Recovering from Vacation

A few things I did on my summer vacation to Chicago and Michigan:

• On the plane from Albuquerque I sat two seats behind actor Gary Farmer. An odd coincidence, as I was already planning on his being the subject of my Meme of Fame 4/7. (I'd last seen him a couple of summers ago when I helped him hang a large painting on the wall of his now-out-of-business gallery, a block from our own. There you go: Meme of Fame 4/7 is now complete.) We exchanged awkward pleasantries in the O'Hare terminal, then went about our separate misadventures.

Farmer and Johnny Depp in Dead Man.

• My spouse got his suitcase locked in a turnstile at the El station. The turnstile would not budge. My spouse therefore became locked in the turnstile. He would not budge. An attendant had to disengage the luggage, and thus my spouse, with brute force. The attendant broke a sweat wrestling the steel bars in their death grip. We haven't a clue exactly how it all happened. Just lucky I guess.
  
• My spouse excused himself for a restroom engagement during a performance of The Enigma Variations at the concert pavilion in Millennium Park. He simply vanished. It was truly enigmatic. Then again, I might want to disappear after that turnstile stunt. Come to think of it, I never saw that man before in my entire life.
  

Everyone was whispering,
'Where did Bennie go?'

I went searching for him...

...only to find him napping on the sculpture terrace
of the new wing of the Art Institute.

• In Michigan I was caught trespassing on the grounds of a private residence I'd mistaken for a funky collectibles shop. I mean, how many antique birdhouses, disintegrating farm implements, and sculptures of giant hands cradling the planet Earth does one family need? Shove your rusty hay rake. Take your vintage sausage grinders. Please.

And call your dog off.

• Upon arriving at the steps leading down to Cherry Beach at Lake Michigan, a panic-stricken family was coming up, slapping at their arms and legs. They shouted warnings of a proliferation of giant and hungry flies. They weren't kidding. Here's Bennie coming back up the stairs, pursued by a swarm of famished flies.

Don't let the smile fool you.

Those insects mean business.

• Arriving at Club Lago on West Superior in Chicago, salivating in anticipation of fried calamari and linguini, we discovered a big sign at the entrance, explaining that the restaurant was closed due to damage incurred by an exploding chimney next door.
  

They say they'll be back.

And so will we...

We just love vacations.

It's a Wonderful Life (100 Ways)

No doubt you've seen this meme around Blogland. I started noticing it last winter and promised myself I'd participate. One of these days, I said. Today's the day. Warning: It's loooooooooong. Bennie and I are about to leave for a little vacation to Chicago and Lake Michigan, and I didn't want to leave you bereft of reading material. Feel free to drop in and read a few items, then come back and read more. And more. And more. It's a list of 100 things a person might have done in one's life. The idea is to copy and paste the same list, then put in bold the things you've done already. And you know me. I have to illustrate my memes.

1. Started my own blog (Truth be told, I found this blog in the parking lot of Denny's. Possession is, however, 9/10 of the law.)
2. Slept under the stars (Yup. In the Rockies, in Yosemite, on the beach beside the Pacific, and occasionally on the trampoline in my back yard in New Mexico. Long story.)

Camping in the Rockies with Trudy.

3. Played in a band (No, but I used to sing in a church choir. They took anyone who could "make a joyful noise.")
4. Visited Hawaii (We went there on our honeymoon. My favorite memory is sitting in the shade of a huge banyan tree, eating breakfast and drinking Kona coffee. At the time I didn't realize that the banyan tree was an omen of the roots we would be putting down, far sooner than we realized. Our firstborn would arrive a little over 9 months later.)

5. Watched a meteor shower (And I once spied on an asteroid taking a bath.)
6. Given more than I can afford to charity (Do you realize what gallery ownership is about? Commercial landlords are my least favorite charity, but they've twisted my arm to contribute to their cause for better than 24 years now.)
7. Been to Disneyland/world (When the kids were little, we traveled down the California coast, stopping along the way to camp on the beach, winding up at Disneyland and Universal Studios.)

8. Climbed a mountain (The closest I've come is hiking down the Vernal Falls trail and back up in Yosemite. That hardly qualifies, but doing that with one child in a stroller and another by the hand does qualify as an adventure, don't you think?)

9. Held a praying mantis (Why would I want to do that? Aren't they the ones who mate and tear their partner's head off?)
10. Sung a solo (Yes, when Oakley was a toddler and had stitches put in his head, I sang solo after solo, my face as near his as possible, unnerving the ER physician. "Well, somehow we got that done," he said, "despite the singing."
11. Bungee jumped (Are you f'in' kidding????)
12. Visited Paris (Oui.)

13. Watched lightning at sea (From the window of my motel room.)
14. Taught myself an art from scratch (The fine art of answering memes.)
15. Adopted a child (Only if you count our dog Trudy, adopted from the shelter in 1999.)
16. Had food poisoning (I must have, but I honestly can't recall an incident. And I've eaten in divey border towns as well as at Denny's. Guess my immune system is cast iron.)
17. Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty (I'm more of a sidelines kind of person. I've looked at it from afar, from the Staten Island Ferry.)
18. Grown my own vegetables (A few tomatoes, some green onions and jalapenos, and some actual corn. My husband is the gardener. I'm a sidelines kind of person. But the garden's on my land too. Possession is 9/10 of the law.)

Bennie's High Desert Garden

19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France (From the eighteenth row back, in a frenzied, picture-taking mob of Japanese tourists. And it may not have even been the actual Mona Lisa. To protect the real deal, they trot out replicas. You never know if what you see is what you get.)
20. Slept on an overnight train
21. Had a pillow fight (I was the featherweight champion of that train.)
22. Hitchhiked (Once while walking in my own subdivision, I got lost and flagged down a guy to ask directions. He drove me home. )
23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill (Unless you want to include mental. Every day is a mentally ill day, for me.)
24. Built a snow fort (What's a snow fort? Why not a sand castle?)

25. Held a lamb (chop)
26. Gone skinny dipping (If a hot tub counts.)
27. Run a Marathon (But I've cheered my husband over the finish line.)


28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice (I am going to get to Italy. One of these days.)
29. Seen a total eclipse (Of business in 2009.)
30. Watched a sunrise or sunset (Every morning and every evening, from our deck.)

31. Hit a home run (Who? Me?)
32. Been on a cruise (Only up the Potomac. And around San Francisco Bay. And on the Staten Island Ferry.)
33. Seen Niagara Falls in person (I've flown over Wichita Falls.)
34. Visited the birthplace of my ancestors (I'll get to the Garden of Eden. Watch me.)
35. Seen an Amish community (I saw that movie with Kirstie Alley.)
36. Taught myself a new language (I know some Spanish. Enough to make my way around a hotel room in Chihuahua.)
37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied (OK, I can pretend, can't I?)
40. Seen Michelangelo’s David (I will. I will.)
41. Sung karaoke (Not on my to-do list, but I admire it in others.)
42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt (in song, in a karaoke bar, in Oakley, Kansas.)


43. Bought a stranger a meal at a restaurant

(Never mind. That's my husband and my son.
But if he puts his hand in that water,
I'm going to act like I never saw him before in my life.)

44. Visited Africa
45. Walked on a beach by moonlight (On the Atlantic, the Pacific, the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean. Now, to make it to the Mediterranean...)
46. Been transported in an ambulance (No, but I did have to climb into one and be checked out by paramedics after a car accident. That was close enough.)
47. Had my portrait painted (Sketched. Twice. Never painted. Unless you count my very abstract Self-Portrait.)
48. Gone deep sea fishing
49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person (I will. I will.)
50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris (As opposed to the Eiffel Tower in Las Cruces?)

51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling
52. Kissed in the rain
53. Played in the mud (I recommend combining Numbers 52 & 53.)
54. Gone to a drive-in theater (When we moved to Santa Fe, we were delighted to discover the Yucca Drive-In. We saw The Lion King there with the kids. Sadly, the Yucca closed soon thereafter. Now, tell me the truth. Does that sign really look like a yucca?)

55. Been in a movie (When the kids were little, we wrote, directed, produced, and acted in our own action/adventure video. Sadly, it was a bomb at the box office. Never even made it to the Yucca.)
56. Visited the Great Wall of China
57. Started a business (We've had our gallery since 1985. And as a kid I had one hell of a profitable lemonade stand.)
58. Taken a martial arts class (But in San Francisco I rented a house from a guy named Bruce Lee.)
59. Visited Russia (No, but if I ever make it to Alaska...)
60. Served at a soup kitchen (I've prepared food for a homeless shelter, but I didn't serve it.)
61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies (But I've bought, and eaten, them aplenty. Chocolate mint rules!)
62. Gone whale watching (Never. One for the bucket list I guess.)
63. Got flowers for no reason
64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma (I should. I'm O negative, the universal donor. And I've been on the receiving end after a spell of anemia. Talk about a precious gift. Even better than flowers for no reason.)
65. Gone sky diving (I won't. I won't.)
66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp (I probably will one of these days. It must be a profound experience.)
67. Bounced a check (After we sold our house in California, we deposited the proceeds in a bank in Santa Fe. The teller put a hold on the out-of-state funds. She meant to put a 10-day hold, but she typed an extra zero and held up everything for 100 days. Yes, there was a whole lot of bouncing going on.
68. Flown in a helicopter
69. Saved a favorite childhood toy up until my late 20s (Make that late 50s. I still have the little stuffed white dog with black ears I used to have to hug to fall asleep. (Bennie isn't too jealous.) My own daughter held that dog and now it's in storage for a grandchild down the way. And I have a collection of Troll dolls from the 60s. Remember those wild-haired things? And Flannery now decorates her kitchen with my Deluxe Dream Kitchen circa 1962. And I have my original Barbie Doll and my Ken Doll (who's actually developed a bald spot and a resemblance to our friend Eric)...and...

70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial (Jefferson too.)
71. Eaten caviar (I personally don't see the big deal. Guess I'm a phlebian.)
72. Pieced a quilt (But both my grandmothers passed down to me some lovely hand-made quilts of their own creation, including one made by my great-grandmother. I live in a passive solar suffused with sunlight, and so I have to keep my beautiful, fragile quilts hidden away most of the time.)

Young Flannery, practicing head lifting,
on a quilt made by her great-grandmother.

73. Stood in Times Square (I even walked around the place.)
74. Toured the Everglades (As a young adult, with my parents.)
75. Been fired from a job (That's the disadvantage of being self-employed. I can't fire myself!)
76. Seen the Changing of the Guards in London (No, but I used to work at a gallery across from the Sir Francis Drake in San Francisco. The doormen wore Beefeater Guard outfits. I watched them go off duty.)
77. Broken a bone (My toe. Three times. The third time was the charm.)
78. Been on a speeding motorcycle (How do you think I broke my toe? Just kidding.)
79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person (Everything, I mean everything, it's cracked up to be.)

80. Published a book (No, but I've published my writing in literary journals.)

81. Visited the Vatican (But I will get to Italy. One of these days. Keep reminding me.)
82. Bought a brand new car (Not anywhere near what it's cracked up to be. I'd rather save my money for paintings.)
83. Walked in Jerusalem (Little Jerusalem, aka Ave Maria Grotto, a replica of the Holy Land near Huntsville, Alabama.)

84. Had my picture in the newspaper (Several times. The first time was when I was a third-grader, touring the phone company. I've been a publicity hound ever since.)
85. Read the entire Bible (Not all of it, but I did walk in Little Jerusalem.)
86. Visited the White House (Only the areas that used to be available on public tours. I'm still awaiting that West Wing invitation.)
87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating

A sampling of wild game. Hunted, killed, dressed, baked.

88. Had chickenpox (And measles and mumps. I grew up before those vaccinations existed. Did I mention I'm old?)
89. Saved someone’s life (Only my own. I make it a practice to stay out of the trajectory of falling meteorites.)
91. Met someone famous (Just this past Sunday Jane Lynch, of Christopher Guest movies fame, and 2 1/2 Men fame, popped into the gallery.)

Charlie Sheen's shrink. A juicy role.

92. Joined a book club (Several friends and I used to meet monthly at each others' homes for a potluck and book discussion. We were in far-flung locations. Los Alamos to Eldorado to Chupadero. The commute became a grind and we wound up reading our books in solitude.)
93. Lost a loved one (Yes. My father, all of my grandparents, all of my uncles and aunts, a cousin. Some friends. It's a hazard of growing older, losing people.)
94. Had a baby (Two times, and by natural childbirth.)

95. Seen the Alamo in person (No. But I've seen Los Alamos in person. See #92.)
96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake (No! I'm too afraid of turning into a right-wing Republican. There's definitely something in the water up there.)
97. Been involved in a law suit (Small claims court. Twice. Sued a shipping company and a landlord. And I've filed a complaint with the Office of the Attorney General of California. Don't mess with me, people!)
98. Owned a cell phone (Aren't I special?)
99. Been stung by a bee (And I once accidentally stepped on a dead wasp with bare feet. I still got stung. The nerve!)
100. Ridden an elephant (It's a crucial part of my morning routine, right after coffee.)

Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Me but Were Too Polite to Ask

This "Foursies" meme, aka assignment, is courtesy Lee, by way of Sandi. What are friends for, right? I'm turning in my work late so am providing photographs for extra credit.

4 Jobs I've held


1) Hardware/Home Improvements/Auto Accessories Sales Associate. My favorite duty was--surprise--mixing paints. I occasionally got to roam into the toy department and set up the Barbie and Hot Wheels displays. Middle management, sadly, determined I was overqualified for my life in screwdrivers and Turtle Wax, and so I was kicked up to:

2) Credit Department Associate. This was before the era of online credit reports and my days were spent in engaging phone conversations with a computer with Attitude: "I'm sorry, San, I'm not allowed to approve that." Of course it was I, not HAL, who had to report the disheartening rejections to the appliance and furniture salespeople. They always took the news poorly. After all, their livelihoods depended on hard-selling every soul who wandered into their department, and their departments magnetized the bankrupt, the jobless, and the convicted. This is the job that thickened my skin and prepared me for:

3) Weight Loss Counselor. Talk about the lean years.




4) Adjunct, Part-time College Instructor. Don't tell me you're unloved, unappreciated, and underpaid. Unless you happen to be a part-time, adjunct faculty member. Then we'll talk.


4 Movies I have/would watch over and over again

1) Enchanted April. Ennui-ridden Londoners retreat to the Italian countryside for a month. Become re-enchanted with life. I want to go there, do that sometime.

2) Chocolat. The chemistry on bodily and soul levels is as powerful as a red-pepper-infused cup of Mayan cacao.







3) Little Women. Sarandon, Ryder, Dunst, & Danes. Dazzling ensemble. And Christian Bale looking amazingly young. He was. That was 1994.

4) To Kill a Mockingbird. One of the few films that does justice to a remarkable book. From the beginning credits, which to this day almost bring me to tears--that kid opening the box--like a Pandora's box of nostalgia--to the last minutes when the fearful Boo Radley turns out to be a a life-saving hero, and an autistic one at that, and played by Robert Duvall at that. Yes, that was Robert Duvall. I love that.




4 places I've lived

1) Montgomery, Alabama. Home of The White House of the Confederacy and The Hank Williams Museum.

2) San Francisco, California. In 1982 I won a round-trip plane ticket to the U.S. city of my choice. I picked The City by the Bay, flew there, fell in love with it, flew back to Tuscaloosa, Alabama, packed my bags, and that time, purchased a one-way ticket. A fortuitous move.



3) Pacifica, California. Bennie and I bought a little "fixer" house set back in a grove of eucalyptus trees. The first home our family called our own. Eye-popping FLOWER POWER wallpaper from the sixties, avocado and orange shag from the seventies. The shag we carted off to the landfill, and thanks to Bennie's sanding skills, beautiful hardwood surfaced from underneath it all. And yes, lovely bare walls lurked beneath the wallpaper. The exterior of our house we painted to blend with the foliage of the eucalyptus, more specifically, the undersides of the foliage of the eucalyptus, a soft sage green with undertones of gray. My paint-mixing background came in handy here.

4) Currently, in Eldorado, a "planned, rural" subdivision several miles outside of Santa Fe, New Mexico. Affectionately known as The White Man's Rez. We've lived in this house for almost ten years. Not a dream house, but we can sit on the deck on summer evenings and gaze at the foothills. Such a view puts it all in perspective.




4 people I want to "Bitch Slap right into the middle of next week"

OK, the question asked for 4, the photo provided 5, so I erased the least despicable.

4 People who email me regularly

1) Lee

2) b2

3) blogger-help-troubleshoot group

4) the penis-enhancement product pusher (Goes by various aliases, such as Aubrey Cunningham and Horatio Kilt, and I don't really have the raw material to be enhanced, but we'll let him continue in his ignorance. His emails are a riot!)

4 TV shows I watch

1) House. The TV show with the delightfully misleading title. Tune in expecting home makeovers and you get more, so much more. For starters, a gimpy physician who's kind of cute in a walking, talking Bitch Slap kind of way. I mean Doc House takes bedside manner and disrespect in the workplace to unfathomable lows. And there's an ongoing subplot that suggests he himself is addicted to painkillers. Even so, you just gotta love him. He always figures out what freakishly improbable disease has taken over a patient's body, always at the eleventh hour, and always over the dead bodies of a clutch of colleagues who have proclaimed him nuts. He is. And that's why he intuits the disease of the week. He's down on the same sick level. The "wounded healer" incarnate.

1) EXtreme Makeovers (Home Edition). Admitted, the Queen for a Day slant cloys a bit and I did want to bitch-slap-into-the-middle-of-next-week that designer who put SIX TVs in a kid's room. And yes, sometimes the wallpapers chosen make me a bit seasick. But I'm a sucker for seeing, week after week, an army of decorators, armed with dynamite and color swatches, blow an unlivable hovel into smithereens only to bring it back as a particular family's idea of a dream house.

3) 60 Minutes. Andy Rooney's 5 makes the other 55 worth it.

4. Two and a Half Men. OK. Bennie dragged me in to see this one. Witness the heel marks from the computer to the TV room. But I have to admit: Gratuitous sex humor is all it's cracked up to be. I'm hooked.



4 Places I've visited

1) Graceland. Hey, that carpet in Elvis's Jungle Room looks like the stuff we carted out of the Pacifica house.




2) 1980 Picasso Retrospective, MOMA, New York. Last chance to see Guernica before it was crated and shipped back to Espana. Worth it? Yup. BIG YUP.

3) UFO Museum, Roswell, New Mexico. And I got the salt and pepper shakers to prove it.



4) The Louvre. Better than Two and a Half Men.

And I've made the Seine with real live Parisiennes. That too--all it's cracked-up to be.

But Versailles? Totally overrated. And oversized.



4 favorite foods

1) Blue corn enchiladas, smothered in smokin' hot green chile. Served with a side of posole and a basket of light-as-air sopapillas. The kind they used to serve at La Choza. That place, last time I checked, had slid backwards faster than a Baptist kid on spring break.

2) The cookies that Flannery and I make every Christmas. The Christmas skulls are an all-time favorite.



3. My grandmother's turnip greens. She would go, leaf by leaf, through a big pile of greens--she called it "a mess" of greens--remove the stems and the bigger veins, so as to maximize tenderness, place them in a large pot with water and a dollop of bacon fat and a pinch of sugar. The sugar was her secret ingredient, just a touch to do a little tango with the bitterness of the greens. She'd simmer this for the better part of a day. I could eat the whole pot of greens, and the liquid that was left in the bottom I could guzzle like a milk shake. In the south they call that left-over liquid where vegetables have simmered for hours pot liquor and they have their reasons. It's highly drinkable and will alter your senses straightaway.

4) My mother's cream-style corn. Not to be confused with that mucilaginous, sucrose-and-corn-starch-riddled mess sold in cans. Genuine cream corn is made from corn. Nothing else, except for a little water. You shuck some corn--what they call "roasting ears," remove the silk, turn each ear upright, and proceed to clip the tip off each kernel by sliding a big knife down each side. Then you scrape the husk thoroughly, getting all of the corn goo out of the crevices once occupied by the clipped kernels. That's the cream in cream-style corn. You put it all in a big skillet and cook it until it turns to this unbelievably delectable creamy concoction, chock-full of those little bits of corn you clipped so meticulously. You can add a little butter, but believe me, you don't even need that. And don't make me bitch slap you--you don't need sugar!

4 places I'd like to be right now

1) Gathering around a big table in some local-color-infused place in Tres Leches with the San Antonio Contingent.

2) Having coffee with Jo down the street from the gallery.

3) Standing in the Cloud Gate sculpture in Chicago's Millennium Park, alongside my partner in life. Looking up at our reflected selves repeating, getting smaller and smaller, all the way to the vanishing point. An experience that is both disquieting and somehow reassuring.




4) Sitting in La Basilique du Sacre Coeur, listening to the nuns/angels sing the evening into being, just like that evening four years ago. The deja vu would be good for this jaded soul.




4 things I'm looking forward to this year

1) The lavender and the Jupiter's beard coming into bloom outside my studio window. Should happen next month.



2. Summer sunsets, as seen from the balcony outside our bedroom.



3) Oakley moving home for the summer. The household conversations always ratchet up several notches in the stimulation quotient when Mister Mokes is around.



4) Christmas. Can't help myself. It's always fun to add another beast to our Nativity tableau. Did I mention I've been to the UFO Museum?



And now I'm to tag four other bloggers. In keeping with the spirit of this "extra credit" assignment, I tag five:

1. Paula. And I award you the BIG E for excellent blogging.
2. Kim. And I award you the BIG E for excellent blogging.
3. Sparkling Red. And I award you the BIG E for excellent blogging.
4. John-Michael. And I award you the BIG E for excellent blogging.
5. Lime. And I award you the BIG E for excellent blogging.

Note: You don't have to include photos. That was my "extra credit" part of the assignment. As a matter of fact, you don't even have to complete the assignment. But do feel free to pass on the BIG E to other worthy bloggers. And thank you for being the excellent bloggers you are.