucks and here is why," is read by only a handful of family members who are worried about me. not that i'd admit that.

My alternate ego is a cynical, hypocritical, freegan, Luddite, blogger!

And now, finally, I know just what to wear to the party!

Jumping the shark.

Jumping the shark.

In September of 1977, Happy Days was in its fifth season. The show’s ratings were slumping and in an effort to boost ratings, the writers decided to demonstrate modern special effects and the magic of television by having the show’s star, Fonzie, jump over a shark. While waterskiing.

When Fonzie jumped the shark, some fans inherently recognized: they’d gone too far.

Likewise, rather than fading into Telluride legend -- a cautionary tale of what can happen when you involve yourself with someone else’s girlfriend – the local epic of a guerilla revenge tactic has, for me, jumped the shark.
Inside gondola cabins, on lift towers, in bathroom stalls, on stop signs, inside foosball tables, on magazine racks, in residential medicine cabinets; you can’t swing a ski pole in this town without hitting an Eric Corff sticker in the ellipsis.

Now, years after the first sightings, one has to ask: is there a statute of limitations on douchebaggery? At what point does the revenge of an act of ‘baggery out bag the original bagging? Are the marketing geniuses behind this whisper campaign available for hire?

Unlikely. Professionals would have moved on, at this point, to something fresh and possibly more damaging: “Eric Corff shops at Walmart” or “Eric Corff…he’d rather be riding your girlfriend.”

Meanwhile, tourists are confused. Some assume Corff is an elected official, which doesn’t say much for douche bags or politicians. Google the cringe-inducing phrase and you’ll find YouTube videos, sightings from as far away as Austin and Buffalo, NY and a spattering of postings from non-locals desperate for an explanation. Who is Eric Corff!?

Just like Happy Days and the Facebook Fan Page for Stickers, this Corff hater-ation has jumped the shark. It’s traveled from never being that funny to old news and embarrassing litter. Above all, it’s really mean and petty for an otherwise really nice and unaffected community.

I don’t care if Eric Corff is or isn’t a douche bag; I’m taking these stickers down when I see them, the same way I pick up trash when I come across it.

On the other hand, maybe I could cash in with “Eric Corff…is he really a douche bag?” Segway Tours.

Meow!

On Saturday, I woke with the memory of a dream.

I dreamt of tigers.

Later, I walked into town where I saw a great tiger mask. I wondered which came first, the dream or this moment?

Next, I came upon note cards illustrated with tigers.

Eureka!

That's when it occurred to me, it was the first day of the Chinese New Year: The Year of the Tiger.

Ten Years Gone

Once in a while you find yourself looking at your life as if you’ve just arrived in the present, via time travel.

On this occasion, you’re investigating current conditions from the perspective of 18-year-old you. That feels right. There is something surprisingly monumental about being 28. It’s the ten-year anniversary of turning 18. You’ve come from the past to investigate the juxtaposition.

At 18, you are a C student, waiting to find out whether you’ve gotten into any of the colleges you haphazardly applied to. You’ve never traveled by plane; in fact, you’ve barely left northeastern Pennsylvania. Friends you have, but your roster has included the same names since grade school.

As you look around this apartment, presumably yours, you don’t see any familiar faces in the photographs; finally you discover a picture on the fridge: an Olan Mills portrait of you and your siblings. You’ve seen this picture before, it was taken in 1986. This truth — that in ten years time the only people you’re still celebrating with pictures on the fridge are siblings —strikes you. A mental pact is made. You’ll take your sister to the mall. You’ll be nicer to Matt. You’ll at least try.

The windows here are tall to match the mountains just outside them. Most notable are three mammoths identical to the snow capped mountains you’ve been doodling in margins of notebooks and lazily entering into school mandated art contests since the second grade.

Your brow is furrowed. There are threads from the life you know in the apartment you will inevitably inhabit, but not the ones you expected.

There is a chalkboard that says, “Reading this confirms you are a time traveler.” Though the handwriting is neat, you recognize this is your message. Without realizing it, you’ve relaxed and the corners of your mouth are now turned slightly up. You begin to think, you might be cool.

The book shelves are full of titles you have not heard: “Jitterbug Perfume,” “Organic Housekeeping,” “Hairstyles of the Damned.” Travel, language and cookbooks own the bulk of shelf real-estate.

Rather than the ubiquitous paneling you’re accustomed to, the walls in this place are painted in rich colors. The counter-top is granite. Intuitively, you suspect you rent.

There is a paper star hanging from the ceiling and a string of brightly colored elephants. The cabinets and fridge are stocked with food, some of which you don’t recognize. You think that is an avocado, but how could you be sure. Are those yellow beets? You’ve only seen jars of magenta beets on dad’s bar, next to pickled pig’s feet.

Noticeably missing is a stereo. Eight-year-old you shows up to remind you of the radio under your pillow. You see speakers plugged into a shockingly thin laptop. Come on, did you really think you’d leave you hanging?

You don’t recognize your presumed boyfriend from photos, but he’s handsome, painfully so, and you look as you do now, but somehow different. With magnet letters, upon the fridge, it’s written, “I Love John Best.” You and John look happy together in a picture taken from across a dinner table from who knows who. You try his name on a couple times. John. John. Beth and John. John and Beth. John and Beth sitting in a tree…You suspect that maybe John lives here too. This is confirmed when you find your bedroom. You find drawers filled with men's clothing. In an otherwise tidy house, your clothes are strewn throughout the bedroom. Some things don’t change.

You hear what you think is an alarm clock and follow the noise to a phone the size of a pager. Incoming Call from Jacey. You hit a couple buttons, SEND, POWER, OK. One of them worked.

“Hello?”

A perky voice answers, “Buenos Dias Senorita.”

You don’t know anything but English. Your panic is audible.

“You okay?”

Relieved. “Yes. Are you?”

Asking “who are you?” isn’t an option as really no reasonable answer from her would explain.

“Oh yeah, just couldn’t find my goggles but I’m on my way. Are you still up for skiing?”

You glance back out those big windows and see what you didn’t notice before: ski slopes, a lift, make that two lifts, and people skiing down a very steep trail.

You swallow hard, “Yeah, how soon before you’re here?”

“I’m at the spur. I’ll be there in 10.”

You don’t know what the spur is, but hopefully, in the future, ten minutes still means 15. But really, it's gonna take ten years to figure this out.