Poetry Friday Word for tomorrow, and Spielberg’s “Survivor: Hollywood”

The last few weeks I’ve been running around like a mad woman.

By that I don’t mean angry.

Just like, y’know, crazyinsanebusy.

“Mad”. In that proper British form, where Colin Firth smiles at me, "You're mad!", (hey, it’s my fantasy), cups my chin, pulls himself to me, even though I just ran through the fountain in the central square and am sopping wet, and he kisses me passionately as we fade…and…cut!

Wait.
Must finish fantasy.
…
…
Okay, I’m good.

The Poetry Friday WORD for tomorrow is MAD. “Mad” in any sense of the word. Insane. Furious. Wild. “Mad skills”. “Mad About You.” Feel free to sprinkle this word in your blog post tomorrow, in whatever sealed envelope you wish to rip open…story, poem, pencil sketch, mime, photo of you with Snidely Whiplash moustache tying Nell Fenwick to the tracks and cackling, “I’ve got you now! Bwahhahahaha!”

Has anyone caught “On the Lot”? It’s a reality-tv show from Steven Spielberg, wherein a bunch of promising film-makers compete for cash, prizes, and hugs from the comely hostess. (The dress she wore this past Tuesday had even ME staring at her cleavage, muttering, “Damn, girl!”) I’ve been watching for the last two weeks, and while amusing, sometimes boring (please, just tell me NOW who’s eliminated, don’t give me that 5-minute stare-down while the camera moves all Sergio Leone-like to the faces of the remaining three contestants), I have a feeling the show is rigged. Or, at least, some of the contestants are taking advantage of the online voting system. This week the challenge was to make a one-minute short comedy film in a week. One of the three winners had a film ("Getta Rhoom") that was horrible…just horrible…at least to my sensibilities…and while I’m a lover of dark comedy, I couldn’t take this film seriously. It was mean-spirited and nasty. OTOH, some of the films rawked...check out 'Danger Zone', 'Lucky Penny', and 'Replication Theory'. Also, 'Dance Man' from last week has me considering the lead actor as a future Fantasy Boyfriend....

(Update: Just found out the 'Dance Man' is actor Mark Feuerstein. And now that I take a closer look at him, I realize he can't be Fantasy Boyfriend material, 'cause he looks too much like my sister's boyfriend, and that's some sort of incest, isn't it?

I have coins that jingle jangle jingle

I realize now why my dad was so happy.

My uncles, my grandpa, the guys at work.

My husband, and possibly all my Fantasy Boyfriends.

It has to do with change.
And pockets.

Over the last few years, I’ve been trying to ditch the ‘mom-purse’ as much as possible, and shoving All Important Things in my pockets.

I must have pockets.
Deeeeep pockets.
And I don’t mean that in a gold-digger/miser/rich-gal sort of way.

I need space.
I need room for my
Keys, and
Cellphone, and
Drivers license, credit card, insurance card, and
Cold hard cash.
Sometimes I stick a Kleenex in there, or a
Cough drop, or
A tampon, or
Directions and invitations.

It’s only lately that I listened to my pockets.

When I walk.
When there's coins
deep in my pockets.
Walking.

Happily down the hall to fill my water bottle, or
Through Gigantic Grocery Store from one corner to
The
Other corner,
For milk and makeup and more, more panties.
Striding through a shop, or
Up to the front door of the school, or
From the basement to the top floor with a load of laundry.

Change.

I love to hear the sound of change.
Rubbing against each other in pockets.
A bird-song of conversation.
State quarters tinkle against old Canadian pennies,
Dimes find dimes and fit their grooves into each other,
Nickels become chimes. (nickels, nickels, nickels, says Psychiatrist Lucy)

It’s the sound
Of the sound
Of the lives of my dad and his kind,
A few coins to rub together,
A delicious sound,
A sound of prosperity,
The sound of 32 cents.

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar

There are two things I’d do if I had a penis.

One. Pee. Everywhere. Make that burbling hollow sound in the toilet. Pee in a corner of the parking garage. Pee on trees. Write my name in the snow with a lovely yellow stream of pee. Pee pee pee. Directionally and with great glee.

Two. Make love to a woman. What’s that like? I have a good imagination, I’ve been on the girly end, and I know what I like. I see how guys do it, the experienced and sexy guys, all their little tricks and traps, the Kama Sutra positions and in-outs counting to 10, with 10 being the most forceful. I think I could do it. I just want to know what it feels like from the poking point of view. I’m sure my tendency to get carried away during the act would result in something ‘premature’, but I could always rub her back and flip her over and do it again.

Now.

Given my dishing on penises, I must also say, I don’t have Penis Envy. I like them, I enjoy them, I wrap parts of my body around them. I enjoy the pleasure they give me, and like to see what pleasure I can give them. I think they’re handy little conduits for waste and wee swimmers. But. I have no real desire to obtain one for my own genitalia.

Given that, I was stymied the other day by a male co-worker's suggestion that I was afraid of penises.

Because I’m afraid of snakes.

Check that.

I HATE snakes.

The whole stinkin’ lot of ‘em.

They’re nasty, creepy, squirmy creatures who live only to freak my shit out.

I have touched a boa constrictor before, in some class or other. Yeah, I didn’t die, but the thought of barfing was a real possibility.

If I’m reading a book or magazine that has a photo or illustration of a snake on it, I have to turn the page, and the next page, and the next, until I’m sure there’s no way the snake could come to life and attack me.

When I was 10 years old, going down into the basement for a jar of strawberry jam, I nearly stepped on a garter snake that had made its way onto the basement floor’s dank darkness. Such a scream my parents never heard…they thought I was dying. I’m still scared of their basement.

When I know there are snakes in the area, I become this paranoid Snake-Hunter, nervously watching the ground, the floor, the drains in the bathroom, for any sign of wiggling or forked tongues poking the air, sniffing for my fear. I pee several inches above the toilet seat.

There’s rumour that the vacant lot beside my office holds tons of snakes. I didn’t believe it until a female co-worker came into Cubeland and left a snake’s skin for another co-worker of ours.

A big snake skin.
Recently shed.
More than 3 feet long.
(shudder)

Now my feet are propped up and I’m searching the carpeting for any signs of slithering. Freaked out.

It has nothing to do with penises. Peni. Whatever.

Penis = good.
Snake = horrible, ugly, slithering death monster.

Poetry Friday: The Word is TRIP

Wow, Memorial Day Weekend snuck up on me. It didn’t occur to me til this morning that some of y’all may be on the road, or sleeping in, or startin’ a 4-day mini-break. I s’pose it’s fitting, then, that the Poetry Friday Word for Today is TRIP. If you choose to blog, feel free to include this juicy little morsel in your post, in whatever meaty mass fills yer bun…story, poem, photo, sculpture, mojito recipe, self-portrait by the camper….

I’ve been running ragged again this morning, and all I have is something not quite right. My favourite trip. From childhood. Definitely Dick Van Dyke, tripping wheep-boomp over the ottoman. YooToob didn’t have that exact clip, but they DID have this sweet little number, which is, in a way, even better. Following it is the Family Guy take on the famous intro, albeit in a more dastardly and harmful fashion. Que sera sera.

Have a very happy, safe, LOOOOONG weekend, y’all!

Poetry Friday Word for tomorrow, etc.

I feel guilt...actual GUILT...for not putting up at least one post this week.

Work is hell. Exciting, busy. But hell.

After-school activities have taken my free time (I actually wept when Girl-child's soccer team had their final party last Saturday...that cuts out two practices and one game every week! tear....).

Lately I am comatose after dinner, not really in a mood to post. Like I need an excuse to not post. But still. The guilt.

Yesterday, Wednesday, I was gone all day on a field trip with Boy-child’s class to Famous Park on Lake Michigan. Oh, it was beautiful! Sunny, in the 80s, the lake sparkled in its chilly spring coat, the sand dunes were gorgeously tan and poofy. We didn’t lose any kids, and only one got sick at lunchtime, when we stopped at Old Country Buffet, and they made pigs of themselves at the steam tables. So it goes.

The Poetry Friday WORD for tomorrow, in honour of yesterday’s activities, is TRIP. Now, I realize this has several meanings…a visit, a stumble, a thing that blows your mind. Use whatever variant gets between your toes, or make one up! Feel free to use it in your blog post tomorrow in your favourite form…poem, story, photo, sketch, acid-flashback, drunken rambling….

The trip yesterday was nice, but y’know what I liked the best? That my prayers and rain-dances and pleadings and cursings to Teh Gods and Spirits on High were answered, and my period didn’t start in all its torrential, chunky, sanguine glory. Ahhh…thank god for The Pill. I’m just a little skittish now what my First Period On The Pill will be like. What, will puppies and kittens come out my nethers? Pieces of eight? Brown paper packages tied up with string? Jeebus, but I swear, when my daughter turns 30, or maybe 40, we’re having a little talk about uterusus (uteri?) and how fallible and naughty they can be, ‘cause if I knew mine was gonna throw such a damn dirty fit eventually, I would have bought Super Plus tampons a loooong time ago and bought more black pants.

Poetry Friday: the word is….

Today’s Poetry Friday is open to interpretation. YOUR interpretation.

Reproduction.

Of a human form.

What’s that make you think of?

In your blog post today, feel free to expound upon human reproduction, in whatever form slips its hand inside your back pocket…story, poem, photo, musing, mess, ménage….

Time is tight this morning, so I will muse briefly.


1. I did play doctor when I was 5 years old, with Randy down the street. I thought it was dumb and pointless.

2. I learned about sex when the neighbor girl and I were looking at a newspaper, and there was an article about a 10-year old girl who’d had a baby. I was about 9 at the time. The neighbor girl, let’s call her Dixie, said, “Oh, I’d be SO embarrassed to be her!” “Why?”, I asked. Then Dixie told me how a man has a ‘tube’ and woman has a ‘hole’ and the man…dadadadada…into the woman’s…dadadada…and nine months later she has a baby. From then on, and still to this day, I sometimes look at couples and think…ew….you really did it with him/her?

3. My mom had two talks about reproduction with me. One was on the day in 4th grade where girls saw ‘The Film’ while the boys got to play kickball in the gym. (I STILL think that was a dirty gyp.) I always got up early, and mom came out to the living room where I was watching Andy Griffith Show, turned the tv off, sat down, and very embarrassingly told me about periods, in a Readers Digest condensed form. She made it sound like trees were growing in my belly. And she really didn’t explain the blood part. Just that it was a miracle. She vastly underestimated my need for information, which I later got from friends. Her second talk about reproduction with me? The night before I left for college, she said, “Remember, if a guy asks you to his room to “see his etchings”, DON’T GO.” That's it. I followed her advice. HAD a boy said that sentence, I would have responded like she told me to. However, the boys I knew in college had no etchings, only kegs of beer, imported record albums, and a taste for innocent farmgirls. Hehhehheh….

Poetry Friday WORD for tomorrow is a sexy, free-stylin’ thang….

Boy-child came home from school the other day, sighed, and mumbled, “We started Repro today.”

I misunderstood him and thought they were watching that Emilio Estevez movie.

“Repo?”, I asked.

“NO, Mooooom…repRo…y’know…reproductive health.”

Oh.
OHHH!!!

I knew it was coming, and yet, still, seeing my 10-year old standing in the kitchen with his eyes full of confusion and questions and “yuck!”, it startled me. My “baby” was learning about “babies” and parts and hormones and puberty, and while I’m up for answering any question, it was still a little nerve-wracking.

That being as it may, the Poetry Friday Word for tomorrow is…whatever you want it to be, SO LONG as it has to do with “repro”…choose a word about boy/girl parts (proper Latin or vulgar American, I don’t care, it’s your blog), talk about when you first learned about sex, draw a diagram of what your mom said periods would be like, whatever floats your little-man-in-a-boat when you think of that anxious time in 4th grade (or whenever) when you left childish things behind and learned how your parents and teachers and neighbors “did it”.

My favourite Repro question of Boy-child’s so far: “Mom, uh…do girls use deodorant?”

My favourite Repro statement of Boy-child’s so far: “OH! So THAT’S why there’s all those things under the bathroom sink! (Pause. Shudder.) Yuuuuck!”

Is You Am a Dog?

Girl-child has decided she wants a pet of her own.

(Excuse me whilst I commence sighing in that long-suffering mom-like way that we hate to admit we indulge in.)

Sighhhhh.

A pet.
Of her own.

Our family has a cat, a very lovely cat, a very affectionate…albeit sleepy and persnickety…and what cat ISN’t…cat, whom Girl-child shares kisses and rolling-abouts on my bed and head-scratches and bits of cheese and tuna.

However.

Since we’ve put the kaibosh on Girl-child having a younger sibling, she’s decided she wants to be Big Sister to Something.

Now, our family has already tried several varieties of pets:

Goldfish. They died. Horrible, water-jumping, tail-rotting deaths, even with daily checks on the charcoal filter and special drops in the water and just the right amount of food and sunlight.

Hamster. Nah. Too bitey. Not affectionate. Hard to cuddle.

Dog. As kids, we thought we were Dog People. Until we got one as grownups. Then, as much as we tried, it wasn’t a good fit. We’re gone all day, and gone most nights for sports or meetings or whatnot, and there wasn’t enough time or space or patience (damn ‘house-trained’ dog peed everywhere).

Sergei took the kids to a local mall last weekend shopping, and they happened into a pet store.
They returned with Girl-child grinning about how she’d found the PERFECT pet.
She COULDN’T WAIT to see if I approved.
Sergei smiled knowingly.

Girl-child wanted…

…a RAT.

RAT!

Oh.
Dear.
Jeebus.
NO.

Me and vermin, well, we just don’t get along. I had a hamster after college, and it freaked me out such (with its albino skin and red eyes) that I had to release it into the wild. The hamster that Sergei brought home a few years ago I hardly ever looked at, much less took care of.

But.

A RAT??

That’s NOT a pet.
That’s a Garbage Dweller.
That’s Templeton stealing apple cores at the county fair.
That’s…

…just not right.

I know people that have kept pet rats. I can’t listen to their stories of their ‘cute pets’ without some amount of goosebumping and shivering and nearly-throwing-up-episodes.

NO.

I told Girl-child that a rat was NOT a good pet for us. Even though she thought they were cute and came to the glass when she tapped on it.

Any rat, any mouse, any varmit, that dares cross my threshold will find themselves in a wicked Rube-Goldberg trap of my own design, which will lead them through tunnels and swamps and right back to the Pet Store.

Mickey, be warned.

Dr. Soccer Mom and Ms. Thang

See, on the outside I’m all unassuming and easy-going and love to tote the kids to soccer and dance, and buy tangerine frappe-whatzis in the grocery store coffee kiosk, and watch the evening news with actual interest…

…but on the inside…

…I’m this girl, all growly and sexy and flirty and ballsy.

I do have tattoos, though, so I got that goin’ for me.




(Sergei got me this cd for Mothers Day. I'm all gooshy. Highly recommend.)

Poetry Friday: The Word is RAIN

It’s the rainy season in the Midwest...if we have “seasons”, which I’m strongly beginning to doubt, as day to day we experience a myriad of seasonal changes that can’t be correlated into what the calendar says. The other morning it was not quite 40 degrees when I left the house, and near 90 degrees when I left work for the day. You can’t tell me that’s Spring. Hell, not even Summer. It’s some strange confluence of seasonal affects that combine into one confusing day for wearing clothing.

What I do know is this…between March and November, the humidity in Michigan makes my hair go nuts. N-V-T-S. And in the rain? Fuggedaboudit. It's a sloppy mess.

Feel free to use the word RAIN in your blog post today, in whatever drizzly pattern trickles down your window…poem, story, photo, song styling, secret to winning the lottery….

I have a couple things, mostly memories. Rain reminds me of things.

Have a good weekend, y’all!


Jules
Years ago, MTv started their “Unplugged” series, and in the beginning, it was hosted by musician Jules Shear. Who I’d always loved. (He has those big sad eyes and plaintive voice that tickle my cooter.) On one show, I don’t remember who the guests were (they had several on at one time), Jules sang the Beatles song “Rain” in duet form with someone I don’t recall. I have the episode taped somewhere, and back then, I watched it dozens of times, to capture the nuances of his voice and sleep on them like a big soft pillow. Unfortunately, I can’t find hide nor hair of it anywhere in Teh Internets. Drat. What I can find is the Beatles video version...and even though I'll always have a soft spot for the Fab Four, my heart beats faster thinking of Jules' less-psychedelic version, all acoustic and smiley.




Nightcrawlers

It was night now. Daddy drove us in his big red car back from the funeral parlour, where the grownups cried and us kids sat on wooden chairs in the hallway, fidgeting with Little Golden Books and plastic yoyos, trying to make sense of it, wondering why it happened. And why not us.

It was night now, and the car drove slowly through the rain, the windshield washers whoomp-whoomping a rhythm that set my baby sister to sleep on Mama's lap, and all of us wishing we were in bed. The pavement was shiny, and the mercury lights from the farms along the road twinkled like stars in the downpour.

It was night now, and I was tired, but I could swear we were hitting something...something little on the road, constantly...bumpbumpbump...bump...bumpbump...bumpbumpbumpbump.

"What's that?", I asked Daddy, and pointed to the little lumps that appeared in our headlights on the road.

"Them's nightcrawlers," he said. "Them big ol' worms come outta the ground when it rains, so they don't drown. Trouble is, they gets where they shouldn't, like the road, and we run over 'em."

"Well, at least they don't drown," I yawned.

It was night now, and I fell asleep, hoping the nightcrawlers would see our headlights, and part like the sea in God's bible.

What I’ve Never Done in the Rain

Stomped in puddles
Kissed a boy under a tree
Tried to cook burgers on the grill
Played Freeze Tag
Washed a car
Run stark naked in the backyard
....my arms outstretched
....the rain running in rivers down the
....slopes of my body
....my hair a terrific soggy mess
....me laughing and finally free
....and
....sexy
....as
....hell

Poetry Friday Word for tomorrow, and the bitch within

Not last night, but the night before….

The storms came. Shook the house with cannon booms, rattling both kids out of their beds and into ours. It’s a queen bed, but it still fit…papa, boy, girl, mama. Curled and cuddled. I left to get Kleenex to sooth spring sneezing, and came back to find boy and girl had curled up together, him in the protective brother pose, she clutching the sleeping agent known as Pink Baby. My heart melted.

We didn’t sleep much. Thunder, lightning, and the endless kettledrum of rain at the window, which is soothing to me but no one else in the house. The kids were restless, and I had to prop my arm uncomfortably under my head to accomodate the extra bodies and the tossing, turning, kicking, grabbing, whimpering.

My hair is a fuzzy kinky mess from the humidity.

The air smells like wet animals, damp socks, and moldy earth.

It’s kinda nice, truth be told.

The Poetry Friday Word for tomorrow is RAIN. Please feel free to use it in your blog post tomorrow, in whatever manner dampens your squeegee…poem, story, photo, recipe for chicken n’ dumplings, audio post of you in the rain fiddling with your car keys while the groceries fall out of the bag….

I haven’t posted the last few days, which felt strange, but I had nothing to say that wasn’t bitching. And I’m just tired of bitching. Because I always bitch about ME and the stupid goings-on of my body. It still sucketh, don’t get me wrong. And I DID have a breakdown at work on Tuesday, when it seemed I would never get better. I cried for nearly an hour with my friend Connie, who has, luckily for me, gone through the same thing and gave me endless amounts of strength and advice. Dammit, but we all need girlfriends like that.

And.

I think now, my head has stopped spinning and writhing. My body has calmed down. I’m still crossing fingers and toes and every body part that The Pill will be Magic.

And today, I brought cookies to work.

Hoo-rah!

Zero

Busy as hell, I take a few minutes for me! Just me! to visit your blogs and make a few comments and catch up on Poetry Friday 'cause I left early and dammit my body is falling apart, and all I can think about is what's on the calendar for the next month and how I can't have my body falling apart, and there are NO creative things in that brain of mine, just none, and then I read your blogs and see the sparkly shiny things you create out of the ether, and the more I read the more inadequate I feel.

Dammit.

Can't. Even. Write. Today.

Poetry Friday: The Word is BELLY

I have one.
You have one, too.
Some are taut and tan.
Some are squishy and quite pale.
Some are hairy and some are bare,
and they lead kisses down to...there....

The Poetry Friday Word for today is BELLY. Feel free to use that lil word in your blog post today, in whatever warm and fuzzy version you choose...poem, story, photo, guitar solo, David sculpture, video of college guys at the gym pumping iron....

The word BELLY is distracting for me, as I immediately conjure up sexy thoughts.

Hmmm...some right now...my arm around Sergei, my hand on his belly, and then exploring...

...uh...

yeah, that's what I mean.

But not all belly-talk is sexy. Girl-child's belly hurts quite often, it seems, either from hunger or too much food, and she likes me to sit with her and rub her fuzzy puppy belly til she feels better. Boy-child's belly is becoming quite a six-pack, and when he peels off his sweaty soccer shirt, I can see the teenage boy he is soon to become, and oh how the girls will call and call him.

And, of course, my belly is a mess.
But let's not talk about that today.

I have a few slight offerings, words strung together, hurredly, with emotion held back, because if I could, I would scream the word BELLY top of my lungs whilst running naked through the building. There's also a good belly, and a bad belly (Mike Myers, how could you?).

Have a great weekend, y'all!


Bent Willows

In the moment
After the arch
And the release
My legs straddling
Your waist
I collapse
Slowly
An open mouth
Closing
My breasts meet
You first
But it’s the belly
On
The belly
the warm
Folding
That presses
new leaves
Into our skin
Remembrances
As the branches
Lace and
Weave
Trunks
Braided
Dew droplets
Between
And down
sleepy
Roots


Meaning Behind the French

Why?
Why my child?
Well, when you were still a star-twinkle
In two pairs of eyes,
I walked through our garden and
spied a cabbage, a lovely thing,
And set about to eating it.
I did not realize that
Deep within its leaves
Was a seed.
That seed warmed my belly.
Your father tended my garden,
(we laughed afterward
from the tickling of the new shoots growing),
and some time later,
you were born.
That is why
That is why.
And now to bed with you,
And now lay your head down,
Je t'aime,
Mon petit chou.


Gorgeous Belly, starting 40 seconds in. Oh. My. God. Those jeans....




NOT a gorgeous belly. This gives me the dry heaves.

Poetry Friday WORD for Tomorrow

I’m late and I’m swamped, and I know you just want it.

So here it is.

Belly.

BELLY.

Tomorrow…feel free to use the word BELLY in your blog post, in whatever Popin-Fresh-finger-punch you crack open…story, poem, photo, musical arrangement of two notes played repeatedly, fashion show cast-off, recipe for the perfect Cosmopolitan….

Hasta manana, amigos!

Wake me up, John Hughes!

1) I woke up to the alarm. Walked on weary legs to the bathroom. Peed. Brushed teeth, and finger-combed hair. Washed face. Deodorant, perfume. Put on makeup. Put on clothes. Packed my lunch, walked out the door, drove to work, and as I was settling down to a nice cup of hot java in front of my computer…
…my alarm went off. For real. That first part there? A dream. I slapped at the alarm and sat on the edge of the bed. Was THIS a dream? Dammit. I’m exhausted from dreaming that I’m awake only to realize I’m dreaming. Lately my dreams have been extremely vivid and real-time, like I’ve been karmically sentenced to live out two lifetimes at once…one during the day and one at night. I’m getting too old for this shit.

2) I’m in 80s throwback mode. Yesterday I posted the “Sixteen Candles” clip, and since then, I’ve had lines from that movie, from “Ferris Bueller”, “Breakfast Club”, and every other 80s teen-movie that dares come into my brain door with Madonna-tights and pixie boots. Then this morning I had this song in my head. I so love Robert Smith. I could eat him.

It’s okay, baby…I’m on The Pill….

No, I really am.

I feel naughty about it, too. Hee.

Me and the OB are trying to control the Crimson Permanent Assurance’s tendency to sail towards the rocks and explode in a thousand million messy pieces, and Sunday I started downing one little white pill every day. I’m waiting for my breasteses to explode hugely and my face to be clear as porcelain.

Then I can start my modeling career.

Meanwhile, I can’t get this scene out of my head…minute 9. Oh, sit through it, you know you LOVE this movie. Minute 9. John Cusack along the way. Farmer Ted. Jake Ryan.



I’m also toying with the idea of starting yet another blog and entitling it, “Mona Talks About Her Period…(sigh)…AGAIN.” Then I wouldn’t have to clutter this blog with useless whining and bitching and moaning about ‘the miracle in my uterus’. (Shipwreck in my uterus, more like it. See? See how I bitch??)