Beauty And The Beast

"Hello, Ann."
"Hello?"
"It's :me Ann."
"It can't be. You're - you were -"
"Dead?"
"Well, everyone said - I saw -"
"Just shows you can't trust everyone. Especially if they're in show business."
"Mister Denham was just trying to -"
"I know what Mister Denham was trying to do."
"But, you're alright?"
"It took a lot of rehab, and I can definitely tell you when it's going to rain. And I try to stay away from tall buildings."
"Where have you been keeping yourself?"
"There aren't a lot  of places where a forty foot gorilla can hide out. I hung out in the Caribbean for a while. Got some work in the fields, agriculture seemed like a logical next step for an ape of my talents."
"But that doesn't explain how you managed to go unnoticed for -
"Unless you've got somebody who wanted me to stay missing."
"Denham?"
"Nope, but you're getting warmer."
"I don't know. The police?  The mayor?"
"Think a little closer to home."
"I - don't understand."
"Are you still hanging around with Jack?"
"Jack? Of course. We were married right after - well. You know."
"I know. And I figured that the two of you needed some peace and quiet. After all I put you through."
"Put us through? What  about you?"
"Well, I've had some time to think about that. And even though your husband has been most generous about finding a way to keep your happily ever after from being anything but."
"What are you talking about?"
"Monthly checks. Made out to a retirement fund. Keeps me in bananas. And away from you."
"Jack would never -"
"Once a month. Check your account."
"Which still  doesn't explain why you're calling me now."
"I want to see you, Ann."
"I don't know if that's a good idea."
"Are you worried about what Jack would say?"
"It's just that we've been having kind of a tough time lately."
"I could have told you that."
"You're so sure. What makes you so sure?"
"Well, there are a lot  of Jacks out there - "
"But only one Kong."
"You said it. I didn't."

Designated

About two weeks ago, Saudi Arabia lifted its ban on women drivers. This is 2018. Two weeks ago. 2018. Really.
The only country in the world that kept women from driving a car has relented. It is no longer illegal for women to operate a motor vehicle.
2018.
Really.
By contrast, I can tell you that one of the reasons I have been missing my wife as she travels across the pond is that I let her do most of the driving. I pretty much  have  dibs on shotgun. I watch the world go by from the  passenger seat, safe and secure in the knowledge that my wife has been driving for nearly forty years and she does a fine job. It is a ginormous relief to go for a ride, though I tend to avoid the temptation to put my head out the window and feel the  wind rushing past.
Which makes me wonder why the prohibition in Saudi Arabia existed in the first place. I suppose if the idea was to keep them home, barefoot, pregnant, subservient. And probably a little more relaxed. Maybe a lot more.
I don't like to drive because it makes me nervous. Sometimes to the point of distraction. Which is kind of contraindicated in most circumstances on the road. I suspect that if I were to take the wheel as some form of revolutionary act, maybe I would feel differently. The women of Saudi Arabia hit the road in protest of these restrictions twenty-eight years ago. Forty-seven women were arrested for driving through Ridyah back then, and many more followed their path in the years after.
I can remember the embarrassment and frustration I felt when I failed my first driving test. At sixteen, it seemed impossible that I had waited that long to the privilege of being a licensed driver and was denied. For two weeks. It took me a while to get bored with it, and eventually I took relief in the opportunity to turn over those duties to someone else. Anyone else. My wife, my son, friends. But if someone told me now that I was barred from this activity, I would have pitched a fit. So, the good news is that I can now go anyplace, including Saudi Arabia, and ask someone else for a ride.
At last. What a relief. It's almost enough to make me want to dance....

What Have I Been Missing?

It's my fault that Toys R Us went out of business. Not me alone, of course, but once Amazon started selling toys, shipping them to my home at a discount, it was a fait accompli. Sure, I continued to make my visits with my son and whomever I could drag along. I would make a few impulses, now and then, but my go-to source for toys was no longer the big concrete bunker full of amusing plastic playthings. I could get what I needed on Al Gore's Internet.
Shame on me.
It is, of course, ridiculously ironic for me to be pining for that warehouse full of fun that once upon put all the local mom and pop toy stores out of business. Maybe I should explain.
My wife has been out of town.
I have been watching TV without supervision.
I finally watched most of You've Got Mail. That little bit of romantic comedy fluff from the late 1990's with America's collective sweethearts Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks. She runs a little bookstore and he runs a great big bookstore and he puts her out of business but they fall in love because they send pithy emails back and forth without knowing that one is trying to put the other out of business. Sorry for that spoiler, but two decades is just about long enough to be public domain. Especially since it was a remake of a 1940's film called The Shop On The Corner that starred America's period sweethearts James Stewart and Margaret Sullavan.  And that was, in turn, a film adaptation of a Hungarian play called something in Hungarian starred Hungary's theater sweethearts.
Crawling back up this ladder of distraction, it bothered me then and now that the connection Meg and Tom made was made on America Online. Hence the title. That proud and loud announcement that there was something in your electronic mailbox was a momentary pronouncement that has fallen by the wayside. Most of us would run screaming from the room if they were reminded by that voice every time someone from Nigeria wanted to propose a deal to unlock his inheritance with your help. But oddly enough, there is a place you can go to get just that for your Gmail account.
Pardon that digression, please.
At the time, Time Warner owned America Online, and this rom-com redux was foisted on the public by Warner Brothers. It was all one big ad for their Internet outlet. And since the whole story revolves around how corporations engulf and devour little businesses, it seemed just a tad ingenuous. So I made a choice not to go see the movie, in spite of all that meant-for-each-other cuteness exuded by Tom and Meg.
Now AOL is going the way of the mom and pop bookstore. Toystore. Warehouse. My mother bailed on her account, which means that there are probably about six more people still connected to the vestiges of the Internet's first McDonald's. I have heard that some people are connecting to Al Gore's Internet using their own wires and cables they found laying around the garage. My mother has been engulfed and devoured by a beast much larger and perhaps more insidious than Time Warner. Google has her now, god help her, since there is no turning back from that vortex.
Or is there?
I watched that movie, after all those years. It didn't put anyone out of business. As far as I know. My mom can now check her email without being yelled at. But I still miss the toy stores. I hope my wife comes home soon.

War Games

There was a trash can in my friend's garage. It was full of toy guns. There was a ritual in which we would file into that garage and stand around that can and solemnly choose our weapons. If you were first to pick, the machine gun was the way to go. These were mostly rifles of some sort or other. Most of them were made of plastic, scaled down versions of the real thing. Some of the were defunct BB guns. Their springs and their workings had become less viable. The second most chosen toy gun from that barrel was a rifle with lever action that still functioned which provided a satisfying click when you pulled the trigger. The rest of the armory had, at one time, been more functional. Part of what had landed them in this communal can was their limitations.
None of that really mattered. Once we held those rifles up to our shoulders, they became machine guns. This ensured us of a kill. We did this by making a noise, way down deep in our throat. It was a phlegm-clearing sound that was stuttered in imitation of automatic firing. Run out of phlegm, run out of bullets. Not that this ever happened. No matter how long the firefight raged around us, we managed to keep shooting. Sometimes we paid lip service to the idea of running out of ammo, but as long as we could clear our throats, we could continue our assault.
Or defense. Sometimes we barricaded ourselves in and around my friend's backyard clubhouse. We fended off invisible enemies. Sometimes they were monsters. Sometimes they were Nazis. Sometimes the monsters were fifty feet tall. The Nazis were always pretty average size. This is how we stayed vigilant for those times when we split into factions and shot at each other. Selecting your cover became the key, since standing out in the open assured that you would be pumped full of phlegm-y lead. It wasn't very often that someone would simply fall down dead. Not without some discussion or debate. Once you had made your shot, you had to prepare your defense. Not from the barrage from the other army, but of your pretend marksmanship.
"I got you!"
"No you didn't."
"Yes I did!"
"How could you have gotten me when I'm behind this wall."
"I got you in the leg."
"No you didn't."
"I could see your whole leg sticking out."
And so it went, pushing a great big pause button on the battle, while our youthful Warren Commission set about proving or disproving the way we had or had not killed one another with pretend bullets. Sometimes when these debates turned into lengthy arguments, the rest of the group grew bored, and turned in their guns. Especially if their guns were not as cool or functional. If you wanted to keep the game/battle going, it was best for everyone to just fall down dead. And then you had to wait until the war was won. Or if boredom set in and you were willing to become a different soldier in some brand new incarnation. Miracles can happen.
I don't know how many times I died back in those days. I lost count early on. My personal body count, the bad guys I put away was ridiculous. My friends and neighbors. The same ones who were looking to blow me away. As many times as we all could. Until boredom set in.
Until dinner time.
But we always came back.
Turns out the only way to stay alive is not to play.

Time Of The Season

Summer's here and the time is right for dancing in the streets.
Okay, I'm not exactly dancing, and I have been pretty much sticking to the sidewalks when I am doing anything that might resemble dancing. Walking, running, and so forth. There have been some other telltale signs that the season has changed. The days are longer. The nights are shorter. Flag Day has come and gone, and the big daddy of them all, the Fourth of July is almost upon us.
People are cooking outside. You can smell it. People are playing  outside. You can hear it. And in anticipation of Independence Day, you can hear and smell people prepping for fireworks displays that will eventually light up the night. The sulfur and explosions remind me of another month passing and the calendar pages ticking down the moments we know and love as summer vacation.
Having already made a trip out to Colorado to visit my mother, I have now begun the secondary function of my summer which is to catch my breath and imagine a new school year that will begin before I know it.
Which is the surprising part. After twenty-one years, one might imagine that the rhythm of the school year would be hardwired in my nervous system. I should feel the waves and anticipate the ebbs and flows. I should know the way this thing is going to turn. Teaching for a couple decades, and spending another decade and a half as a student, how can there still be any surprises left?
Okay. They're not exactly surprises. They are more like moments of supreme naivete. What sort of nuance or subtle deviation from the norm should I expect? I check my email and look at the calendar and I wait for the call. There was a time when there was more preparation and planning. When the school district was flush with money to train us all to perform and present newly adopted texts and programs.
Now the school is being cleaned. One hundred eighty days of wear and tear and child-scrawled graffiti must be scrubbed from the desks and walls. New teachers will be hired. New kids will enroll.  I will be going back. But not today.
It's summertime, and the living is easy. More or less. 

Enemy Of The People

So, upon further review, the "President" came up with these words to say about the murder of five people working at Maryland's Capital Gazette: "My government will not rest until we have done everything in our power to reduce violent crime and to protect innocent life." 
Let's start with that possessive pronoun, shall we? "My government." Not by the people, of the people and for the people. MINE. That public service thing still doesn't seem to have fully sunk in. He is supposed to be working for us. The people. 
And then there's the part about "everything in our power." In his brief address before he went on to tout his tax-relief program, he did not mention the First Amendment. Four of the five victims of Wednesday's shooting were journalists. A group that has previously been described by the "President" as the enemy of the American people. Sick, awful, fake, pile of garbage: these are words he has used to describe the fourth estate. And now, he would like us to know that "Journalists, like all Americans, should be free from the fear of being violently attacked while doing their job." I understand that he was limited in his rhetoric, but I do wonder why he felt the need to reassure journalists that they still deserve the same protections under the law that all Americans experience. 
Meanwhile, we wait to see what kind of bold exercise his administration is going to offer up as a solution to reduce violent crime and protect innocent life. The last brainstorm ended up being a plan to separate children from their parents. Innocent life seems to be somewhat subjective here. How about a program to separate pump shotguns from their constitutionally protected owners. The Second Amendment seems to get a lot more play with his government than the First. 
The killer in Maryland chose to deal with his disagreement by exerting his right to bear arms in direct confrontation with the stories the Gazette wrote with their freedom of the press. That freedom was upheld in a court before the killer turned to murder to solve his issues and then again on appeal. Not liking the court's decision, he decided to take matters into his own hands. In this case "matters" was a shotgun. 
So what will it be? Everything in our power? That's a pretty powerful boast. I wonder how this will work out. 

In The Cards

I struggled for a while on the last day of my trip to Boulder, trying to come up with the perfect souvenir from my home town. What could I take back to Oakland that would forever remind me of this place where I grew up?
A T-shirt?
I have drawers that are full and  overflowing with T-shirts that remind them of places I have gone and concerts I have seen. One in particular that came from a University of Colorado athletic department dumpster more than forty years ago that has become a staple in my athletic wear. Much to my wife's chagrin. It takes me back to a time when my older brother and I would seek out anything that resembled a link to the football program. He got a broken helmet once. I got that T-shirt.
So I don't really need a T-shirt.
I took a bunch of pictures, many of which are repeats of photos I have taken on trips to my hometown previously. Evidence of having returned to this corner or that. Vistas that have been photographed by professionals long before I came along with my cell phone and affirmed their choice of an angle or subject. The mountains, it seems, are lovely. And that's the way I remember them when I close my eyes anyway, so these are redundant memories as well.
So I didn't really need all those pictures, either.
I think that the thing I will bring back with me is the gin rummy game. My mother and I sat at her dining room table and played cards into the night. Initially, I had to remind her of the rules she had taught me when I was eleven, but soon we were on an even keel and we talked about everything but the rules to the game, since they had been internalized so very long ago. It was not unlike the hours we spent together wandering around the rest of her house, out in the yard, sitting down to have lunch on her deck in the back yard. We started talking and kept kibbitzing until we realized that it was time to move on and do something else. The gin rummy game was one of those activities that kept our hands busy while we pursued the main focus of my trip: reminiscing and catching up and sharing our thoughts about what had been and what will be. It was a direct link to all those games we played at one end of the dining room table at our mountain cabin, by the light of a kerosene lamp.
I needed that gin rummy game. I'm taking that home with me.