It’s your first visit to your daughter’s new house with her new husband and no dad could be happier than you. They take you from room to room. The living room, the kitchen, the spare room that they say with a giggle will one day be a nursery. Then they show you their bedroom.
“Thought the other room was going to be the nursery,” you say.
They both nod. That’s right.
“So what’s with the bunk beds?” you ask.
They look thrown. “You mean our sleep tower?” your son-in-law says.
You look at the bunk beds again.
“Sleep tower?” you repeat. “What the hell are you kids into?”
Your daughter laughs. “I get the top. Jarrett likes the bottom.”
“My knees,” your son-in-law explains.
You walk out of the bedroom, shaken to your core, and you sit down to a long, polite, silent dinner.
After, your daughter follows you out to your car.
“Jesus, honey,” you say. “What the hell is that all about?”
She nods sadly. “I know how it looks, Daddy,” she says. “It’s just what he prefers.”
You shake your head. “What about what you prefer?”
Tears form in her eyes. “You don’t think there’s anything wrong with his knees either, do you? He says when they’re better I can have the bottom, but he’s lying isn’t he? I want the bottom, Daddy! I was supposed to marry someone who’d treat me like a princess and let me have whichever bunk I wanted! But he’s just another liar out to get whatever he wants!”
She cries into your chest. You pat the back of her head, coming to grips with the knowledge that your daughter is a grown woman who digs bunk beds. You conclude that you were a not-very-good father, and you vow to visit your daughter’s home as infrequently as possible.
Happy Bunkbeds Day!
Tuesday, July 29, 2014
Monday, July 28, 2014
Sand In The Suitcase Day!
Your mom’s on her bedroom floor rubbing her body in sand. Sand that shook into her suitcase from the swimsuit she wore on the beach in Tulum, two winters ago when she was there for a work retreat and she went for a walk with Alfonse, the spa director of the eco-resort. Alfonse promised her he’d show her the exact perfect spot on the beach to see the moon over the cliff, and he came through. The spot was on her back, underneath Alfonse, her pleasure causing her to howl loud enough she feared she’d scare the moon away. That sand in her suitcase hugged hers and Alfonse’s bodies and she’s rubbing it all over her skin, feeling his touch once more. If the sand from that beach can be in the bedroom she shares with her husband, years later, Alfonse can be there as well. Space and time allow for so much more than we know. You mom is there again. She’s there on that beach having the most wonderful sex of her life again.
“She’s doing the sand thing again,” you tell your dad.
“Ah Christ, every damn trip,” your dad says before marching upstairs to yell at his wife.
“Dammit Doreen! You can’t bring him back! Let a fling be a fling so we can not miss our plane for once!”
Happy Sand In The Suitcase Day!
“She’s doing the sand thing again,” you tell your dad.
“Ah Christ, every damn trip,” your dad says before marching upstairs to yell at his wife.
“Dammit Doreen! You can’t bring him back! Let a fling be a fling so we can not miss our plane for once!”
Happy Sand In The Suitcase Day!
Friday, July 25, 2014
Open House Day!
Today at the open house, you think you’ve found the perfect place. Beautiful yard, great kitchen, and lots of storage space. You’re pretty sure you’re going to take it until you notice the photos on the tables are all photos of you, surrounded by a husband and two kids you’ve never met before.
“Is this some kind of prank?” you ask.
The realtor looks more closely at the photos.
“Oh, this happens sometimes,” she says.
“What does?” you ask.
The realtor explains that some houses skip ahead.
“The house knows what your life is going to be, who you’re going to marry, what kind of family you’re going to raise here,” she says. “It knows so well that it thinks you’ve already lived here.”
“Lived?” you ask.
“Well, it’s up for sale. So you’re selling it. One day.”
You ask the realtor if you’re going to get a good price. She says she doubts it. You seem to want to sell in a hurry. Things aren’t going so well with your husband.
“I’m not even dating anybody,” you say. “How is it the house thinks I’ve been living here with a husband and kids, and I’m already moving on to a new chapter in my life?”
The realtor says she can’t answer that, but you should get a move on before the house realizes you’re there before you’ve ever been there. Just then the house starts screaming.
Happy Open House Day!
“Is this some kind of prank?” you ask.
The realtor looks more closely at the photos.
“Oh, this happens sometimes,” she says.
“What does?” you ask.
The realtor explains that some houses skip ahead.
“The house knows what your life is going to be, who you’re going to marry, what kind of family you’re going to raise here,” she says. “It knows so well that it thinks you’ve already lived here.”
“Lived?” you ask.
“Well, it’s up for sale. So you’re selling it. One day.”
You ask the realtor if you’re going to get a good price. She says she doubts it. You seem to want to sell in a hurry. Things aren’t going so well with your husband.
“I’m not even dating anybody,” you say. “How is it the house thinks I’ve been living here with a husband and kids, and I’m already moving on to a new chapter in my life?”
The realtor says she can’t answer that, but you should get a move on before the house realizes you’re there before you’ve ever been there. Just then the house starts screaming.
Happy Open House Day!
Thursday, July 24, 2014
End Your First Date About To Be Crushed To Death In A Trash Compactor Day!
Say to him over the loud grinding of the gears, “Even if we die right now, I really had a good time with you tonight.”
He’ll say, “Yeah. Though the wild turn of events over the course of the evening lead to us being stuck here, about to be turned into nothing but splotches of liquefied organs, this was the best date I ever had.”
You kiss for the first time. It’s such a powerful kiss, you both suddenly know that this isn’t how it can end. Something so right can’t reach such a premature and gross conclusion. This could be the love of both your lives. That kiss proved it. And that kiss gives you the strength to try and get out of this to see where this love takes you.
“We have to try!” you shout.
“I agree,” he says. “We can’t just—“
Some of the garbage gives way underneath him and he’s dragged under the compactor wall. You mourn the love of your life for a few endless seconds before the walls close in and take away the pain of your loss.
Happy End Your First Date About To Be Crushed To Death In A Trash Compactor Day!
He’ll say, “Yeah. Though the wild turn of events over the course of the evening lead to us being stuck here, about to be turned into nothing but splotches of liquefied organs, this was the best date I ever had.”
You kiss for the first time. It’s such a powerful kiss, you both suddenly know that this isn’t how it can end. Something so right can’t reach such a premature and gross conclusion. This could be the love of both your lives. That kiss proved it. And that kiss gives you the strength to try and get out of this to see where this love takes you.
“We have to try!” you shout.
“I agree,” he says. “We can’t just—“
Some of the garbage gives way underneath him and he’s dragged under the compactor wall. You mourn the love of your life for a few endless seconds before the walls close in and take away the pain of your loss.
Happy End Your First Date About To Be Crushed To Death In A Trash Compactor Day!
Wednesday, July 23, 2014
Your Old Friend Alice’s Funeral Day!
You’re 70 and your friend Alice was 70 when she died and you used to be best pals. You showed up wondering what happened to you two, then you find out when her family tells you they don’t want you to speak at the funeral because they felt like she put more value in her friendship with you than in her relationship with her husband and kids.
“That why she moved away and stopped taking my calls?” you ask her daughters.
They nod. “We told our mom that unless she cut ties with you we would stop loving her. We told her she had to sacrifice a cherished friendship in order to keep us as daughters.”
“You’re shitty daughters,” you tell them.
They shrug. “Deal with it. You’re not speaking at that funeral.”
You keep quiet at the service but at the burial a plane flies by with a banner tailing behind it that reads, “Alice is dead, and she loved her best friend more than her own horrible kids. I loved you back just as much, Alice. Sorry your kids sucked. Sorry and Goodbye. Catch Jason Mraz at Foxwoods Thur-Mon.”
You got a discount by tacking on an ad that the pilot already got paid to run. Doesn’t matter, the kids are looking up at the sky and crying as you walk away from Alice’s grave, knowing full well you had a friend for life.
Happy Your Old Friend Alice’s Funeral Day!
“That why she moved away and stopped taking my calls?” you ask her daughters.
They nod. “We told our mom that unless she cut ties with you we would stop loving her. We told her she had to sacrifice a cherished friendship in order to keep us as daughters.”
“You’re shitty daughters,” you tell them.
They shrug. “Deal with it. You’re not speaking at that funeral.”
You keep quiet at the service but at the burial a plane flies by with a banner tailing behind it that reads, “Alice is dead, and she loved her best friend more than her own horrible kids. I loved you back just as much, Alice. Sorry your kids sucked. Sorry and Goodbye. Catch Jason Mraz at Foxwoods Thur-Mon.”
You got a discount by tacking on an ad that the pilot already got paid to run. Doesn’t matter, the kids are looking up at the sky and crying as you walk away from Alice’s grave, knowing full well you had a friend for life.
Happy Your Old Friend Alice’s Funeral Day!
Tuesday, July 22, 2014
Pam Can’t Drink Day!
You ended it with Pam because she can’t drink.
“It’s because I have to take all this medication for anxiety,” she said. “Alcohol contraindicates.”
That’s all well and good but you told Pam from the get-go that she better be able to keep up with you or you’d be hightailing it to someone who could. Someone like Martha.
“Let’s get started,” Martha likes to say at around 4:30 PM when she pulls the top from the bottle of gin. “Don’t dawdle.”
Martha drinks way better than Pam, and the two of you have a lot of fun getting plastered each night and then spending the next morning helping each other piece together why you have so many bruises on your bodies. But you can’t get over the feeling that maybe you should have found some way to make it work with Pam. No matter how well you and Martha drink together, she’s no Pam.
“Why are you Googling herbal remedies for anxiety?” Martha asks one drunken night after going through your search history. “It’s that Pam, isn’t it? You’re looking for a way to get her to take different meds so she can drink with you.”
You try to lie but Martha’s too blitzed to listen. She throws your laptop at your head, knocking you unconscious. Martha runs to your aid but she slips and cracks her head open on the floor.
When you wake up, the police are hovering over you, having been called by the neighbors. With Martha dead and signs of a domestic dispute all over the apartment, no one buys that Martha did all the disputing. You’re jailed for manslaughter, sentenced to six years of longing for the one that got away because you never thought to convince her to try herbal anxiety remedies that wouldn’t have been contraindicated by alcohol.
Happy Pam Can’t Drink Day!
“It’s because I have to take all this medication for anxiety,” she said. “Alcohol contraindicates.”
That’s all well and good but you told Pam from the get-go that she better be able to keep up with you or you’d be hightailing it to someone who could. Someone like Martha.
“Let’s get started,” Martha likes to say at around 4:30 PM when she pulls the top from the bottle of gin. “Don’t dawdle.”
Martha drinks way better than Pam, and the two of you have a lot of fun getting plastered each night and then spending the next morning helping each other piece together why you have so many bruises on your bodies. But you can’t get over the feeling that maybe you should have found some way to make it work with Pam. No matter how well you and Martha drink together, she’s no Pam.
“Why are you Googling herbal remedies for anxiety?” Martha asks one drunken night after going through your search history. “It’s that Pam, isn’t it? You’re looking for a way to get her to take different meds so she can drink with you.”
You try to lie but Martha’s too blitzed to listen. She throws your laptop at your head, knocking you unconscious. Martha runs to your aid but she slips and cracks her head open on the floor.
When you wake up, the police are hovering over you, having been called by the neighbors. With Martha dead and signs of a domestic dispute all over the apartment, no one buys that Martha did all the disputing. You’re jailed for manslaughter, sentenced to six years of longing for the one that got away because you never thought to convince her to try herbal anxiety remedies that wouldn’t have been contraindicated by alcohol.
Happy Pam Can’t Drink Day!
Monday, July 21, 2014
You Know Anyone Your Mom Might Hit It Off With Day!
Your mom writes love songs but her career’s been in a slump ever since she fell out of love with your dad. House payments need to be made and you’re going to have to go to college somehow.
“Any of those teachers at your school single?” your dad asks you. “Anyone you think your mom might hit it off with?”
You tell your dad you don’t feel comfortable being put in this position. That you think your mom should cheat on him of her own volition, that it should happen naturally.
“Yeah, yeah,” your dad says. “But love sometimes needs a nudge. She wrote dozens of songs about me, but I ain’t doing it for her anymore, and they’re about to cut off our electric.”
On Parent-Teacher night you make sure to introduce your mom to your social studies teacher, Mr. Lawson.
“You two both enjoy things,” you say to them, trying to get some kind of connection to happen.
“Hello,” Mr. Lawson says.
“I hope I never hear you say goodbye,” your mom says. Then she rifles through her bag for a notebook.
Meanwhile, your dad is at home sitting on the back step of the house, staring at a tree he and your mom planted when they first moved in. That tree never stopped growing. Maybe if he tends to his marriage the way he did that tree, your mom will find it in her heart to love him again. He makes a silent promise to try as soon as she gets home, not knowing it’s already too late. She’s found a new song.
Happy You Know Anyone Your Mom Might Hit It Off With Day!
“Any of those teachers at your school single?” your dad asks you. “Anyone you think your mom might hit it off with?”
You tell your dad you don’t feel comfortable being put in this position. That you think your mom should cheat on him of her own volition, that it should happen naturally.
“Yeah, yeah,” your dad says. “But love sometimes needs a nudge. She wrote dozens of songs about me, but I ain’t doing it for her anymore, and they’re about to cut off our electric.”
On Parent-Teacher night you make sure to introduce your mom to your social studies teacher, Mr. Lawson.
“You two both enjoy things,” you say to them, trying to get some kind of connection to happen.
“Hello,” Mr. Lawson says.
“I hope I never hear you say goodbye,” your mom says. Then she rifles through her bag for a notebook.
Meanwhile, your dad is at home sitting on the back step of the house, staring at a tree he and your mom planted when they first moved in. That tree never stopped growing. Maybe if he tends to his marriage the way he did that tree, your mom will find it in her heart to love him again. He makes a silent promise to try as soon as she gets home, not knowing it’s already too late. She’s found a new song.
Happy You Know Anyone Your Mom Might Hit It Off With Day!
Sunday, July 20, 2014
True Romance Day!
DEPARTURE
You ask to be excused from the table and your dad grunts so you head upstairs where your duffle bag is packed and you flash your flashlight three times out the window. He responds with three flashes from a flashlight of his own.
JOURNEY
You board the bus and you kiss for three hundred miles until someone complains to the driver who comes back to ask the two of you to stop kissing. You hold off for fifteen miles before the other passengers complain that your kisses were the only thing keeping them going on this bus ride.
“It’s nice to be around people who are hopeful!” a man with an open face wound shouts.
“The sound of their lips keeps me from hearing the echoes if what my sister said to me when we last saw each other in ’83,” a lady trying to pick the lock on a handcuff concurs.
“Lift the ban!” the other passengers shout. “Lift the ban!”
“Fine.” The bus driver buckles. “Ban lifted.” So you kiss for the next 1100 miles and everyone on the bus is grateful.
EXCITEMENT
Ten miles from your destination you pull out your guns and rob everyone on the bus. Someone tries to be a hero so you shoot him in the heart.
MALAISE
Hiding up in the mountains wears on you after twenty-six months. You try to remember the day you met, just another gray November day of senior year turned suddenly to the brightest springtime morn when you saw his face.
“He’s a transfer,” your best friend whispered into your ear when she spotted you drooling.
But a cold mountain wind blows and the memory scatters with the gust. He comes back to the cabin with not enough meat. You can feel the baby kick.
JOY
The three of you head down the other side of the mountain, to a valley town in a whole other state and no one looks at you twice when you enroll to get your GED. You’ll make a life for your baby, a better one than you made for yourself.
STRIFE
You’re driving home from school when you spot the flashing lights of three squad cars forming a roadblock at the end of your street. You stop in time to see him run down in the middle of the road, pinned to the concrete with the knees of police. They lift him up and you think he can see you. The rest of your life you’ll hope he could see the two of you, that he could see you mouth the word “goodbye.”
MEMORY
You tuck her in and you pretend you’re reading a storybook as you tell her the tale of the boy and the girl who ran off to find out what their love might do to the world. And when she asks if it did anything bad you say yes. And when she asks if it did anything good you kiss her on the forehead and you say yes.
Happy True Romance Day!
You ask to be excused from the table and your dad grunts so you head upstairs where your duffle bag is packed and you flash your flashlight three times out the window. He responds with three flashes from a flashlight of his own.
JOURNEY
You board the bus and you kiss for three hundred miles until someone complains to the driver who comes back to ask the two of you to stop kissing. You hold off for fifteen miles before the other passengers complain that your kisses were the only thing keeping them going on this bus ride.
“It’s nice to be around people who are hopeful!” a man with an open face wound shouts.
“The sound of their lips keeps me from hearing the echoes if what my sister said to me when we last saw each other in ’83,” a lady trying to pick the lock on a handcuff concurs.
“Lift the ban!” the other passengers shout. “Lift the ban!”
“Fine.” The bus driver buckles. “Ban lifted.” So you kiss for the next 1100 miles and everyone on the bus is grateful.
EXCITEMENT
Ten miles from your destination you pull out your guns and rob everyone on the bus. Someone tries to be a hero so you shoot him in the heart.
MALAISE
Hiding up in the mountains wears on you after twenty-six months. You try to remember the day you met, just another gray November day of senior year turned suddenly to the brightest springtime morn when you saw his face.
“He’s a transfer,” your best friend whispered into your ear when she spotted you drooling.
But a cold mountain wind blows and the memory scatters with the gust. He comes back to the cabin with not enough meat. You can feel the baby kick.
JOY
The three of you head down the other side of the mountain, to a valley town in a whole other state and no one looks at you twice when you enroll to get your GED. You’ll make a life for your baby, a better one than you made for yourself.
STRIFE
You’re driving home from school when you spot the flashing lights of three squad cars forming a roadblock at the end of your street. You stop in time to see him run down in the middle of the road, pinned to the concrete with the knees of police. They lift him up and you think he can see you. The rest of your life you’ll hope he could see the two of you, that he could see you mouth the word “goodbye.”
MEMORY
You tuck her in and you pretend you’re reading a storybook as you tell her the tale of the boy and the girl who ran off to find out what their love might do to the world. And when she asks if it did anything bad you say yes. And when she asks if it did anything good you kiss her on the forehead and you say yes.
Happy True Romance Day!
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