It's Fate

So, nothing on tv was pleasing me tonight, and I got bored and started scrolling through a dating website that I haven't logged into in months, because I'm wondering if my recent contemplation about giving up men might be premature, and TA DA!

Angels sing, choirs in the background, picture the heavens parting....

Lo and Behold, there is a picture that makes me stop and look. It's someone I know. Not KNOW KNOW, but whose face I know, because he was an actor in a cult tv show that I was nuts for a few years back. The cancellation of that show, and the subsequent cancellation of the next show by the same producers (Blast you NBC and Fox) sent me spiralling into a depression for months. I mean it. I wept when those shows were cancelled. I joined fanclubs and went all fan geeky and wrote to the networks and swore I'd never watch any of their shows or buy any of their advertisers' products if they cancelled those shows.

Of course, I am suspicious. This actor/writer is doing reasonably well in Hollywood these days and has been in some very successful movies recently. Ok, he's not the leading man in them, but he's funny! And smart! So what would he be doing on a website like this? Why would he need a dating site to meet women? And what kind of guy would imitate him...as I said, he's not a leading man, and he's not a traditional beefcake (I have never used that word before in my life) sort. But he has appeal...he IS from near my area, and I hear he still lives there part time, so maybe it's possible.

At any rate, right this minute, I am going to believe it's really him. Ok, sure I'm way too old for him, and sure it would take a ferry for me to see him, and sure, his screen name at the dating site is the sort that would make me scroll right past him if he weren't someone I recognized, but the fact is I DID recognize him, because people, this is FATE.

I am going to marry him, and he and I are going to spend our lives collaborating on scripts and showing up unannounced at small town improv shows and we will laugh our heads off until we grow old.

Because that's the way it's meant to be.

P.S. Don't think for a second I'm going to post which site this is or what his screen name is. I found him FIRST!

A is for Apple, B is for Baby, C is for Cookie...

Ok, the kid has been a very unpleasant little man to be around this week--VERY unpleasant--and I was steeling myself this afternoon for whatever his mood would be like when I picked him up after work, but thank God, he seemed to be in a very cheerful mood and tired out from swimming at his summer day-camp today. So I bought him a bag of pretzels on the way home. When the kid eats pretzels, he likes to hold up individual pretzels that have been broken or whatever, and he'll say, "Look mom--this is the shape of a D! This is an E! L for lucky!" and so on while I drive, and I'll nod at him in the mirror and say things like, "wowwwww--that's great honey!"

I've been very frustrated with the kid because of the sense of entitlement he's developed recently--all week he's been begging for more things, complaining about what his friends have that he doesn't, and just generally being a whiny pain in the ass, and I've been pulling my hair out trying to get it through to him that we are very lucky and there are many people in the world who aren't as fortunate as we are. It's been really exhausting to reason every minute with a pissed off 7 year old, and I'm almost at the end of my rope.

So, anyways, we're driving along and suddenly he says, "I think from now on I want to give all of my allowance to poor people."

I nearly careened off the road, I was so shocked. Is this the same kid whose recent battle-cry has been "gimme, gimme, gimme!"? So I say, "wow, that would be a wonderful thing to do. What made you want to do that?" and he says, "Well, because poor people sometimes don't have houses or any money or anything to eat and I wanted to share." And I'm feeling so proud and relieved that he really isn't the little monster he's been impersonating recently and I say, "You're right--and that's a very nice thing for you to think about doing."

More driving along, more pretzel eating, and then he pulls out a pretzel, holds it up and says, "Mom, look! A P!" And then, with the most somber expression I've ever seen, he says, "P. For Poor People."

I just about died.

This hurts my brain

Tonight our sitter "Adam" is downstairs asking his mom to pick him up, despite the fact that I've offered a number of times to drive him home so he won't be here all bloody night as usual. While Adam is waiting for his mom, my son Fynn tiptoes upstairs to my office and whispers, "Mom, do we have any treats?"

No, I say, but maybe we can get one later. Then he looks at me suspiciously and says, "Please, just tell me where they are--I promise I'll share with Adam."

"Fynn, there are no treats," I reply, "we'll get some later."

"Well, can I just check and see where you're hiding the treats?" he whines, rocking from one foot to the other impatiently.

So I say again, more emphatically, "Fynn, there are NO treats. I'm not hiding anything!"

He becomes totally exasperated and says, "Well, can I just check?!"

At this point I start to become quite annoyed and I cry, "Fynn, you can't check for something that doesn't exist! I do not have treats. There is no point in checking for something when I say they aren't there. I am not lying--there are NONE."

In response, he shakes his head, lets out huge huffy sigh and says, "UGH! It's like you're speaking a different language or something!!!"

Did you ever have that nightmare...

where you suddenly realize you're one credit shy of graduating, one exam away from finishing a course...but you find this out well after you thought you were done? I mean, you've been going around living your life, thinking you were finished, celebrating the fact that you're all done, and then you find out that all along you were wrong?

I'm living that nightmare.

I just discovered that despite all of my careful checking and double checking and planning and everything else, I miscalculated the amount of senior credits I have. I am not finished after all. I am, to my surprise and dismay, one class away from graduating.

I celebrated finishing school last week. I started kicking back with magazines at night--finally able to enjoy a light read without feeling guilty that I should be doing something else instead. But wait! I SHOULD have been doing something else instead! Like actually taking the right number of courses!

The worst part about this is is the fact that I actually DROPPED a senior course last semester, thinking I had more than enough, because I didn't need the added stress. Ha!

And there are so few classes in the summer that I can take that will work around my job. My boss has been really patient so far about my being in school, but this might be the last straw.

So, today I registered for a month long third year poli-sci course about American politics. I know nothing about poli-sci. I know nothing about American politics apart from the fact that I hate George Bush and Karl Rove. The textbooks cost a fortune.

Am I crazy? Or should I audition for the music department and take a month long course about singing for the stage? I'm serious. Input is required friends. I know I've neglected the blog, but please, if you don't mind dusting away the cobwebs in here with me, I'd sure appreciate advice from anyone who has any poli-sci knowledge.

This is so depressing.

I love this.

Darth Tater

He rocks. I want to take him to Paris and photograph him in front of the Eiffel Tower, or take him to Washington and snap him in front of the White House, or New York in front of Lady Liberty...or, or, or...you get the idea. World domination by potato!

So, I promise to update soon. Had my last class ever at University last week, and once I get my last bloody essay done, I'll be finished school forever. Eeeek. I'm looking for a new place to live, my son turned 7 last weekend and we've had houseguests and all kinds of craziness around here, so I am flat-out tired. I had a terrible email mishap in which an intensely personal email of mine was--through my own ineptitude--accidentally sent to about 20 people in my address book (do not ask me what I did--I couldn't repeat it if I tried), so that's an embarrassment I'm struggling to recover from right now. Ah well. Such is life.

See you soon.

Potatoes Unite!

What is it about my face?

I got on the bus today and recognized the bus driver. He's the friendly guy. He knows my name. He knows everyone's name. He can talk down a pissed-off passenger. He's nice to crazy old people. He smiles and thanks everyone when they get off the bus. When he asks you how your day is going, it seems like he's actually interested. Sometimes he's very chatty with me, which is nice, except it means that I get stuck standing at the front of the bus talking to him while he goes on and on about his kids. Still, he's friendly and he has one hell of a hard job, and we all need a little civility on this planet, I think, so what's the harm in standing for 15 minutes, right?

So today he starts telling me about his best friend who happens to be a woman, and how she did something years ago that really pissed him off, but he never told her what it was. He walked around carrying this anger at her and resenting her for it, and the whole time she was totally unaware that he was even upset about this. I have no idea why he decided to unload all this on me--we only have a superficial "how's your day going?" kind of relationship. But he obviously needed to tell someone, so I listened while he went on about how she was so surprised that he'd been angry with her and she asked him why he never said anything, and then he realized if only he'd communicated this to her, he could have stopped walking around with all this anger. Which is great--good for him. He and his friend are now back on track and he's asked her to forgive him for not trusting her enough to let her know he was upset with her. But still...kind of a weird thing to tell a passenger, right?

Ok, though. He's probably bored. All he does is drive around all day and talk to strangers and many of them probably act like he doesn't exist, even though they put their lives in his hands once a day. Again, no skin off my back if he wants to unload a bit on me.

Then he starts telling me about his kids and how he and his wife home-school them. That's cool. Not my bag, but then again, I don't have a partner at home who could give me this option for my son. Still, it's all interesting--he's really into it. He tells me all about the bible stories he and his kids read together and how it's great because the kids learn to read, but they also learn a "moral lesson" based on "factual events" that they can draw on when they run into problems in life.

Um, ok. Again...so NOT my bag, but he's a nice guy. Obviously he loves his kids and is proud of them, and who am I to judge?

So I make the mistake of telling him I'm not religious. Because I'm a moron.

Then I have to listen to him explain how it's not about religion. It's about spirituality and values and God's love. Again, hey man, that's cool for you. Good on ya and all that jazz. I so don't want to be discussing this on a bus, but whatever. He seems really happy to be talking to me. And that's good for him. I'm glad to help, even though I'm becoming a little uncomfortable.

I try and steer him off the spirituality talk and back to the homeschool stuff because I figure that's safer territory and I can more easily feign interest in that. I ask about field trips. He gets excited and tells me about all the cool stuff they do, and I have to say, it does sound fun. They go on nature hikes, fishing, they visit fire stations. So I tell him about how I've heard the recycling depot does field trip tours for schools, and he is psyched about the idea and how it would really stand out in his kids' minds and make them understand how important it is to recycle. And I'm pleased that he's so excited to learn about this. And we're at my stop at the university, where the buses sit for several minutes.

So, I'm at the exit of the bus right next to him, ready to run and get a coffee before I head to class, and he tells me about his friend who owns a cafe and they run a fair-trade coffee co-op. Very cool. I'm into that. And he says he's really into supporting small business, especially those that respect cultures and make an effort like those that sell fair trade coffee. Again, right on. I'm down with that.

Then he says he doesn't like these big businesses like Starbucks. I nod. Lots of people don't like Starbucks. I'll admit to buying a cafe mocha there here and there, but generally, I do make an effort to buy coffee from independent places that sell fair trade brands, so I have no issues with what he's saying. It's all good. Nice guy, smiley friendly bus driver. Loves his kids and supports small businesses. Good for him. And he says, "I don't like the kind of lifestyle Starbucks promotes."

And I think, "Yeah, a lot of people feel that way. Big business, squeezing out the moms and pops, popping up on every corner of our ever-growing consumeristic more more now now bigger better culture. It's not a great lifestyle to promote, I guess. I should be more aware of this stuff. I should be more determined to think about what I consume." So I keep nodding and smiling. I'm thinking about running to the independent coffee place on campus right now actually, but he's talking into the short time I have between departing the bus stop and class.

Again he says, "I don't like the lifestyle Starbucks promotes," and I nod and smile and step towards the door again, hoping he'll take a breath for a second so I can say, "nice talking to you, I've got to run!" but he keeps going. "I might be overstepping my bounds," he says, so happy to have a kindred spirit in me, "but gay marriage is wrong. A child needs a mother and a father--a boy without a dad will not grow up to be masculine. A girl without a mom will not be feminine. That's a fact. That's the kind of lifestyle Starbucks promotes."

I'm stunned. I stand there, literally speechless. What is it about my face that makes someone think that I might possibly agree with that? Why on earth would he say something like that to someone he barely knows? What do I say?


Nothing. I said nothing. I was so tired. I had to get to class. I didn't know what to say. I thought about the fact that I'm a single mom whose son doesn't have a man and a woman raising him together. I thought about the fact that I have more gay friends than straight, and they deal with shit like this all the time. I got off the bus and felt sad and defeated. I waved to my former favourite bus driver, who smiled happily at me and shouted, "It was great talking to you, Katie!"

I bought a coffee from the independent coffee seller on campus and told the cute coffee guy about it, and we shook our heads and rolled our eyes at each other.... then I wandered across campus to my queer film studies class feeling totally disturbed and angry at myself for not speaking up.

It's safe to hit the "Next Blog" button if you:

• Are hoping to buy a motorized wheel chair
• Really into purchasing large amounts of fertilizer
• Are intensely interested in hearing why Mary-Jo and all of her neighbours in their trailer park in Wichita think that abortion is murder.
• Are into Spanish cartoon porn.
• Really want to increase your website traffic and don’t mind having your blog covered with crap from advertisers.
• Love America. I mean, REALLY, REALLY love it. Like you love it so much you want to marry it.
• Know what “Diem dam chinh thuc lop Tin 04b1” means.
• Want to improve your spanking techniques.
• Don’t mind that your computer will freeze for half an hour when you stumble upon a 13 year old Japanese girl’s tribute to Hello Kitty!