Memories, Light the Corners of my Mind: Valentines

Damn you CWG.
Your post about VD, er Valentines Day, got me all Time Machine-like.  So while I should be working on cataloging paperwork…

Before I went to The Smart Kids School, I was part of the regular school crowd.  Duh.  Anyway.
I totally remember stressing out about VALENTINE’S DAY.  This tradition ceased when I entered TSKS, as I can’t recall exchanging Valentines past 5th grade (Daffy, that’s um, level, well, I was 10 in 5th grade).

James Brown and I had been in the same school from about 5 years old.
We were bussed into the K-2nd grade school because there wasn’t one nearby.
The school for 3rd-8th graders was closer and we used to walk to school.  Both ways.  Uphill.  With WonderBread bags in our moonboots.*  It’s not that we were poor, it’s just what you did.
I lived two blocks from the main intersection and James lived on one of the main streets.  Invetibly, we’d end up walking to school together; before that, we’d be bussed together do to our geographic area.
James’ parents were M.I.A. so his grandparents were raising him.  He always (and I’m talking right up though high school) wore black dress pants and white t-shirts.   I guess being raised by people who were six times your age would tend to skew your view of the world a bit.
So much so that he thought we were dating.
And he had this obsession with Garfield; which I totally forgot until I started looking for photos of old valentines.
So, he always thought it was his duty to walk me to and from school, come over to see if I wanted to play, etc. etc. and I pretty much wanted him to leave me alone because he was a dork and I was “super cool” with my big hair and clip-on coin earrings.
Without fail, from the time we started exchanging valentines, until I transfer to TSKS, I would get James’ BEST valentine.

I do believe he also used to give me candy on V.D.  You know how it was back then, spending your entire allowance on one person…  And we weren’t even in the same class.
Mom would MAKE ME give him a valentine, though I never wanted to**.
Well, after The Transfer, he couldnt walk me to school because I got bussed.
He’d still come over every once in a while to see if I wanted to hang out (“Uh, as if!”).
Once high school came, he was one of the first people to get a car and he would come over and ask me to go out on dates with him (“I’m, um, busy, or something…”).
Eventually he gave up.  And by “eventually” I mean I think we were 17…18?
We ended up working together at the local grocery store towards the end of high school and I remember him meeting someone he was over the moon about.
Half of me was a bit curious if he was a catch under the uniform.  Half of me was relieved.
But then he started talking to me about his sex life, and well, the kid used to eat paste.

My first year at TSKS, Andrew Wolfe used to come into our classrom because he was so damn smart, he had to come to our room for 7th grade math***.
Once again, I became Princess of Dorks.
Andrew was so sweet on me, he’d give me his best Valentine, notes, cards, candy, much to my embarrasment.  Total Embarrasment.
After the better part of a school year of rejection, Andrew finally got the picture and stopped bothering me.
When I moved up to 7th grade, his 6th grade class was on the same floor as the library.  When he’d see me, he’d scoul or look at the floor.
Sometimes I still wonder what happened to him.

Soon, we will discuss who got MY best valentine.

* My dad used to try and re-waterproof my boots with stinky-ass mink oil.  All it did was help me identify my locker by scent.  And WonderBread bags (no other brand) had some imaginary power to keep your feet dryer when your boots did leak.  LIE.
** Later I found out that I was one of the few who would give him valentines.
*** Andrew would have been in 5th grade.  Math and English were taught at your grade level and one grade above.

I’m a Cheater.

Dear XXX,

I have been faithful to you for the past 20-something-ish years now.
Lately though, I am starting to wonder what else there is out there.  Curiosity is getting the best of me and the only thing you’ve changed in the past 20-something-ish years is your address.
I feel as though your chambers are a library.  Drenched in yellows and browns, your once shining resin clock is now yellowing and that cross-stitch in the corner seriously needs a dusting.  While I do not doubt your cleanliness, I wonder about who has been here before me.
And after all these years, you ask me the same questions, to which you already know the answers.   You ask me at the most awkward times, reducing me to a muttering of “uh-huh”.
Do we have bad blood over the pre-Steve?  It’s not that I wanted to send him to you, it’s that I needed to get him out of the house before I tied his testicles to the deck railing and left him out in the snow.
I know that I still have some hard feelings about when you sent me over to see your friend.  Now he was a jerk.   I figured that all of our time together would have lead you to have me see someone else; knowing what I physco I become.  Come to think of it… maybe he wasn’t your friend after all.
You know, speaking of my conditions, I figured that maybe you should have been one of the first ones to notice that something was rotten in Denmark rather then blowing me off.  I often wonder if you wouldn’t have been so rushed if we may have curtailed a lot of this pain and practically permanent damage.
Finally, I know that you run a business and the business of business is to make money.  However, our visits lately have seemed more like a cash grab then a genuine concern for my well-being.  I am a bit apprehensive to see if there’s anything that you may have missed in your hastiness.  I am also excited to see if you weren’t on the mark about some of my other concerns.
It is with this sentiment that I tell you that I am going to cheat on you.
I am going to see a new dentist.
There, I said it.

Sincerely Yours,
Stephanie

Note to Self: Children at the Grocery Store, Part 2

Yesterday I’m taking care of my relatively short grocery shopping list.
I come down the aisle towards the milk coolers and there are people standing in front of both doors to the skim milk.  And they’re not talking about skim milk.  GET OUT OF MY WAY.

Then, around the corner comes a mom with four (yes, 4) kids aged infant to 7/8-ish.  I don’t estimate kids ages well.  The older one had a cart, so he could have been 5 or 15.  Regardless, so there is this mom with one of those huge shopping carts that has the car on the front (akin to the picture below, in case you live under a rock) with a kid who keeps entering/exiting the car,

a baby in the cart section (I think those are in aisle 15A, BTW), a toddler with a balloon and her lackey son with a cart of various diapers.
I’m pretty sure she saw me, which just raised my anger when she hit me in the ankle with the car/t and didn’t apologize.  She was trying to sneak her baseball team in the out end of the next aisle.  Oh,  unless I’m the only one who see the grocery aisles governed by the same rules as the road and water (red right return).
So naturally, she tries to cut me off.   And after hitting me in the ankle, I cut her off.  No way lady… don’t think so.
Halfway down the aisle, she parks the minivan about an arms length away from the shelves while the balloon toting kid dances (in a very not cute way) in front of the car, but just a little towards the other side so no one can get by.  It’s been a while.  Mom is deciding between stewed and diced tomatoes.  “Morgan (or whatever suburban name it had), get out of the way, you’re blocking people.”
And there is a collective sigh of relief from the people who want to get to the other end of the aisle.
“Chance,” she turns behind her to the son with the cart while pushing her cart forward (yeah, see the problem here?) “Can you push the cart?  Just make sure that you don’t hit anyone in the ankles.”
And I hurled a can of Chunky at her.
No, I kid.
I glared at her.
And laughed when I heard her trying to discipline her troops three aisles away.  “Morgan, Morgan.  Morgan.  MORGAN!  Get in, no, get over here, Morgan.  Morgan, get in the cart.  In the cart.  Morgan.  Now.  No.  No.  NO.  GET IN THE CART.  Now.  Morgan.  No, put that down.  NOW.”  etc.

This is bad idea because…

So, I’m racking my brain on what my to write as a new story; seeing as writing makes me feel better, not to mention smrt [sic].
One of the pages I subscribe to has a post about what happened in the ’90s… and I’m thinking to myself “what a premise for story!  A person gets stuck in this eternal time warp is is socially retarded!  Awesome!”
And then I remember the show, The Winner, and figured out that a story like that shouldn’t be written.  Ever.
Other help-help-I’m-from-another-time viewings:
* Blast from the Past
* 13 going on 30
* The Time Machine (okay, grated that the OTHER way, but you know what I mean)
* Back to the Future (if you DARE bring up #3 after this post, I will tie you to railroad tracks and let you be run over by a STUPID time-traveling/ghost train.  You’ll get the stupid.)

Short version: here we go again… I will spend more time THINKING about what to write then writing.

New Story Posted

Small Conversation

Haven’t quite figured out if this is how it should end, though I know I could go on and on with it…

Let me know if you need a password.  If you got the password once, you already have it.

So Close, yet so Far

growler.
Last week I wrote a short fiction piece.  And I finished it (which is truly amazing).
Since then, I’ve been itching to write again.
Much like the days when I was prolific, I have my best ideas in the shower or right before I fall asleep.  Both are inconvenient; particularly the sleeping one as I need to take advantage of when I am tired.
See, if Stephanie isn’t mentally stimulated enough during the day, her brain works overtime between the hours of 11pm and 530am.  This may or may not lead to nightmares, frustrating dreams, migraines….
I want to write.  I need to write.  I have to write.

A couple of nights ago, I had a FANTASTIC idea for a piece and it was RIGHT BEFORE I fell asleep.  And once I’m up, it takes a good half hour or so to fall back to sleep, which makes getting up and writing my ideas down an impossibility.  And wouldn’t you know it, the idea is lost in [the] space [between my ears].

Blogging helps, but it’s not creative enough.    And if the muse isn’t there (like if I write because I feel like I have to, rather then wanting to) I do not like the pieces I create and will be even less motivated to finish the piece.

Oh, and if you’re so inclined to read the short story, drop an e-mail address in the comment box and I’ll send you the link and password.  Because I’m freakish about my writing.

Perhaps this is part of the problem: