...i'll be 35 this year...when i was 15 that number seemed like a lifetime away...and it was...over the last 20 years i've lived a life so unlike the one i had as a child i sometimes can't believe i'm the same person...i've changed physically--i've gotten wider, my hair's gotten shorter, my skin's gotten redder (thanks, mom)...i've grown up--gotten married, moved from the golden coast, had a child...i've had a slew of people come and go in my life, each one leaving behind some part of themselves with me--my love for show tunes, disneyland, menthol cigarettes, skiing, desert air, basketball, spanish verbs, orange county, silver jewelry, jade, NASA...my loathing of reggie miller (sorry, jerwanda), high heels, trust fund babies, republicans, barbies, and all things chartreuse ...
...and now that my life has turned upside down by events over the last few weeks, i find myself standing not at a crossroads, but a freeway (another thing i miss and love), where the carpoolers veer off to the left and launch 100 feet over the rest of traffic in their speedy solo lane, while the off-ramps connect to other labyrinth lanes...when i was 15 this picture of my life caused my heart to bounce...i could go anywhere, do anything...i could reinvent myself, shaking off my identity as the daughter of a rapist from a poor desert town...i could take one lane and, if i didn't like it, take another...eventually, i'd make my way into that speedy lane...but i'd never turn around and go back...
...i've been in the carpool lane for years, and now i'm being forced to exit...to merge into general traffic...i'm 35 and i have to figure out what to do with my life all over again...the lanes ahead scare the hell out of me, because each one has a warning sign above it...
...growing up, my grandmother always told me, "You can't depend on a damned man. You have to support yourself"...grandma certainly was bitter about her five failed marriages, true, but even her skewed--down right fucked up--view of the husband-wife dynamic resonates with me...if i'm not bringing in an income, not contributing monetarily to the household, what good am i? for over 20 years this has been my main contribution to my family......since i was 8 years old, i've been working to support myself...
...what else am i?
...i've heard the platitudes and the benefits of being a woman who can stay home...i know that if i devote more time to my kid now she's more likely to be a better adult...but i never wanted to be one of those women...i wanted to get up early, shower, put on a scrubs, charge the workplace, be the alpha bitch, and come home to a house that was clean, a meal that was cooked, pets that were groomed...in short, i wanted a housekeeper named chi-chi and a top position at a hospital...but somewhere around my second year of college, i decided that life wasn't exactly for me...i followed writing, and then didn't know what to do...i have just enough talent to be miserable, not enough to support myself...
...it's time to finish my memoir, give it a good one-two punch in the editing department, and send it off into the world...i know i've got something good...but to dive full-time into writing, with no means of supporting myself, causes a pileup of I-5 proportions...
...whether it was what i planned for myself 20, 15, or 10 years ago, it's happening...i'm going around the pileup, finding my own detour...i'll probably end up in back alleys, on one way streets, crossing rickety bridges...
...each morning i'll get up, shower, put on jeans and a t-shirt, get the kid off to her own world--her own freeway--and charge my writing room...at least inside those four walls i really am the alpha bitch...because i'm the only one there...
4.26.2012
4.22.2012
Dance Granny
...i've been run out of the dance academy's lobby by a dance granny--you know the type: the over fifty crowd who take care of their grandkids while their eighteen-year-old children are studying for the GED and/or working part-time at arby's...this dance granny isn't particularly haggard, but she has a washed-out look about her that, on my first visit, i pitied...i generally feel sorry for her type--raising her second set of kids because the abstinence only sex education provided by the local high school just didn't take...but this woman soon lost all pity i could possibly muster for her...
...dance granny is an authority on everything from shrimp farmed in china to the latest illegal immigration laws...i wouldn't even have noticed she was in the room if she didn't jump into the middle of the conversations going on around her...today, it's the georgia coast...a mom mentions to another mom next to her that her family is vacationing at tybee island this year...something she's just mentioned in passing...polite conversation you might have with an acquaintance you sit next to each saturday morning for an hour or so while your children dance together behind closed doors...she's not bragging...she mentions it as if she's talking about the weather...they've rented an RV and are going to spend a week at the beach...next week, we all will have forgotten this point, as it's not important to us...what's important are the things we're going to be doing after this hour of limbo i call waiting-for-my-kid's-class-to-end-so-i-c
...sure everyone in the lobby can hear everyone else...the room's the size of a jail cell...it even boasts a worn television set in the corner, broadcasting the dancing going on behind the walls...it reminds me of scenes from television crime dramas--the little areas off the interrogation rooms where the detectives wait to catch the criminals in a lie...suddenly, i'm sweating like i'm guilty of something...i shift in my place on the hard wooden bench against the wall and try to take my mind off the idea that this is some sort of line up...
...dance granny hears the word "beach" and she's off to the races..."We prefer the gulf to the coast, my family. We go down there a few times a year. It's good swimming. Warm."
...the mom looks around, unsure at first if the comment is directed at her...when she sees that it is, she says, "We've done that before, but the gulf doesn't have shallow water for our kids. We really--"
...dance granny cuts her off: "The water is deep. It's not as cold as the coast though, so there's that going for it. Of course, when the oil spilled we missed a year, but we've gone three times since then, we have a little cabin down there. My daughter's husband and his family have it. They're from Alabama. Course, my daughter's from here in middle Georgia, but she's lived so long over there she has that deep drawl now. I tell people there's three Gerogias--the mountain people, the middle, and the coast. They don't hardly believe me unless they hear it for themselves."
...she stops for a breath...by then the room has gone completely silent because she has grown louder with each new word...i glance around, and notice no one is looking at her, not even the mom who's vacationing in the RV...a dozen set of eyes are not looking in dance granny's direction...the room grows heavy, as if the ceiling were dropping...as if dance granny's voice has triggered a booby trap...
...i turn to the television in the corner, eye my daughter's teachers putting all the little ones in a circle...my daughter is watching, mimicking the dance steps as i've told her to do...a few of the other girls are simply spinning around, unfocused...why are their parents, their grandparents, spending money for these classes if the kids aren't even enjoying it?
...a dad walks in, his smart phone in hand...he stands next to a woman who is so tiny, if she'd been wearing a leotard i would've mistaken her for a student..."Is that the new iPhone?" she asks, nearly to herself...she glances in dance granny's direction...but it's too late...the acoustics in the lobby are good and her words ricochet around before landing right in dance granny's ears...
...the dad nods and opens his mouth to speak, but granny is on the move...she's out of her seat, her own phone in hand, taking two steps until she's encroached on dad's personal space...to no one in particular she says, "My son got me this new phone and I still can't figure it out. I haven't been able to check my email."
...i shudder, thinking of the type of mail this woman sends out--those chain mail warnings, a series of pictures of cats dressed in formal attire, a long message encouraging the reader to make a wish and then scroll to the bottom if they want it to come true...i get a few of these a week from people i really believe should have to take some sort of exam before being allowed to operate anything having to do with the internet...
...the dad, a good southern boy who respects his elders not out of genuine reverence but out of some sort of rote training, smiles and says, "I sell that phone at my store. I can set that up for you." ...he reaches out for her phone, but dance granny holds tight...
"You have store?"
...the dad is about to answer, but dance granny is going again...this time, she's talking so loudly that the dad and tiny woman back away as far as they can...they look as if they're pinned to the high counter of the front desk where the girl who sits behind it is fiddling with a set of monster high dolls...i know the girl, vaguely, as the owner of the studio...she's a college student, an artist, who will be heading off to art school soon...she brushes the dolls' hair with an intensity only found in lonely children...
...dance granny is postulating on the way her son simply turned off the service on her last phone, leaving her stranded with the new one...how it took her three days just to figure out how to call him from it and demand he give her back the other one...it's been six weeks and she still doesn't know how to do anything else but use her phone for phone calls...finally, she shoves the phone at the dad and says, "Can you show me how to use this thing?"
...the dad is gracious, but the tiny woman turns away...in doing so, she meets my stare and rolls her eyes...i raise my eyebrows...
...a few moments later dance granny is off on another speech, this time about people who don't give blood during charity blood drives...i can't take it any more...i glance one more time at the television screen--my daughter won't be out of class for another half hour--and head outside to the picnic table just beyond the parking lot...it's been raining off and on for days, and the bench is moist, but i'd rather have a damp ass that listen to dance granny for another second...
...i'm not sure what makes dance granny so chatty...she's the oldest person in the lobby, by far, so perhaps she feels that gives her some sort of permission to dominate and monopolize conversations...i'm new to the dance academy, but everyone here seems to know one another at least by sight...maybe they're used to her, her loud voice as if she's speaking at a pep rally...maybe she's just background noise like the dance teachers behind the closed doors beating out ballet positions while the little girls follow along...
...more to the point, though, why does dance granny even need this sort of vapid conversation?...it's as pointless as the chain emails she'll once again send when the gracious dad sets up her account on her new phone...does she save up all of her talking points for saturday mornings, when she knows that the rest of us are just waking up and, thus, too tired to mutter a decent reply?
...sitting at the table beneath the large oak tree, a high-pitched chatter begins behind me...two squirrels are bickering over an acorn...they're perched on a chain link fence, playing a strange version of chicken...finally, the loudest of the two abandons the fence...he hops down and scurries up the side of the tree, ignoring me completely...
...i suddenly wish my husband had come with me...if he were here, at least i'd have someone to talk to, maybe we could have some coffee and plan our week...as it is, we'll try to get our lives together in the fleeting moments we have before we lose consciousness when we fall into bed at the end of the day...we're both so tired lately...as if, instead of our daughter, we're the ones dancing around in circles...
...maybe instead of suffering from verbal diarrhea, dance granny is simply lonely...perhaps she spends her weeks in silence, ignored by the people who love her...maybe the dance academy lobby is the only place she can find some sort of connection to the outside...or maybe her week-long silences finally build up until all she can do is release her voice on the rest of us, a pseudo revenge on a world that, otherwise, overlooks her completely...
...dance granny is an authority on everything from shrimp farmed in china to the latest illegal immigration laws...i wouldn't even have noticed she was in the room if she didn't jump into the middle of the conversations going on around her...today, it's the georgia coast...a mom mentions to another mom next to her that her family is vacationing at tybee island this year...something she's just mentioned in passing...polite conversation you might have with an acquaintance you sit next to each saturday morning for an hour or so while your children dance together behind closed doors...she's not bragging...she mentions it as if she's talking about the weather...they've rented an RV and are going to spend a week at the beach...next week, we all will have forgotten this point, as it's not important to us...what's important are the things we're going to be doing after this hour of limbo i call waiting-for-my-kid's-class-to-end-so-i-c
...sure everyone in the lobby can hear everyone else...the room's the size of a jail cell...it even boasts a worn television set in the corner, broadcasting the dancing going on behind the walls...it reminds me of scenes from television crime dramas--the little areas off the interrogation rooms where the detectives wait to catch the criminals in a lie...suddenly, i'm sweating like i'm guilty of something...i shift in my place on the hard wooden bench against the wall and try to take my mind off the idea that this is some sort of line up...
...dance granny hears the word "beach" and she's off to the races..."We prefer the gulf to the coast, my family. We go down there a few times a year. It's good swimming. Warm."
...the mom looks around, unsure at first if the comment is directed at her...when she sees that it is, she says, "We've done that before, but the gulf doesn't have shallow water for our kids. We really--"
...dance granny cuts her off: "The water is deep. It's not as cold as the coast though, so there's that going for it. Of course, when the oil spilled we missed a year, but we've gone three times since then, we have a little cabin down there. My daughter's husband and his family have it. They're from Alabama. Course, my daughter's from here in middle Georgia, but she's lived so long over there she has that deep drawl now. I tell people there's three Gerogias--the mountain people, the middle, and the coast. They don't hardly believe me unless they hear it for themselves."
...she stops for a breath...by then the room has gone completely silent because she has grown louder with each new word...i glance around, and notice no one is looking at her, not even the mom who's vacationing in the RV...a dozen set of eyes are not looking in dance granny's direction...the room grows heavy, as if the ceiling were dropping...as if dance granny's voice has triggered a booby trap...
...i turn to the television in the corner, eye my daughter's teachers putting all the little ones in a circle...my daughter is watching, mimicking the dance steps as i've told her to do...a few of the other girls are simply spinning around, unfocused...why are their parents, their grandparents, spending money for these classes if the kids aren't even enjoying it?
...a dad walks in, his smart phone in hand...he stands next to a woman who is so tiny, if she'd been wearing a leotard i would've mistaken her for a student..."Is that the new iPhone?" she asks, nearly to herself...she glances in dance granny's direction...but it's too late...the acoustics in the lobby are good and her words ricochet around before landing right in dance granny's ears...
...the dad nods and opens his mouth to speak, but granny is on the move...she's out of her seat, her own phone in hand, taking two steps until she's encroached on dad's personal space...to no one in particular she says, "My son got me this new phone and I still can't figure it out. I haven't been able to check my email."
...i shudder, thinking of the type of mail this woman sends out--those chain mail warnings, a series of pictures of cats dressed in formal attire, a long message encouraging the reader to make a wish and then scroll to the bottom if they want it to come true...i get a few of these a week from people i really believe should have to take some sort of exam before being allowed to operate anything having to do with the internet...
...the dad, a good southern boy who respects his elders not out of genuine reverence but out of some sort of rote training, smiles and says, "I sell that phone at my store. I can set that up for you." ...he reaches out for her phone, but dance granny holds tight...
"You have store?"
...the dad is about to answer, but dance granny is going again...this time, she's talking so loudly that the dad and tiny woman back away as far as they can...they look as if they're pinned to the high counter of the front desk where the girl who sits behind it is fiddling with a set of monster high dolls...i know the girl, vaguely, as the owner of the studio...she's a college student, an artist, who will be heading off to art school soon...she brushes the dolls' hair with an intensity only found in lonely children...
...dance granny is postulating on the way her son simply turned off the service on her last phone, leaving her stranded with the new one...how it took her three days just to figure out how to call him from it and demand he give her back the other one...it's been six weeks and she still doesn't know how to do anything else but use her phone for phone calls...finally, she shoves the phone at the dad and says, "Can you show me how to use this thing?"
...the dad is gracious, but the tiny woman turns away...in doing so, she meets my stare and rolls her eyes...i raise my eyebrows...
...a few moments later dance granny is off on another speech, this time about people who don't give blood during charity blood drives...i can't take it any more...i glance one more time at the television screen--my daughter won't be out of class for another half hour--and head outside to the picnic table just beyond the parking lot...it's been raining off and on for days, and the bench is moist, but i'd rather have a damp ass that listen to dance granny for another second...
...i'm not sure what makes dance granny so chatty...she's the oldest person in the lobby, by far, so perhaps she feels that gives her some sort of permission to dominate and monopolize conversations...i'm new to the dance academy, but everyone here seems to know one another at least by sight...maybe they're used to her, her loud voice as if she's speaking at a pep rally...maybe she's just background noise like the dance teachers behind the closed doors beating out ballet positions while the little girls follow along...
...more to the point, though, why does dance granny even need this sort of vapid conversation?...it's as pointless as the chain emails she'll once again send when the gracious dad sets up her account on her new phone...does she save up all of her talking points for saturday mornings, when she knows that the rest of us are just waking up and, thus, too tired to mutter a decent reply?
...sitting at the table beneath the large oak tree, a high-pitched chatter begins behind me...two squirrels are bickering over an acorn...they're perched on a chain link fence, playing a strange version of chicken...finally, the loudest of the two abandons the fence...he hops down and scurries up the side of the tree, ignoring me completely...
...i suddenly wish my husband had come with me...if he were here, at least i'd have someone to talk to, maybe we could have some coffee and plan our week...as it is, we'll try to get our lives together in the fleeting moments we have before we lose consciousness when we fall into bed at the end of the day...we're both so tired lately...as if, instead of our daughter, we're the ones dancing around in circles...
...maybe instead of suffering from verbal diarrhea, dance granny is simply lonely...perhaps she spends her weeks in silence, ignored by the people who love her...maybe the dance academy lobby is the only place she can find some sort of connection to the outside...or maybe her week-long silences finally build up until all she can do is release her voice on the rest of us, a pseudo revenge on a world that, otherwise, overlooks her completely...
4.17.2012
Open Letter #2
dear White Trash Neighbor,
bravo!...since my last epistolary narration, the lawn has been mowed...i must admit, i had my doubts about the power of the pen when it came to our relationship...but now that i know you're listening, i'll go on...
i'm pleased that you finally entrusted little "jimmy" with the task of mowing the yard...
one hiccup, though, remains...and maybe this is me erroneously believing the rest of the world should think and act as i do...but you had him out there working on easter sunday...at 9:30pm...and that struck me as rather odd...in the south, most people consider easter a holy day...a reason for schools and government offices to close for days on end...since i often see you piling all five--or is it six?--kids into the dented van--the girls in ankle length cotton, little "jimmy" in his pleated slacks--and heading out every sunday, i made the assumption that you, too, found this day special...perhaps the "specialness" ends at sundown?...whatever the case, i couldn't help but notice little "jimmy" mowing in darkness, the only light cast on him from my own front porch...he seemed to be falling over the mower...a side-effect of sunrise worship?
as i turned out the lights inside my house and headed to bed, i listened for a moment to the drone and gurgle of the blade...it was already an hour past my own child's bedtime...she had to wake early the next morning for daycare...my husband and i had work...would little "jimmy" be getting any rest?
then i wondered at the value of cutting the yard in the dark...what life lesson was he was learning--aside from listening to your bossy neighbor?...that home maintenance should only be undertaken as a covert operation?
now that the grass has been hewn, i can clearly see the blocks holding up the truck in the yard...and perhaps you can finally get those tires you've been "waiting on" for over a year?...i can also clearly see the mattresses strewn about the grass...are you planning a night out? is this some sort of camping trip? i've not known many people to bring an entire chest of drawers on such an excursion, so i'd like to know--logistically speaking--what you have planned...since my home is only a few yards from where you've constructed a makeshift campfire, should i have the fire department on speed dial?
really, truthfully,
Neighbor Who Runs Inside When She Sees You Coming
bravo!...since my last epistolary narration, the lawn has been mowed...i must admit, i had my doubts about the power of the pen when it came to our relationship...but now that i know you're listening, i'll go on...
i'm pleased that you finally entrusted little "jimmy" with the task of mowing the yard...
one hiccup, though, remains...and maybe this is me erroneously believing the rest of the world should think and act as i do...but you had him out there working on easter sunday...at 9:30pm...and that struck me as rather odd...in the south, most people consider easter a holy day...a reason for schools and government offices to close for days on end...since i often see you piling all five--or is it six?--kids into the dented van--the girls in ankle length cotton, little "jimmy" in his pleated slacks--and heading out every sunday, i made the assumption that you, too, found this day special...perhaps the "specialness" ends at sundown?...whatever the case, i couldn't help but notice little "jimmy" mowing in darkness, the only light cast on him from my own front porch...he seemed to be falling over the mower...a side-effect of sunrise worship?
as i turned out the lights inside my house and headed to bed, i listened for a moment to the drone and gurgle of the blade...it was already an hour past my own child's bedtime...she had to wake early the next morning for daycare...my husband and i had work...would little "jimmy" be getting any rest?
then i wondered at the value of cutting the yard in the dark...what life lesson was he was learning--aside from listening to your bossy neighbor?...that home maintenance should only be undertaken as a covert operation?
now that the grass has been hewn, i can clearly see the blocks holding up the truck in the yard...and perhaps you can finally get those tires you've been "waiting on" for over a year?...i can also clearly see the mattresses strewn about the grass...are you planning a night out? is this some sort of camping trip? i've not known many people to bring an entire chest of drawers on such an excursion, so i'd like to know--logistically speaking--what you have planned...since my home is only a few yards from where you've constructed a makeshift campfire, should i have the fire department on speed dial?
really, truthfully,
Neighbor Who Runs Inside When She Sees You Coming
4.12.2012
Shut the Front Door
...and lock it...
...when you grow up in and around the greater Los Angeles area, that's the first lesson you learn right after how to conceal your handgun in your stroller/diaper...now that i live in rural georgia, i find it terrifying that my neighbors, my friends, perfect strangers, leave their cars, windows, and front doors unlocked...one person admitted to me she left her keys in her car at all times...
...what kind of world is this? why aren't they all terrified?
...why am i?
...today a link was sent to me via a former student... i stared at the screen in disbelief and shouted to my husband, "shut the front door!"
...to which he responded, "it's closed and you've got it locked. what're you talking about?"
...this: Students Who Love Professor Wilson-Young
...sure, i've only got three likes...but those ripples are encouraging...kind of like the keys in the car...at all times...making the rest of us a little more honest...
...when you grow up in and around the greater Los Angeles area, that's the first lesson you learn right after how to conceal your handgun in your stroller/diaper...now that i live in rural georgia, i find it terrifying that my neighbors, my friends, perfect strangers, leave their cars, windows, and front doors unlocked...one person admitted to me she left her keys in her car at all times...
...what kind of world is this? why aren't they all terrified?
...why am i?
...today a link was sent to me via a former student... i stared at the screen in disbelief and shouted to my husband, "shut the front door!"
...to which he responded, "it's closed and you've got it locked. what're you talking about?"
...this: Students Who Love Professor Wilson-Young
...sure, i've only got three likes...but those ripples are encouraging...kind of like the keys in the car...at all times...making the rest of us a little more honest...
4.03.2012
Open Letter #1
dear White Trash Neighbor:
let me begin by saying i don't use that title lightly...in fact, because i lived with that stigma for much of my childhood, i hate it...but, honey, you have earned it...take a bow...
i'm not from the south...there's a learning curve that comes with living next door to me...for instance, i'll never understand the concept of putting a truck on blocks...in the front yard...and using it as a fort/dog house...and in the process, ruining a beautiful lawn and sprinkler system installed by the previous homeowners...i will probably never understand why most southern homes smell of pork...or cured meats in general...and why your home, specifically, seems to attract all manner of overweight, unattractive little children who seem as drawn to the smell as i am repelled by it...i know i've completely missed the point of your above ground pool...and your unwillingness to clean it of algae...and mosquito larvae...and overweight, unattractive children...but i'm trying, so cut me some slack...
but i cannot abide by the three-foot tall grass in your front yard...sure, let your three dogs dig holes and urinate all over your back yard...it's fenced...no one can see into the flat mud hole that--before you bought the place--was the lush envy of the neighborhood...let the overweight, unattractive children dance and sing in a black mixture of dog shit and georgia clay...let them fling their retched little bodies around on the trampoline you insisted the previous owner include in the sale...but please, for the love of neighborhood property values, mow your goddamn front lawn...
i've overlooked the fact that you've let it go to seed...that you couldn't use the sprinklers once your dented truck had decapitated several of them...that you cut the shrubs down to twigs, let the magnolia and knockout roses die, and allowed weeds to overtake the day lily patches...who needs all that work? but the grass...the three-foot-high grass...there's just no excuse...
here's an idea...and may i add that it's killing two birds with one stone? i might have mentioned already that your home seems to be the pied piper of overweight, unattractive children...one of whom seems to be a young man of about twelve, whom i've heard you calling "jimmy"...perhaps instead of spending his afternoons peeing in the front bushes or riding his motorized scooter up and down the block, "jimmy" could get out the old push mower and have at it with those weeds?
or, if this is too sexist for you, perhaps one of the four girl children might be free? i was mowing my grandmother's lawn when i was eight, so i know it's not that hard...the oldest girl--you know the one, right? with the sour orange hair?---looks fit enough to run the mower around your fifteen yards of lawn...that might ,then, be an excuse for wearing her tube top and jean skirt out of the house, as she's so prone to do when she goes for the mail each day...
or maybe you're not into the whole "child labor" thing (i doubt it...what other reason is there for having five kids and converting your garage into more bedrooms?)...here's another idea: get your fat ass out there and mow the yard yourself...i'm a big-assed girl myself...trust me, an afternoon in the georgia sun will melt some of that off...then maybe you can expand your wardrobe to include something other than the navy mu-mus you seem to hoard by the dozen...that might help with the "dating problem" i've heard you mention as you scream into your cell phone while pacing around your three-foot-high lawn...
and while i'm writing, i haven't asked in a while...how's your parole officer? now that the kids are back with you--and you've provided them with bedrooms in the garage--i haven't seen her around much...is she keeping your three exes off your back? i hope so...i know you don't really need all that stress...
really, truthfully,
Neighbor Who Runs Inside When She Sees You Coming
let me begin by saying i don't use that title lightly...in fact, because i lived with that stigma for much of my childhood, i hate it...but, honey, you have earned it...take a bow...
i'm not from the south...there's a learning curve that comes with living next door to me...for instance, i'll never understand the concept of putting a truck on blocks...in the front yard...and using it as a fort/dog house...and in the process, ruining a beautiful lawn and sprinkler system installed by the previous homeowners...i will probably never understand why most southern homes smell of pork...or cured meats in general...and why your home, specifically, seems to attract all manner of overweight, unattractive little children who seem as drawn to the smell as i am repelled by it...i know i've completely missed the point of your above ground pool...and your unwillingness to clean it of algae...and mosquito larvae...and overweight, unattractive children...but i'm trying, so cut me some slack...
but i cannot abide by the three-foot tall grass in your front yard...sure, let your three dogs dig holes and urinate all over your back yard...it's fenced...no one can see into the flat mud hole that--before you bought the place--was the lush envy of the neighborhood...let the overweight, unattractive children dance and sing in a black mixture of dog shit and georgia clay...let them fling their retched little bodies around on the trampoline you insisted the previous owner include in the sale...but please, for the love of neighborhood property values, mow your goddamn front lawn...
i've overlooked the fact that you've let it go to seed...that you couldn't use the sprinklers once your dented truck had decapitated several of them...that you cut the shrubs down to twigs, let the magnolia and knockout roses die, and allowed weeds to overtake the day lily patches...who needs all that work? but the grass...the three-foot-high grass...there's just no excuse...
here's an idea...and may i add that it's killing two birds with one stone? i might have mentioned already that your home seems to be the pied piper of overweight, unattractive children...one of whom seems to be a young man of about twelve, whom i've heard you calling "jimmy"...perhaps instead of spending his afternoons peeing in the front bushes or riding his motorized scooter up and down the block, "jimmy" could get out the old push mower and have at it with those weeds?
or, if this is too sexist for you, perhaps one of the four girl children might be free? i was mowing my grandmother's lawn when i was eight, so i know it's not that hard...the oldest girl--you know the one, right? with the sour orange hair?---looks fit enough to run the mower around your fifteen yards of lawn...that might ,then, be an excuse for wearing her tube top and jean skirt out of the house, as she's so prone to do when she goes for the mail each day...
or maybe you're not into the whole "child labor" thing (i doubt it...what other reason is there for having five kids and converting your garage into more bedrooms?)...here's another idea: get your fat ass out there and mow the yard yourself...i'm a big-assed girl myself...trust me, an afternoon in the georgia sun will melt some of that off...then maybe you can expand your wardrobe to include something other than the navy mu-mus you seem to hoard by the dozen...that might help with the "dating problem" i've heard you mention as you scream into your cell phone while pacing around your three-foot-high lawn...
and while i'm writing, i haven't asked in a while...how's your parole officer? now that the kids are back with you--and you've provided them with bedrooms in the garage--i haven't seen her around much...is she keeping your three exes off your back? i hope so...i know you don't really need all that stress...
really, truthfully,
Neighbor Who Runs Inside When She Sees You Coming
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