Posted By startswithanx on August 24, 2010

Jake and I took a little stay-cation with Penny recently in Mt. Charleston. It’s just 40 minutes from Vegas, but looks and feels like we boarded a plane, jumped on a snowmobile and hopped on a ski lift to get there. During a hot Vegas summer, that just means there are mountains there and no one’s cracking eggs over the sidewalks to prove you really can fry them.

We had some time to kill when we first drove in and decided to drive up the mountain to check out the pretty houses. It was a steep drive. On the way back down the hill, Jake said something about his brakes. That’s when a memory from the past gently tapped me on the shoulder and then yanked me into 1993.

Shelby’s family had a cabin in Northern Utah. She divided her summers between there and good ol’  West Valley City. Every now and then I’d accompany her. The first time we made the three-and-a-half-hour drive alone, without one of her parents behind the wheel, we almost didn’t make it to the cabin. We almost didn’t make it to age 17.

She took the scenic route that had us twisting and turning down a beautiful hill I still wasn’t old enough to appreciate. Huge trees shaded the road and I can’t remember if the lake was in view at that point or if my memory just does me the favor of putting it there. I do remember we were driving close to the edge of this mountain and Shelby’s foot was heavy on the brakes all the way down. There we were, probably listening to Lisa Loeb and crunching on Funyuns, when Shelby yelled that she couldn’t stop the car. Just as I was thinking she chose a horrible time to exaggerate, she reached for the emergency brake. We broke into a lovely, loud chorus that had her singing “I can’t stop!” in between all my “Oh my God’s” until we staggered off the road and the nose of her car Eskimo kissed a nearby tree. If it weren’t for that tree …

No one was hurt. Not even her car. It was an Eskimo kiss, not a full-on makeout session. But we were both choking on our own hearts by the end of it. I don’t remember if a stranger pulled over to tell us we should let the brakes cool down and then put it in neutral the rest of the way or if we figured it out ourselves. What I won’t forget, though, is that — amid all the “Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit!” talk — we both said if we had to die it would’ve been “cool” to die together.

All that poured over me like a shower of Shelby nostalgia as Jake, Penny and I were coasting down that road in Mt. Charleston. I got quiet, long enough to absorb the memory completely, and then blurted out “Put it in neutral! You’ll burn out your brakes!”

Then I got quiet again. And then I got really sad. Not because she’s gone — I’ve almost come to terms with that — but because my brain had shown that memory the  nearest exit and all but ushered it on out of the noggin. I almost forgot that awesome moment with her. In the last three years since she passed away, I’ve realized the only thing I can do is remember her. The only thing I have is the memory of her. So, my worst fear is forgetting her. I’m afraid of forgetting facial expressions, inside jokes, things I loved about her, things I didn’t love about her, her moles, her feet, special dates, stupid fights, first conversations, last conversations, NEAR DEATH EXPERIENCES. I don’t want to forget any of it. And everytime I think of how afraid I am of forgetting, Sarah McLachlan comes to pay me a visit. Yes, the singer.

Allow me to explain.

When we were 10 years old, we watched the movie “Beaches” together. Aside from deciding I was CC and she was Hillary Whitney, we also decided “The Wind Beneath My Wings” was our song. I know. Just like Kraft, it’s the cheesiest. Hey, we were 10. At the time, it made perfect sense.

Fast forward almost a decade later and Shelby and I are adults in my Nissan Sentra. We haven’t spoken in months because of stupid girl stuff. I’m driving and she’s in the passenger’s seat when Sarah McLachlan comes on the radio. Shelby loved her. I always thought of her as bubblebath music and, um, let’s just say I preferred showers.

Shelby: Dude! This is the song I was just telling you about. This is my song to you.

Me: (Turning up the volume) OK, OK, lemme listen to it.

(Song finishes)

Me: (Confused) How could I NOT remember you?

That last line might read like it was sweet and dripping in honey, but it was said with a very strong “DUH” tone. Come on. This was the same girl who asked me to be her best friend during a fourth grade slumber party and made a case for why she deserved the title over our fellow slumberers. The same girl who begged me to take my 7thgrade school picture in a black Zorro hat, just like she did. The same girl who wouldn’t let go of our hug when she lost the Miss Dynamite pageant. The same girl who decided an entire joint between the two of us was the best way to get high for the first time. The same girl who told me the stuff you only tell a best friend the night before her wedding.

And, THAT SAME GIRL was now asking me, through her bubblebath seranading pal Ms. McLachlan, if I would remember her?

Having that memory of us losing our brakes in Northern Utah creep up on me out of nowhere wasn’t an example of my brain almost forgetting. It was an example of my brain promising to remember. Just like ”The Wind Beneath My Wings” made perfect sense at age 10, “I Will Remember You” makes perfect sense now. But uh, sorry, Shelby. I’m sticking to my first answer: How could I NOT remember you?

Category: characters, memories, this happened, tribute, utah | 10 Comments »

Posted By startswithanx on August 20, 2010

Have you ever been friends with someone for a long time on Facebook and decided one day that they have a very obvious favorite child? I can think of three chicks off the top of my head who have all but cropped the rest of their kids out of family photos and held the one up like it was freakin’ Simba on the mountain top.

Um, we know you have other kids, ladies. Refusing to mention them or acknowledge them isn’t going to change the fact that they’re going to be there when you get home, starved for supper — and attention. God forbid the day they’re old enough to create their own account and discover that Mommy has cyber-aborted them.

One chick has a tween daughter and a little boy. Her obsession is with the daughter. It’s clearly a vicarious thing. The mom was a horrible dancer back in high school. Little coordination and even less flexibility. Her daughter wins trophies and prizes and accolades for her dancing. I know because we get a minute-by-minute update when she’s competing. I would tell you all about the boy’s extra-curriculars but, um, I’m pretty sure they crate the poor boy.

The other lady has a daughter who attends college back east and a son who lives at home. With her it isn’t just a Facebook thing. I knew her for years before discovering she had a son. Who lived down the hall from her. And sat at the same dinner table with her every night. And parked in the same garage. Yet, I’d only met and heard about and tuned out the name of HER DAUGHTER. So, the Facebook favoritism came as no surprise. I’m just waiting for the day she creates a fan page for the daughter that she’s mistaken for her own sorority sister.

Last, we’ve got a woman with two teenage daughters and one boy around 7. Every update is about her “little man” and how she can’t wait to get home to him. I have NEVER seen a mention of the girls. I understand the daughters are probably at that age where she’s wondering if it’s too late to sue the condom manufacturing company, but STILL. Come on, at least act like you give a damn. Ya know, the way Clair always did so my siblings wouldn’t get the wrong idea. Or, at the very least, put on an act for the sake of not getting called out on a Facebook friend’s blog.

With all my Facebook rants (this one, this one, this one, this one and the one you’re reading), I’m starting to think Jake’s got some competition for my favorite blogging subject. That and I’ll probably never get another friend request for the rest of my life.

Oh, that reminds me. I have a little **SHOUT-OUT** to give. I got a comment a couple weeks ago from a reader named Erica. It was her first time commenting, but it wasn’t on a recent post. It was on a pretty old one. This one, right here. Anyway, for some reason I emailed her about her comment and she wrote back to tell me that she’d been reading my blog from the very first post and planned to follow it all the way to the end. Say what?! I know, a bold declaration, but she freakin’ did it. A few days later I got a comment from her, on this post right here, saying “Well, here I am. The end. Now I have to wait for new entries instead of a (seemingly) unlimited supply at the click of my mouse. I am so excited to read more!”

And, for that, homegirl deserves a shout-out. Actually, she deserves some kind of plaque, but a shout-out will have to suffice (only because I’m fresh out of plaques): Thanks, Erica, for making me feel guilty every time I put off blogging now. Ha! No really, thanks for being so committed to Starts with an X. It was kinda cool knowing you were logging on every morning and clicking your way through the past two plus years worth of posts. Hope you stick around for the next two!

Category: pop culture, this happened | 9 Comments »

Posted By startswithanx on August 18, 2010

I have a little joke I love to play on Jake from time to time. It happens on those mornings that I have to literally roll out of bed. Ya know, so the hard bang against the floor will do what the rooster setting on my alarm clock couldn’t. On these mornings it’s especially difficult to tolerate the bundle of snoring love in bed next to me. The guy who doesn’t have to wake up for a good one to four hours, depending on the day. Yep, the same one who talked me into staying up late to watch the latest of his Blockbuster bombs, which always go by better with a couple glasses of wine, which always loses its good idea-ness the next morning, which is why the sound of Jake’s peaceful slumber can have me fantasizing about cold buckets of water and straight-in-the-ear bugle calls.

If I’m still feeling resentful by the time I get out of the shower, I’ll lay back in bed next to him and curl up real close. That’s when I start whispering sweet nothings. Well, Mrs. Butterworth would consider them sweet nothings, anyway.

Me: (In a whisper softer than cashmere) Baby?

Jake: (Rolling onto his side, which is supposed to be my cue to let him sleep)

Me:  How does breakfast sound? Huh, sweetie?

Jake: (His deep breathing stops as if to say, “I’m listening.”)

Me: (Still whispering) How does a stack of warm pancakes sound right now? (Gentle kisses on the arm) I’m talking fluffier than cumulous clouds with every bite leaving a thick coat of syrup on your teeth. I’m talking sizzling bacon and over-medium eggs on the side. (My fingers are now tracing what he likes to refer to as his “natural curves.”) A glass of freshly-squeezed orange juice to chase it down and all on a tray right here in your lap. Baby, how does breakfast in bed sound?

(Normally this is where he gives me a well-deserved smack with the nearest pillow, but last week he had a different, unexpected reply.)

Jake: (In a crystal clear, not slightly groggy, voice) Are you serious?

Me: (Silent, only because the joke hasn’t gone this far since the first year of our relationship.)

Jake: (His eyes are now open and he’s realizing it’s as likely to happen as me serving it the way the hot lady in that picture up there is doing.) Yeah, right!

That joke usually brings me great pleasure, but the fact he believed it for a half a second made me want to, well, first run to Albertson’s since we had none of those items in stock, besides the eggs, and then make a stop at the trays-for-breakfast-in-bed store. And then, oh yes, prepare it all. But that feeling probably lasted for as long as Jake thought I might actually be serious because my resentful, who-invented-mornings-anyway attitude quickly turned to one of why-can’t-it-be-seven-a.m.-all-day-long? I think I even did one of those jumps they do in musicals where their heels click together in the air on my way out the door that morning. I may have waved at all the neighbors and whistled my way into work, too.

But, for real. Baby (I’m talking directly to my fiance now), I really am going to prepare you breakfast in bed to make up for all those mornings I’ve whispered prose about buttery waffles and cheesy omelettes (yeah, the menu changes at X’s Imaginary Diner) into your sleepy ears. And, I’m going to do it soon. PROMISE.

Category: this happened | 15 Comments »

Posted By startswithanx on August 10, 2010

So, I’ve been thinking more and more about the “first dance” song for our wedding. The more I think about it, the more I think it’s a ridiculous ritual. Why the hell do people want to spend three minutes and 45 seconds of their lives watching us rock back and forth while holding each other with nervous smiles on our faces? Isn’t that why we were promoted from 9th grade to 10th grade (yes, I went to junior high not middle school) — so we never had to witness such a pathetic display again?

I mean, come on, it’s boring as hell. The only people whose dancing can make me remotely misty-eyed is Clair and Cliff, aka The Madre and The Padre. Oh yeah, Kim Kardashian brought me to tears during her Dancing with the Stars run, but that was only because, as Chris Rock put it, she had “all that ass and couldn’t shake it.” Kinda the same as my parents making me emotional?

So, I had an idea. Before I share it, you should know that I’ve been full of wedding ideas that, when expressed, are all but met with people spitting at my feet. It all comes down to how ridiculous I find so many of these wedding traditions. Like cutting the cake. What? Since when is that something worthy of putting your fork down, zipping your lips and busting out your cameras for? It’s like, because we’ve decided to marry each other, we’ve become invalids or babies or something. Everything we do for the first time as husband and wife, that everyone else in the room, including ourselves, do every day is supposed to be some big landmark moment. Oh look, X is sneezing for the first time as Jake’s wife: Awwww.

I had this one idea — not the idea this post is about, but another one — when we first got the wedding talk going almost a year ago. We were tossing around the idea of getting married at our house, in front of immediate family and best friends. Our stairs would’ve been the aisle. Hey, wouldn’t it be hilarious, I told Jake and Venus, if we sent a stunt double down the aisle first? Yeah, we could have her in this big pouffy white dress, with one of those veils over her face that’s so layered you can’t see her face. We’ll start the cheesy-ass wedding march music and she’ll “accidentally” tumble down our stairs!!!

Silence. Followed by squinty eyes and furrowed brows. Followed by stares that started at my eyes, went all the way down to my feet and then came back to my eyes again. Followed by a nervous “Just kidding!” from me and slow steps backward.

So, back to the first dance song. I think we should meet the sillyness of this tradition and raise it a few chips. What if we did something a little, um, unexpected? Like the song below, for example. You HAVE to give good ol’ Sylvia a listen. Around the three minute mark it hits its peak: “Un momento poquito.” I figure that’s when I’ll go into my dance solo while Jake takes a seat and just nods his head up and down, like guys do when they get lap dances.

You have to really imagine us holding each other tight and gazing into each other’s eyes well into the 2:30 mark for this gem. And then you have to imagine the reaction of our guests.

Anyone need a wedding planner? I’m really getting good at this stuff.

Category: banter, pop culture, wedding | 11 Comments »

Posted By startswithanx on August 5, 2010

As an adult, getting the Facebook friend request from the woman who birthed you is probably the teenage equivalent of having her chaperone prom. You want to drink the spiked punch, talk ish about the queen’s dress and enjoy the theme song from under the bleachers, but … um … SHE’S watching. How can you engage in anything bad, aka FUN, when SHE’S watching. That’s kind of how I felt when I got a friend request from Clair about a month ago.

There I was, checking out people’s pictures from the weekend, offering my thumbs up when justified, rolling my eyes at all the passive-aggressive updates from the girls who need anti-depressants, contemplating deleting the douche baguettes – ya know, the usual. Then, I notice a new friend request and anxiously click on the icon. I see that familiar, comforting face that always made it all better and instantly go into Mee Mee Moo Moo Land. I love you, Mami. Sing me a song.

**Screeching brakes**

Uh, WTF? What’s the madre doing on Facebook? Shouldn’t she be trying to figure out dial-up or asking someone to help program her VCR? Sheeeeeeeiiiit, I got bamboozled (that was for you Asian Spice) by my own ageism. The thing is, I had that feeling you got as a teenager when you heard keys in the front door and the liquor cabinet was open. Do not ask me why. First of all, Clair reads this blog. Any chances of passing myself off as one of those dignified, self-respecting kind of daughters are pretty much destroyed. Second, it’s not like I’m all over Facebook in my whipped cream bikini and declaring my mayorship of The Green Door via Foursquare. Once I told myself all that — and not a second sooner — I clicked “accept.”

One month later and I’ve hardly noticed any activity from the woman. In fact, I find myself wishing she would throw up a self-taken pic of her and Cliff’s faces real close together or “like” Jesus Christ or update her status with something about how she wishes her daughter could be a little more civilized, like that Chelsea Clinton. Ya know, so I can see her face and go into Mee Mee Moo Moo Land again. But no, she’s too busy living her fabulous retired life to bother with Facebook. Either that or she’s doing all that stuff on her Twitter account.

Category: family, pop culture, this happened | 11 Comments »