I Survive Each Day In Order To Make You Look Better

Nary a day passes when I don’t wish that I had posted something new here on the parka-butt blog.  This is more evidence that my ambitions don’t produce the fruit that one generally hopes for when they think of their personal character and discipline.

Discipline is for unruly toddlers and training circus poodles.  Duh.

When C and I first got married and I was jobless, cat-less, and moderately hopeless, I tried to teach myself to play the guitar (something I still wish I could do), in hopes of creating some sort of personal forward-movement.  My string-picking days lasted for, well… let’s just say that my fingertips didn't even have enough time to calluses over.  

When I was in college, I held to a pretty consistent workout schedule.  Sound like willpower?  It does, doesn’t it?  That is, until you realize that I did this in order to eat vast mountains of ice cream with my roommates and regularly down a half-dozen Krispy Kreme donuts by myself.  (mixed selection, if you’re wondering).  Oh - I also beat my now-husband in an eating contest at White Castle, just in case this point needed reinforcement. 

 Mind if I finish that?

Now that I think of it, when I was in high school, I actually had quite a bit more perseverance than I do now, which is to really say that my character has taken a serious nosedive since the age of 15. 

I started playing JV basketball as a freshman – I’m still not sure why – and I never stopped.  I hated basketball.  I was consumed in hot, angry tears over it on more occasions that I dare admit, but still, I just couldn’t quit.  For all you 8^th graders out there, this is NOT a way to spend four years.   To make matters worse, I was awful: an elbow-swinging, freakishly terrified-of-the-basket, rule-violating madwoman with a mouth guard the size of a boomerang.

As we say amongst our friends, I was the show.

But at least I wasn't this guy.

I dated a young man in high school for a couple of years who was a relational train wreck, and gave him far too many chances for far too long.   I still don’t know if he was actually in it for my anxious, antisocial personality – it could have been my boomerang wielding face and cool wardrobe (read: a fair amount of dad’s military-issue clothing) that reeled him in - but for some reason, I didn’t mind that he went out with other girls and stole stuff.   

Fortunately, this young mustang grew up to be a pretty great guy (and was actually fairly kind, considering he was a hound at the time and I was afraid of the general populace), so I still consider this episode a win-win.

These days, I quit half-way through almost everything, from putting on makeup (quickly translates to putting on mascara) to reading books and completing projects.  In fact, I just started a wall-hanging project yesterday, so you can start making your wagers on whether or not I finish. 

My money’s on the other guy.  

Change Is Like Quarters And Dimes

It's been a little over a year now since C and I moved north.  As I look back, I can see that some of my personal behaviors have changed - a number of them significantly so.  Still, there are parts of life that have remained the same, which is a surprising fact on its own.  This whole experience has seemed a little like being born over again and having to figure things out from scratch.

In a good way.

Non-shockers:

• I drive less... much less, but I haven't actually found that I walk more.  I just... don't... go... anywhere.
• I've stopped shaving my legs so frequently.  When it's -20* and God has given you natural long underwear, you don't go around just lopping it off in the name of being en vogue.  We are so past vogue.  

We're so far past it that we're behind it again.

• I drink (if it's possible) more coffee than before, but I don't pay $4.25 for it.  I fill up at the grocery store, right next to the Chester Fried Chicken case, for like, one whole dollar.
• I have no idea if skinny jeans and Ray Bans are still trendy.  Are they?  Or can we finally move on to suspenders and Muck boots?
• I cook more.  That is, unless it's summer, in which case I don't cook at all, which is glorious.
• I am less driven into madness by Wal-Mart (less is still some, mind you).  One-stop shopping is kind of a big deal up here, even for newbies.
• I can still buy local eggs.
• I don't miss pop radio.   Would you?
• I am still learning the difference between Sunday Lunch and Sunday Dinner... or is it Supper?

Shockers:

• I've started wearing eye shadow.  This is a little ironic, considering 1) I work in my basement and mostly go out only to get the mail, and 2) I'll have to drive an hour and a half to buy more when I run out.  

Or, more likely, i'll just quit wearing eye shadow.

• I don't lock my door.  I used to do that, back when there was a reason to lock your door... or someone to lock outside of it.  Now, I mostly want to lock people in.  Visitor-people.  This could be you.
• Is that a squirrel in the freezer?  Oh, yes - yes it is.  

Yes. 

It.

Is.

• I have a bird feeder.  It's the middle of nowhere, in 0* weather, and I can't get any birds to eat at my bird feeder.  What are they thinking?
• Instead of getting a real hair cut, this morning I just had C snip off "the mullet part" before I got in the shower.
• I have cable [and a hipster somewhere falls down dead every time I turn it on].
• I can purchase marrow bones, chicken livers and Snow Cap lard at the same place I buy my shoes.
• I find myself racing out of the house, at 11PM, in only my pajamas, to catch a glimpse of the Northern Lights.

I know what you're wondering and no, I haven't seen them.  

Cold for nothing.

• I have driven a front-end loader, albeit only for a minute or two, and I was mostly just holding the brake.  They can't take that away from me.
• My friends enter raffles for MACHINE GUNS.  You know who you are.  

I still struggle to be on time for anything, and I continue to impress hosts of people with my uncanny ability to strangle the life out of stories, but of all the things that have changed or stayed the same over this year, I'm most grateful for my friends.  

The good.  The bad.  The ugly.  Especially the ugly; nothing makes you feel good like an ugly friend.

Just kidding.  You got me.

It's the special friends that make you feel good.

  

Facial Reconstruction

This past Saturday morning, my friend and I were getting ready to head out to the children’s museum I told you about yesterday.  Her two year-old daughter was keeping me company as I tidied up my bedroom.  She was helping me pull the comforter up on my bed, wiping down the bathroom sink with me, and generally doing all the work.  Along with the normal stuff, our real estate agent had scheduled a showing for later that morning, so we had to get the place clean as well as replenish all of our bribe money, which really takes some time.

So my little sidekick and I finish cleaning up, and since it’s getting close to the time we’d decided to head out for the day, I return to the bathroom to start “doing my face”. 

Doing 

my 

face.

Now, I don’t know where that phrase came from – I don’t even like using it – but I also don’t feel like I wear enough product to warrant saying that I’m “doing my makeup”, so really, there isn’t a more pleasant alternative.  I apologize.   

So I begin doing my face - putting my face on, taking my face off – whatever it is that involves washing and covering up the zits that have sprouted during the night.  And as I perform each step of my routine, my little friend is asking me, “what’s that thing”, or “what are you doing”.  It started innocently, with me explaining why we wash our faces, but we were quickly in sinister territory. 

It all started when I pulled a set of tweezers out of my bag.  If there was ever an instrument that looked hazardous to your face, this was it.  She looked horrified.  “What are you doing?!”, she asked, in that sweet but appalled voice that only children posses.  She looked like I’d just shown her where the vet sticks the cat thermometer for the most accurate reading, and was thinking that perhaps that was how one got the most accurate human reading, too.  In that moment I realized that what I was doing seemed totally absurd.  Here I was, telling a two year old that I was using sticky black paint to make my eyelashes long and pretty like hers.  I was using foundation to cover any spots on my face.  (Spots?  Don't animals have spots?)  I tried to whip through the lipstain phase so she wouldn’t ask why I was doing it.  The only answer I could think of had to do with clowns and strawberries.  It was better to stay quiet.

Back when I was in high school, I went on this youth retreat with my church.  One evening we played a game.  We were told to find a partner, and each set was given a bag of supplies.  The object of the game was to use the supplies in your bag as makeup for your partner’s face, and that the best job done in the allotted time would win.  I, of course, became the canvas, and as soon as the game began, my partner cracked open our first supply: tomato ketchup.  Now, I don’t know when it became a good idea to take something with vinegar as a key ingredient and smear it all over your face, but we were doing it, and we were going to win.  Next, she screwed the top off a jar of marshmallow fluff.  I can’t even remember where that went.  Mustard followed that.  Yes, what graces your Hebrew National in July was now giving my eyelids the nice sheen that accompanies chemical burns.  Thank goodness we didn’t have any combs - it could have been mascara.  Lastly, I got hit with a dollop of peanut butter lipstick.

For the sake of retelling, I really wish I had a peanut allergy, but I don’t.  I also have a photo of this, but it's at the other house.  Regrets.

So there I am, sitting on the carpet, covered in lunch condiments.  And in the time it takes for everyone to be judged and the winners announced, I’ve developed two pink, semi-permanent, soda-can sized circles on my cheeks.  It took at least 12 hours for the ketchup stain to fade, and I’m pretty sure my face stung for at least the next day.

We did win the game, though.

I'm hoping that my friend's daughter doesn't take Saturday's makeup lesson to heart.  As I was applying what I consider normal tools of maintenance, all she probably saw were the makings of a good hot dog. So please, next time you guys are at a ball game, get her a pretzel.  No cheese, no mustard.  Just salt.  Or better yet, dry.