Posted on by cheryloreglia · 32 Comments

Who’s Dealing With the Luggage?

Photo by Daria Shevtsova on Pexels.com

It’s early morning, we’re in the middle of Holy Week, patiently awaiting Easter, not standing in the full light just yet, but full of trust in our Lenten work. If I were being honest I would admit mine was an epic fail, but I’m hopeful because I believe the roots of new life often lie in the decay of that which we hold onto, hoard really, stuff we’re trying to unload, and by the way we can’t do it alone.

When entering the epic Easter story, where death precariously hangs a few scant inches over our heads (Craig Lounsbrough), having been methodically placed there one piece at a time by a lifetime of choices. The reality is until we understand the gravity of what hangs but a breath away, we will not understand why Jesus hung on a cross to sweep it all away. Praise be to God.

Larry says to me, as I’m sipping my coffee, and enjoying the prospects of a day without prospects, “I’ve read about this before, it happens all the time.”

“Honey, I might need a little more information if I am to agree, or not?”

He glances at me over the rim of his rather feminine-looking reading glasses (I believe they are an old pair of mine), balanced at the end of his generous nose, as if he just noticed I was in the room, but he fails to fully register my presence, and promptly returns to the article he’s browsing on his phone.

Suit yourself, I return to my inner musings, and warm coffee, it’s as if I were alone, but not, which I’m quite familiar with thank you. This is how marriage with an introvert manifests, I’m here, but not fully realized.

Just when I believe we’ve put the mysterious matter behind us, he looks up and says, “Rental cars, when you check out they’re death traps.”

“Really, you’ve rented hundreds over the years, and managed to survive?”

He says, “listen to this, yesterday some doorknob leaving the rental car parking lot plowed into the car in front of him, took out the woman who was unloading her trunk.”

“I’ve never heard of such a thing?”

“It happens all the time. I always stand to the side of the car when I’m checking out.”

“So that’s why you have me deal with the luggage?”

I get the look.

“Do you need a refill?”

“I do.”

So this got me thinking about the importance of where we stand, not just in parking lots, but our practices, and perspectives. As Abraham Lincoln was known to say, “be sure to put your feet in the right place, then stand firm.” In this case, it’s to the side of danger.

I believe a healthy perspective is an important attribute, along with a sense of humor, because the world is not fixed, everything is contingent on each other.

It’s early afternoon, I’m back in my room grading papers and simultaneously working on this week’s post. It’s true, women can multitask, both projects suffer, but we get shit done.

Larry walks into our room after hours of revamping a two-bedroom unit we’re – meaning Larry – is preparing to rent. He says, “you have no idea what a cluster of gopher poo (he used a scrappier word but you get the gist) I had to deal with today.”

I say, “oh no, what happened,” giving his tale half an ear as I continue to grade reflections on turning sin into salvation.

He goes into a long explanation about the state of the sinks in the unit, how he just finished replacing the kitchen sink, when he decided to replace the leaky trap in the bathroom sink, tighten it up a bit, and the entire sink cracked. He spent the better part of an hour breaking out the tile and removing the shattered sink. Now he has another installation to finish before we can rent the place.

I say, “rentals age like people, you go years without a problem, and then wham, you’re bombarded with issues.”

He says, “seems as if I’m inundated with leaky traps.” Was he trying to be funny?

“As you know they’re hard to replace.”

I glance to my left where my husband of thirty-eight years is now snoring in the chair right next to me. I came in here to be alone, to think, consider my words, but like he has for thirty-some years, he prefers to sleep right next to me, and I think that’s sort of romantic.

After throwing a blanket over the snoozing man, I head to the family room to empty a few more cupboards in preparation for our upcoming remodel. I can only do a few at a time, it’s emotionally draining. Pieces of my former self are stacked in these cavernous crevasses and I’m forced to sit and revisit these memories. I reacquaint myself with the master chef I was going to be, the world traveler, the published writer, the interior decorator, the supreme quilter, the domestic engineer, but above all the mother extraordinaire.

I manage to empty several cupboards of memorabilia which I load into three boxes and carefully stack in the garage. I’m sweaty, exhausted, and feeling nostalgic, haunted by delusions about who and what I was going to be, but now realize I fell short in many of my aspirations. I wonder if this is how God felt when he was emptying the tomb?

I did what I could, but could I have done more? I suppose, but at whose expense? The painful truth is we gravitate towards our truest desires, right through the mess of life, despite the pitfalls, and unexpected turn of events. We all have our limitations, and we can use them to derail ourselves, or God forbid…ask for help!

I still believe it might be easier to die than remodel a house, at least on the other side you don’t need all this baggage. Sue Augustine says the time has come to lay that baggage down and leave behind all the struggling and striving.

I retire to the backyard, Larry joins me on the patio, our backyard is broken up into informal beds containing a miniature maple tree, Italian fountain, playset for the grandkids, with an assortment of pots filled with geraniums, succulents, and inpatients arranged with casual precision around the patio. The arbor is only standing because of a magnificently overgrown wisteria now bursting with purple foliage. As a whole, the garden is charming, but largely dilapidated.

It seems we are currently inundated with stages of dilapidation, including our dwellings, our purposes, and our bodies, but we’ve managed to stand to the side of danger for the most part.

I return to the story of Easter and the moment Jesus emerged from the tomb, groggy, confused, and disoriented from all the trauma to find his beloved companion standing beside him. I can only imagine how excited Mary was to hear him call her by name and calmly instruct her to go and share the good news, “I have risen.”

The Easter story could have been considered an epic fail, but God transforms that which appears to be tragic into triumph, the inevitability of death into the miracle of new life, and by the way she deals with the luggage.

I’m Living in the Gap, join me in the safety of the comments! How’s the renovations going?

Anecdotes:

  • “Everyone has baggage, maybe we should help each other carry it.” Rob Liano
  • “To believe in the story of Easter is to believe that a wall is nothing more than a door in disguise.” Craig D. Lounsbrough
  • “People are here because they’ve got baggage. I’m talking curbside-check-in, pay-the-fine-’cause-it’s-over-fifty-pounds kind of baggage. Get it?” Lauren Kate
The patio…
Posted on by cheryloreglia · 43 Comments

“Honey, I’m Home Forever”

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

“Often when you think you’re at the end of something, you’re at the beginning of something else. I’ve felt that many times. My hope for all of us is that “the miles we go before we sleep” will be filled with all the feelings that come from deep caring – delight, sadness, joy, wisdom – and that in all the endings of our life, we will be able to see the new beginnings.”
― Fred Rogers

I’ve been shot, twice now, in the left arm, and I’m a little unsettled about life after vaccination. Additionally, I’m horrified to admit I’ve developed a mild case of agoraphobia over the last year, might have something to do with prolonged Zoom calls. It’s a theory, baseless really, but if not Zoom, then it’s definitely The Larry Factor. The idea of planning a cruise, a dinner party, or a massage seems rather terrifying, maybe even irresponsible.

I’ve become a walking germaphobic and honestly, the masks are only exasperating my condition.

We’ve been through a lot lately, both individually and collectively, so let’s go easy on each other. I don’t know about you but I tired. I’m actually tired of doing nothing but numbing the dread for the better part of a year. I might need therapy because “trying” to be “happy” isn’t getting rid of the angst. Maybe I should call Shawn Anchor the “happy” expert?

The truth is I’ve been hibernating as if a bear with a den of cubs for the better part of a year. I’m lethargic, okay grouchy, and fat (the PC term is fluffy). Seriously, I could do daily workouts with those insane Peloton instructors, and I’d still have a healthy layer of insulation that would get me through next winter. Try not to judge.

And not to complain but my students are under some sort of spell, try as I may to hook them with stellar lessons plans (Bahaha), I only manage to wake them up briefly before they slip back into their COVID comas, and crawl under their hoodies.

My hope is that one morning I’ll wake up and realize this was all a dream.

Well, more like a nightmare, but let’s focus on the positive.

Just when Larry and I have become addicted to endless hugs and kisses from our grandkids, and the sound of laughter reverberating off the walls of our home, they pack up and leave. Our villages came so close together, the beginnings and endings could no longer be discerned, well that and the fact they moved across the street.

As my cubs relocated it’s as if the house doubled in size down to the hollowed halls and can I just say the silence is deafening. I’m not kidding. My ears have been trained to identify the sounds of distressed children for like a year as if I’m a massive sonar device and now all I pick up is a noiselessness void. It’s unnerving.

Home wasn’t a set house, or a single town on a map. It was wherever the people who loved you were, whenever you were together. Not a place, but a moment, and then another, building on each other like bricks to create a solid shelter that you take with you for your entire life, wherever you may go. Sarah Dessen

Yesterday I putzed around the house for like the first time in a year, adjusting the trinkets that survived my grandkids, fluffing pillows that will stay where I place them, returning abandoned toys to the cupboards. I had a big decision to make and I was wallowing in the ability to linger with my thoughts for more than a few minutes without disruption. And just like Cheryl Strayed, I loved the cozy familiarity of the way I arranged my belongings all around me.

Not to complain but our sleep patterns have become as erratic as the availability of toilet paper, by 8:00 pm we can no longer keep our eyes open (let’s agree to agree it’s not just about the wine), and then for the life of us we can’t figure out why we’re wide awake at 2:00 am playing solitaire on our phones? Okay, I play solitaire, Larry searches youtube for things like porcelain repair, and how to get crayon art off textured walls.

I say it’s the residual of a pandemic whose contagions have altered our internal clocks, possibly forever, or the house is haunted?

The next thing I know Kelley and Tim show up on our doorstep, the very day the guest room is vacated, definitely a sight for sore eyes, I haven’t seen them since their wedding last year!

Kelley’s a Kondo kickass and now that both Julie and my houses are in various states of disarray we need some serious assistance. I have cleared out three gigantic cupboards, a closet, and although I have miles to go, there are only a few weeks before our remodel begins. Keep in mind I have a deeply embedded aversion to change and all these adjustments are taking a toll on my sense of well-being.

I’ve taken up chanting, it doesn’t work, but it annoys the roommates. So there’s that.

Julie and Nic now have a fully functioning kitchen and we have given it a worthy christening. Nic has already cooked up some delicious gourmet hamburgers, savory eggs benedict, and an elegant chicken salad. He’s a brilliant chef and I blame him for my evolving curvaceousness.

Drumroll please…so here’s my exciting news!

A wise person, Susan Newman, once told me that the way you leave something is the way you enter what’s next. Today I’m giddy to announce my retirement after 15 years at Notre Dame. I sent a note I’ve been holding in a draft folder for weeks to the principal, vice-principal, chair and co-workers informing them of my intention to retire at the end of this academic year, instantly I wanted to rescind the note, but I reminded myself about the champagne I bought for tonight’s celebration and decided to resign myself to resigning. As my co-worker Deidre says, a bottle of champagne is a good motivator for SO MANY life choices. Pretty sure that’s why they serve it at weddings?

We gathered around Julie’s generous island to celebrate my newfound identity, or maybe my ability to make a damn decision, Kelley did one of those boomerang things as I popped the champagne and filled our glasses. She posted it on Instagram and like half a dozen people messaged me to see if she was pregnant? She’s drinking champagne people!

So Julie lifts her glass and says, “Dad you do the toast for Mom.”

Larry looks like a deer caught in the headlights, he says, “What are we celebrating?”

We all stare at him as if he turned a putrid shade of green? “Dad, Mom retired today.”

“She did?” He gives me the look.

I say with all the authority of a recently retired school teacher, “really, we’ve been discussing this for months, and now you claim ignorance?”

“I didn’t know today was the day.”

“Hint, the full glasses of champagne?”

“I thought we were celebrating Nic’s new kitchen?”

“Dad, that was so last week.”

In the meantime we are all standing there holding our bubbly with worried expressions clouding our recently cheerful faces.

He looks around, lifts his glass, and says “to Mom’s retirement.”

“Now that’s the way to wrap up a decade of work?”

“So what’s next?”

“My retirement plan is to get thrown in a minimum security prison in Hawaii.”

“I’ll drive the get-away car.”

Honestly, I’m no longer equipped to function in polite society. I don’t remember how to wear makeup, or real clothes, or shoes. This is the result of working from a lounge chair, in pajama bottoms, on Zoom for a year! Now when people ask what I do for a living, I can say I’m a writer, and that will explain everything.

I’ve come to the end of a long road, but as you know when we think we’ve come to the end of the runway, that is when we learn to fly.

“No, this is not the beginning of a new chapter in my life; this is the beginning of a new book! That first book is already closed, ended, and tossed into the seas; this new book is newly opened, has just begun! Look, it is the first page! And it is a beautiful one!” C. JoyBell C.

I’ve come to realize that behind every story there is a gap, I’m Living in that Gap, but don’t mistake this as the end. Here’s to new beginnings, join me in the comments, what are you starting anew?

Anecdotes:

  • A home is not a mere transient shelter: its essence lies in the personalities of the people who live in it. H.L. Mencken
  • “Retirement: That’s when you return from work one day and say, ‘Hi, Honey, I’m home—forever.'” Gene Perret
  • “We spend our lives on the run: we get up by the clock, eat and sleep by the clock, get up again, go to work—and then we retire. And what do they give us? A bloody clock!” Dave Allen

Posted on by cheryloreglia · 49 Comments

The Arrogance of Time

“How did it get so late so soon? It’s night before it’s afternoon. December is here before it’s June. My goodness how the time has flewn. How did it get so late so soon?” Dr. Seuss

In my remote cocoon, rolled up in a blanket, secured to the double wide chair I used to hate, and now love, gazing out over the expanse of the lake, the steadfast mountain, the “unmentionable” fog, I’m thinking about the arrogance of time and how swiftly we mutate as if a caterpillar from chrysalis to adult.

I am often deceived by the endless charm of time, disguised as a gift, but somehow pompous as a politician whose false assurances serve no one. 

You know what I mean?

The conceit of a system so dedicated to it’s own perpetuation it fails those it’s obligated to assist, one who is incapable of turning back his scrawny arms of time, always marching forward, as if a well trained soldier who refuses to stop the trajectory of the front line, oblivious to the multiplicities it has overrun, left in ruins, laid flat in it’s overarching objective to never surrender to the moment.

Fuck you is the epithet I want to use, but I’m silenced by my dowdy manners, as I dig for the right words to describe what I immure in my mind, this persistent unease, simular but not the same as grief, a sort of angst that has settled into my bones? 

Time and death seem to be marching in formation and I’m annoyed with their ruthless precision.

Speaking of marching…box after box we carry across the street, my daughter, husband, son and son-in-law, wrestling a life’s worth of valuables, stashed for a year in my garage, and now being reconveyed to their new dwelling…the clothing, the linens, the toys, the plates, the spices, the tupperware, the couches, cushions, and mirrors, followed by tables, dressers, beds, and bikes. The movement back and forth across the street reminds me of a beehive, as the workers gather their loot, returning to the hive, with the queen bee (Julie) directing the entire production. 

“Honey, do we really need this?”

“Mom, is this couch to heavy for you?”

“Dante, can you help us carry this in the house?”

“Dad, when you finish putting in the new toilet, can you start on the bunk beds for the twins.”

After two days Larry and I escape to the lake to rest our weary muscles and recover our ailing limbs. Our exhaustion is as mysterious to us as our grey hair and wrinkles. How did we arrive at old age where energy is as extravagant as premium gasoline? 

Larry says to me, “it feels good to be back up here after such a long break.” He seems so relaxed, smiling as he opens a nice bottle of GiaDomella Cab, splashing a taste into each of our glasses.

I nod my head, but totally disagree, we both live in want of being in the place we are not, we’ll call it irreconcilable desires, a flume we’ll never bridge, being here and not being here is simply how I measure time.

“Come back,” are words I rotate as if laundry in the drum of my mind, seriously, I’m haunted by these spinning thoughts, and as you know if I have to deal with it, so do you.  

I want to be at the lake (think writing, water, wineries), he longs for the established routines of home (think biking, breakfast, and boot camp), what keeps us apart is what we think we need. Isn’t that always the case.

After the dishes are stacked in the washer, the counters wiped clean, the smell of pan fried ribeyes still lingering in the air, we retire to the long green couch, sipping the last of the red wine, watching the glowing embers of a duraflame log start to fade, discovering again the seduction of wordless moments, the endless ticking of the clock, both of us lost in our own thoughts.

We sit, this man and I, our aging bodies so different from when we first met, closer now to the end then to the beginning of life, as he rubs life back into my icy feet, the dog wedged between us as if a needy child. The winter is barren, just like me, I gaze at the rippling moon river reflected on the placid lake, envied by the stars, as I envy the spring in the winter of my years.

I wonder about the world my granddaughters will inhabit, one that I will never know, or the world that has passed away, one that they will never understand. And I worry that this entire year spent sheltering in place, suspended, unheralded, trapped in the amber of the moment, is the year we collectively failed to seize?

Our home of thirty years will be dismantled when we return, as the kids vacant our guest rooms, we prepare to demolish the old tile in the kitchen, tear out the dysfunctional appliances, cabinets, even some walls, essentially refurbishing the hearth of our home, as inhumanly as fire extirpates a forest. 

Kelley is coming home in a few days, maybe to see it all one last time, before the demolition, perhaps to capture some unretrievable moment in time? 

I’ve lived most of my life with unfashionable finishes, part of me wants this new kitchen, so in some rare form of insanity, I too can be redone. As Jennifer Elisabeth says don’t worry if people think you’re crazy. You are crazy. You have that kind of intoxicating insanity that lets other people dream outside of the lines and become who they’re destined to be.

Julie said to me in the car the other day, “your past self doesn’t need you, but your future self does.” That sort of stopped me in my tracks. What am I doing today to enhance my destiny?

We have three days up at the lake before we return to the nest, the upheaval, the metamorphosis. Our trinity of days will be filled with trips to Lakeport in-between hours of work, walks in the neighborhood, quiet dinners for two, slumbering quietly beside each other as we have for decades. 

We’ve taken to enjoying our coffee in bed under the cover of morning, him watching the news, me writing these words, lost in a dual retrieval of consciousness. The process is slow, lumbering, gentle. This is who we’ve become?

He works at the game table which as you know is cattywampus to the long green couch, me at the generous kitchen counter, I have to take down the “save water, drink wine” sign so my students won’t see this aspect of their teacher, pristine, neutered, sub rosa. We’re studying the Holocaust this week, determining the depth of evil man is capable of enacting on those considered subhuman, without dignity, inferior. Is it not so different today? How we scapegoat others when we refuse to shoulder the burdens of our own decisions. 

I can’t help but wonder what might happen in the throws of a pandemic, with an invisible enemy, one who has defeated us in the most catastrophic of ways, one who targets the vulnerable, severing our ability to breath, zapping our strength, diminishing our reason. A nemesis who has taken down our global economy, wreaked havoc on all our lives, some more heinous than others. Who will be left to blame?

Our time at the lake is fruitful, the days pass quickly, our work here is done, but as Markus Zusak says, “she wanted none of those days to end, and it was always with disappointment that she watched this time come to an end.”

As we carry our bags to the car, fastening the dog cover to the back seat, resting our coffees in the cup holder before driving away from all that I desire, “come back,” I hear the words echo in my mind, pushing away the needs, the wants, the obligations that are calling us home.

What I’ll be missing tomorrow, is you next to me on the long green couch, sipping wine by the flickering embers of a duraflame log, discovering the seduction of wordless moments, moon rivers, and pitch dark nights. Oh, the arrogance of time, “come back,” I’m not finished fanning the embers of an aging courtship, I just put a dab of perfume behind my ear.

I’m Living in the Gap, clamoring for the lake, care to join me in the comments? 

Anecdotes:

  • “Time is a created thing. To say ‘I don’t have time,’ is like saying, ‘I don’t want to.” Lao Tzu
  • “The future is uncertain but the end is always near.” Jim Morrison
  • “I have realized that the past and future are real illusions, that they exist in the present, which is what there is and all there is.” Alan Wilson Watts

Posted on by cheryloreglia · 38 Comments

When Etiquette Fails

“We could love and not be suckers. We could dream and not be losers. It was such a beautiful time. Everything was possible because we didn’t know anything yet.” Hilary Winston

I remember sitting on the grass listening to a classmate, Nancy Rasmusson, sing Ventura Highway, while playing the guitar at our final school assembly for junior high. I was thirteen years old, on the cusp of adolescence, and I’ll admit to you, I was under the erroneous illusion that I was rather hip? The evidence was compelling, I had taken a puff off one cigarette, almost choked to death, but I believe it counted, besides I could be cool without Virginia Slims, I had bell bottom pants, days of the week underwear, and a Bic lighter that my parents didn’t know about.

I know, I know, cool on steroids.

Life was simple, innocent in many ways, but the feeling I remember most acutely was this sense of excitement for all that was about to unfold? I was going to high school next year, Dad had agreed to let me go to my first dance, it was my graduation dance from junior high. I almost fainted when Paul, or was it Ben, some really popular guy asked me to slow dance. I borrowed a Gunny Sack dress from my sister and she was going to be annoyed with the new sweat stains on her prized garment, oh well, after the dance we parted ways, ended up at different high schools, and if memory serves we never saw each other again, but whatever his name was, we’ll always have that dance.

At this point in time I conceded I might not be able to marry Donny Osmond (although a tiny part of me held on to that dream), I planned on bleaching my hair during the summer with Sun-In (a hydrogen peroxide spray), and I’d saved up enough babysitting money to buy those platform sandals that were the epitome of fashion in the 70’s. Of course they made me tower over everyone, as if I wasn’t awkward enough, and truth be told they would be the source of an embarrassing fall in the years to come, but I was obsessed with the idea of being trendy.

The summer went better than expected, I started my period which was a huge relief, because now I had something to fill out my training bra. I met this sweet boy at a baseball game and we hung out for the rest of the summer, he introduced me to the Beach Boys, and I had my first kiss. I was more than ready to tackle high school or so I thought?

My Mom was not one to drive us anywhere, she was a product of her time, “why would I drive you when you have a perfectly functional bike?” It was the first day of high school. Really? Nancy got a ride from one of her friends, she was secretly mortified we’d be once again attending the same school, this had not happened since the fourth grade, and although I’d made vast improvements in my general demeanor, they were not up to her lofty standards.

My sister’s reputation for being well-mannered and kind was her crowning glory, I on the other hand was known for my slightly unruly, out of control, and disruptive behavior. Second borns, like vampires, we can lose control with little or no provocation. I learned long ago, when etiquette fails, trust your instincts.

My Dad was forced to drive me to school on the first day as Mom stayed defiantly in her pajamas and robe all morning with curlers in her hair. Mortifying. I thought, that poor woman, pull yourself together. Little did I know the minute we left the house, she donned a swanky tennis outfit, grabbed her Wilson racket, and was on the courts competing with all the other stay-at-home Moms. They’d grab a quick lunch after practice, before racing home to catch the latest episode of As The World Turns, just as we were walking in the door from school.

I thought she never left the house until I was like in college?

Dad took me to school in his old Ford truck, it was white, with roll down windows, which I asked him to shut so my hair wouldn’t be blown to smithereens. As he pulled into the circular drive of Del Mar High School, easing up to the drop off curb, he said, “have a good day.”

I absolutely froze.

“Honey, get out of the car.” Sometimes parents don’t know how to help, they aren’t prepared for some new version of their teenager, such as the doubting, conflicted, refusing to leave the car type?

There are like a thousand kids milling around in these intimidating cliques, laughing, and talking with ease. I do not see anyone I know and I am not getting out of the car. I was petrified, and with the conviction of a fourteen year old, I demand, “take me home.”

If my Dad was anything, he was practical, so he tried a new approach, “I have to go to work, get out of the car.”

“I’m afraid.”

I see his sensitive side kick in, he says with a little more compassion, “You’ll be fine, honey,” then he reaches over and pushes my door open almost knocking over some student in the process, who was not pleased, she turns and glares at me through the window. Perfect.

“Dad.”

“Go on, you’ll be fine, I promise.”

Slowly I emerge from the vehicle, hanging onto the handle until Dad pulls away, he waves to me from the back window, and I believe he was smiling.

This was the 70’s, parents were unemotional, they encouraged independence, you found your own footing in life, stumbling was considered formational. The good old days.

My little locker slip is crumpled in my sweaty palm, as I go in search of locker number 237, at least I have a destination. Freshman were assigned locker buddies their entire first year. I prayed she wasn’t from Blackford Junior High (our arch rivals) with braces and bad breath. I suppose this was because high school campuses were designed to hold around 2,000 students, and I believe Del Mar was hovering around 2,500 at the time, hence the locker sharing policy.

When I approached the row of lockers with my number sequence, I found several students milling around, looking as lost as me. I notice locker number 237 was hanging open, there’s a lunch box and several books organized on the shelves.

One of the girls with same hair style, long, parted down the middle, pushed behind her ears, says, “hi, is this your locker?”

“Yes, are we sharing?” I could only hope this posh girl was my locker buddy?

She laughs and says, “yes, my name is Conni, I think we went to the same junior high?” Clearly we ran in different circles, but she had her shit together, sparkling eyes, beautiful smile, and it was like. . . everything’s going to be alright.

“I’m Cheryl, how about you take the top and I’ll take the bottom,” which really never became a reality as we jammed our things wherever they fit, eating each others lunches, sharing notes from our classes, kept a stash of change at the bottom of the locker for cokes and coffee. Soon Conni and I would become the best of friends, within months she allowed her boyfriend John, or was it Jack, use of our locker. It was a chaotic jumble with three of us using the same small space, not to mention the bottle of Tabasco we had to catch every time we opened the door, but we happened to be strategically located on the main quad, and it became our hangout.

I spot my sister chatting with a gaggle of upperclassmen, I notice she avoids making eye contact, probably hoping I won’t run over screaming her name. I thought about it, but being my first day and all, I showed considerable restraint, and just waved, which she barely acknowledged, sisters.

It was a fine high school, as far as high schools go, typical of the era, miles of covered corridors, criss-crossed with rows of identical blocks of classrooms, a large open quad was located in the center of campus, with the warm stench of cafeteria food filling the air. This was the 70’s, there was a designated smoking area in the back of the amphitheater, with the quadruple door entrance to the gymnasium to the east of campus, behind the gym were the locker rooms, pool, sporting fields, and tennis courts.

This was the suburbs, every school had the same boring design, basically these were holding tanks until our acne cleared up and we were old enough to go to college.

The senior guys were dreamy, the senior girls wore annoyed expressions, the rest of us practiced being cool, some more successful than others. You could easily delineate the nerds, from the jocks, the glee club, from class council, the marching band from the spirit commission, the parking lot kids, from the academics, everyone had their uniforms, and established hangouts, and under no circumstances were freshmen to wait in the senior lunch line or use the senior bathroom without reputational death or worse, pantsing was a popular antic.

“There are a million rules for being a girl. There are a million things you have to do to get through each day. High school has things that can trip you up, ruin you, people say one thing and mean another, and you have to know all the rules, you have to know what you can and can’t do,” says Elizabeth Scott

The first bell rang and like Pavlov’s dogs, people started rushing around, filing into the halls, except the seniors of course. Reluctantly we head off to our first class, scouring our printed schedules, so we wouldn’t mistakenly end up in the wrong room, humiliated for the rest of the year.

I had Spanish I, two buildings up, last door on the left, near the student parking lot. To my utter surprise my cousin Karen was sitting in the back of the room, she’s shy, and looked slightly alarmed to find us in the same class. I wave and offer a friendly hello, as if my ship had arrived at Gilligans’s Island, and I was about to be rescued. She waved me off so her friend could sit next to her, being a year older, she didn’t take to fraternizing with freshmen, and there goes my life raft.

It took me less than a minute to get comfortable, I had an easy going nature, what can I say?

We had those typical student desks, a chair attached to the desktop, one unit with a rack under the seat to hold our things. These will be our cages for the next four years.

What happened next may have led to my cousin’s decision to transfer out of Spanish I within a week, who knows, we’ll call it a hunch.

So this adorable head of dark curls takes the seat right in front of me. I’m admiring the tangle of thick wavy hair when without warning, my wayward hand reaches out and tugs one of those tempting locks, like I said before, “when etiquette fails, trust your instincts.” It wasn’t meant to hurt, just tease the occupant, let him know I was behind him.

The young man turns around in his seat, his eyes as big as saucers, if I had to describe the look I would call it arrant fear.

I smile, “hi, I’m Cheryl, I’ll take notes this week, you’re up next week,” what’s not to like?

He looks as if I slapped him across the face with the palm of my hand, he takes hold of both sides of his desk, and scoots as far away from me as possible. Seems a little rude, but those curls….

I scoot my desk right up behind him, and give those dreamy locks another yank, just to be ornery, I know I’m hard to endure, elude, escape ~ not much has changed.

Bobby yells from across the room, “I think she likes you, Oreglia.”

No truer words have ever been spoken…

“Did you meet your soul mate? That always happens on the first day of school, right?’ Francesca Zappia

I’m Living in the Gap, revisiting the past, when did etiquette fail you? Drop me a note in the comments!

Anecdotes:

  • “It was only high school after all, definitely one of the most bizarre periods in a person’s life. How anyone can come through that time well adjusted on any level is an absolute miracle.” E.A. Bucchianeri
  • “For the record, I would like to point out that it is NOT being obsessive to memorize a boy’s schedule so that you can accidentally bump into him. It is called being efficient.” Jess Rothenberg
  • “Do you think that every single thing that happens in high school can be categorized as either gossip or stress?” David Levithan
  • “Damn, if I could go back, I would say a lot of things. And I would laugh more.” K.B. Ezzell
Posted on by cheryloreglia · 36 Comments

Colons Before Coffee?

Photo by fotografierende on Pexels.com

“It’s only awkward if it matters.” Joyce Rachelle

There are some conversations that should never be heard in the light of day, it’s true, they should be confined to the pages of a nondescript journal, sequestered to the back of a dusty bookcase, maybe to be discovered post mortem. Life is not always graceful, and unfortunately for you I process my experiences online, impulsively publishing my unfiltered thoughts with little regard for your sensitivities.

This is how the unpleasantness got out in the first place, all I can say is there is some reprehensible use of language, and you might consider this a courtesy warning?

“It’s going to be a shit show,” I think I hear Larry spew something of this manure nature as he enters our room, totally shattering my pristine dreamscape.

Now, just so you get the full picture, the sun hasn’t fully risen, I’m still trying to make sense of my hazy world, in a complete fog I struggle to remember where I am, oddly enough the curtains at the lake are taupe and the ones at home are blue, I deduce we’re home, but squint at the man standing in the doorway to confirm it’s my husband attempting to discuss colons before coffee?

Who does that?

Stretching my groggy limbs, I mumble something nondescript, “things are called shit for a reason, dear.”

He walks over, places a cup of coffee on my nightstand, and a kiss on my lips.

I watch him settle into his recliner before he blatantly overshares, “I’m thinking of scheduling my colonoscopy for next week.”

Attempting to adjust the pillows behind me, I offer a pleasant warning, “no bathroom talk before my first cup please, Emily Post would be appalled.”

Disregarding the established decorum, he says, “when are you due for your next one?”

After a fitting and proper glare, I say, “I’m enormously aghast to confirm there will be a sequel to Cheryl’s Rectum, I got my notice a few weeks ago, which I’m planning to ignore for the near future, we’re in the middle of a pandemic, it would be irresponsible.”

“Let’s schedule them together.”

Is there anything more ghastly than picturing that sort of procedure with your husband holding your hand? I have no words so I remain silent.

“Think about it, we’ll have our Dulcolax cocktails before a liquid dinner, you can light some of those smelly candles, each of us traipsing off to our own restroom, clean as a whistle by morning.”

“Yes, if memory serves you scheduled your last one the day after Mother’s Day?”

“I had to watch you slicing up your filet mignon while I sipped gallons of vile Kool-Aid.”

“It was not the romantic evening I was envisioning, I believe you were quite testy about the prep?”

“A couple’s cleanse, it’ll bring our relationship to a whole new level.”

The idea is ludicrous, I mimic his earlier claims, “it will definitely be a shit show.”

Rubbing his chin, as if seriously considering this whole shindig, he says, “we’ll have to stock up on ultra soft toilet paper.”

I laugh claiming, “Bahaha, because you’re full of crap.”

He smiles and says, “I believe it’s one of the few times in my life when I will not be full of shit!”

I lift my cup and offer, “to duo defecations, honey I need a refill.”

As he gets up to grab my cup, he says, “we’ll have to Uber.”

“That will be interesting, instead of drunk college students, they’ll have to manage two elderly people still high on Demerol, carrying their donut pillows.”

“I’ll treat you to a McDonald’s breakfast biscuit after they’re done filming our sequels.”

“Honey, Netflix has nothing on us.”

We moved on to more mundane topics, but the truth is I believe words are strong enough to overcome what we fear, don’t you? As Anne Morrow Lindbergh says, “good communication is as stimulating as black coffee,” and just as pungent in some cases.

All joking aside, a colonoscopy is the best screening test available for colorectal cancer, a lifesaving procedure, and a necessity for everyone at some point in life. It is the only screening test that also prevents many colorectal cancers, but unlike the COVID vaccine, people aren’t lining up for their debut? 

During a colonoscopy your doctor examines the lining of your entire colon to check for polyps or tumors. These are the terminators of life, we want to know about them, so they can be removed immediately. It might sound uncomfortable and embarrassing but there are many reasons we all need to schedule an appointment.

Unbeknownst to many, colon cancer is super common, it can run in families, or happen randomly, but the best news is the procedure is simple and non evasive. I agree, it’s awkward as hell (so are mammograms), maybe that’s why the whole couples colonoscopy has not taken off? 

No excuses, you have the script, and as Milena Veen says, you too can be “an inexhaustible source of awkwardness.”

I’m Living in the Gap, discussing colons before coffee, care to join the conversation in the comments?

Anecdotes:

  • “Spontaneously, without any theological training, I, a child, grasped the incompatibility of God and shit and thus came to question the basic thesis of Christian anthropology, namely that man was created in God’s image. Either/or: either man was created in God’s image – and has intestines! – or God lacks intestines and man is not like him. The ancient Gnostics felt as I did at the age of five. In the second century, the Great Gnostic master Valentinus resolved the damnable dilemma by claiming that Jesus “ate and drank, but did not defecate.” Shit is a more onerous theological problem than is evil. Since God gave man freedom, we can, if need be, accept the idea that He is not responsible for man’s crimes. The responsibility for shit, however, rests entirely with Him, the creator of man.” Milan Kundera
  • “We react squeamishly to shit, don’t we? But if we look into the matter you’ll see that it’s the most valuable substance on earth, all life comes from shit and returns to shit.” Daša Drndić
  • “Sometimes I act like I have my shit together more than I do. Sometimes I act like I don’t have my shit together as much as I do. I’m done acting. I’d rather just be okay with however together my shit is at the time, and still do my best to show up, as I am.” Scott Stabile