Margaret Versus the Russian

Poor Margaret. Short of having no mind of her own, she did nothing to deserve what happened to her at my house all those years ago. What happened is that my crazy Russian boyfriend barged in. But in his defense, he'd been invited and she had not. 

My crazy Russian boyfriend was the real deal. Well, he wasn't exactly crazy but he was a bit of a loose cannon and had arrived in the States from Moscow a few years earlier. He had chosen Greg as his Western name and looked like a 30-something Liam Neeson. My head felt like I'd drunk a little too much vodka every time I looked at him.

Greg was unfiltered. Whatever provocative, non-conformist, guaranteed-to-tick-off-as-many-people-as-possible, ultra-liberal thought entering the fruited plain of his mind would fly right back out of his mouth. He was opinionated, politically-charged and had a position on every issue.

And God help you if you didn't have a position, too. Your position didn't have to be the same as his, but if you didn't have one and he sniffed that out, you'd better make one up fast.

For some reason Greg called me Vegetable. The first time he did I reminded him that for every vegetable, there's a dip. I earned points from Greg for smacking him down but it never deterred him from calling me Vegetable.

Margaret lived across the street from me with her husband and two Springer spaniels. Because of a seizure disorder Margaret wasn't allowed to drive and her husband was at work all day. Her world was smallish as a result - or it seemed so to me.

Margaret often dropped by to chat. My problem was that I had a hard time coming up with anything to chat about because Margaret didn't seem to have many interests, nor for that matter, many opinions, nor for that matter, many original thoughts. She spoke of her dogs more than she did of her husband and of her church more than her dogs.

One day she dropped by unannounced and my heart groaned. I had nothing against Margaret other than my difficulty conversing with her and that she never seemed to know when to leave. Then I remembered that Greg was coming for dinner and my mood brightened. He'd arrive soon, there'd be a few minutes of friendly chat, Margaret would surely know to vamoose and all would be right with my world.

Margaret and I were in the living room drinking tea when Greg pounded on the door. When I opened it, there he stood, a freakishly long loaf of bread in the crook of his arm and a bottle of wine in the opposite hand.

"Vegetable, I am here!" he announced, arms spread, grinning and waiting for his kiss.

I took care of the preliminary business of hugging and kissing him. Then, knowing anything could come out of that mouth at any second and that Margaret was within earshot, I took him by the hand and redirected him as though he were a two-year-old: "Greg, come in and meet my neighbor!"

Greg never just worked the room, he possessed it. And physically he dwarfed Margaret and me. Intellectually he dwarfed Margaret. After three long strides he set down the bread and wine and came to a stop near my mystified neighbor. He extended his hand to Margaret who eyed it as though he'd just thrust a python in her face. Then he boomed, "Margaret! Wine?"

I knew Margaret didn't drink, probably due to her seizure medications, her religious convictions or both, so I jumped in quickly with, "Greg, Margaret doesn't drink." 

Already there was the slightest whiff of intolerance in the air but who had issued it I couldn't tell.

Within less than a minute, Greg managed to bring up the subject of term limitations, a hot-button issue slated for the ballot that November. Greg could manipulate conversations in ways that allowed a sizing up of those he might want dirt on. He would do this in order to bury them in that dirt later.

"So, Margaret," he began, artfully prepping his prey, "what do you think of term limitations?"

Margaret practically vibrated off her chair in excitement. "Oh!" she sang out, grateful he'd lobbed her such an easy catch, "I don't really have an opinion on them yet but I'll ask my husband what he thinks and of course, I'll talk to my pastor."

I swore I heard the cocking of a pistol and pictured its muzzle pressed against Margaret's temple. Greg smiled at Margaret. Guileless as an otter, Margaret smiled right back.

"Well, Margaret," he said, towering over her because he was too antsy to sit down and speaking as though to a moron, "the problem with relying on others to vote our consciences on this issue is that we can end up reelecting the same . . . g@##%$n . . . f%&*@#g . . .  a$$%@&#s year after f%&*@#g year."

Margaret was gone within seconds. I glared at Greg, disgusted in the same way baby Super Man's Earth mommy would have been disgusted if he'd smashed up the house with his rattle. Even then, when baby Super Man smashed up the house with his rattle, it was because he didn't know his own strength. Greg knew his own strength. He looked back at me and shrugged.

"What? What did I say?" he demanded.

These days I wish I had Greg around when some unwelcome visitor wants to change my religion.

Wait Till the Midnight Hour

"How would you like to walk through the cemetery with me at midnight tonight?

Your Name Here by Teece Aronin. Available at
RedBubble.com/people/phylliswalter.

This to me from my college gal-pal, Margie. I was barely out of my teens and Laurie was a few years older. 

"Are you kidding? Yes!"

"This'll be fun! I'll knock on your door at 11:30."

I thought about the upcoming adventure all afternoon. Would I be scared? No way. Margie was such a sweet girl; kind, funny, smart and reliable. If she said tonight would be fun, then tonight would be fun. 

But by that evening I was getting nervous and at 11:30 when Margie knocked, I jumped out of my skin. I opened the door and there she stood: five feet tall, glasses, a brunette with a pageboy haircut. She held a flashlight that was as big as she and she'd nearly buried herself in a black wool coat. It was October and nippy so I slipped my coat on, too. We arrived at the cemetery at 11:55 and waited until midnight to walk in. 

The darkness was near total. Branches trimmed out in decaying leaves were faintly silhouetted against the sky. Margie was in front of me fumbling with that steel pillar she called a flashlight and I was praying for her batteries to have more life than what was buried in the cemetery. And I was frustrated because I couldn't see her.

"Did you have to wear black?"

"Oh, I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking. Hang on - I'm trying to switch on this flashlight."

Blessedly it finally lit and we walked farther in. 

"Margie?" I asked. "Are you scared?"

"No! This is fun!" she bubbled, making me want to forget her adorable pluck and just knock her right down. "You?" she asked.

"Oh, you have no idea," I whined. I grabbed the back of her coat, the toes of my shoes just inches from the heels of her boots. 

Margie shined the flashlight in my face to read my expression, unintentionally blinding me. "You poor thing, You're fine. Really you are. But you want to know the real reason I wanted to do this?"

This was the part of the horror movie where the heroine finds out that the best friend is a homicidal maniac. In the morning, some grieving widow bearing flowers would stumble upon a corpse with a flashlight-shaped indentation in her scalp.

"No - I mean yes - I mean I guess," I answered, looking at her in a whole new horrifying light.

"Because someone told me they saw a gravestone in here with my name on it. I thought it would be fun to come find it."

"You mean there's a gravestone in this cemetery that says IDIOT?" 

"No, my last name," she said.

That was when Margie turned around, took one step and tripped. She fell forward and it didn't occur to me to let go of her coat, so I went with her. The momentum of the fall caused her arm to fling up - the arm that was attached to the hand that held the flashlight. The light swung up and flashed full onto a granite monument. The name engraved there: BYRNES. Margie's last name: Byrnes. 

We screamed, but Margie was the one who named names, mentioning a few you've seen in the bible. Then we scrambled to our feet and ran faster than two chunky little girls ever dreamed possible. We didn't stop until we skidded to a halt at the steps of Saint Gabriel Hall. 

"Wanna do that again tomorrow?" I gasped.

"#%!@ you!" she cursed - just not as sweetly as usual.  

Joeless Shoes

In a building I frequent there's a lost glove someone left on a chair for its owner to find. For days that glove has lain there and I keep wondering who it belongs to and if it will ever be claimed.

This got me thinking about all the times I've come across a single, vacant shoe lying in the road. Why would a single shoe be lying there like that? It's not as if anyone purposely pitches one shoe out into the road never to return - do they?

And it doesn't seem that many of the scenarios for how this could happen are good. I'm not aware of anyone ever saying, "Gee, I'm really sick of my left shoe; the right one, not so much, but this left one has got to go. I'll throw it out my car window." The window goes down, the shoe flies out and car and driver continue on their way, one shoe lighter.

I just mentioned that I can't imagine "many" of the scenarios being good, but truth be told, I can't imagine any scenario that is. On the flip side, I can imagine all manner of scenarios that are bad.

"Shoeless Joe" Jackson was a professional baseball player born in the late 1800s. According to what I read, he had an impressive .356 batting average. Allegedly Jackson got his nickname when he discarded the cleats that were hurting his feet and without benefit of shoes, knocked out a triple that cleared the bases. That is one of the few scenarios where my imaginings of abandoned shoes doesn't have some nefarious possibility attached to it. But this example doesn't apply to our quandary because Jackson left both his shoes, not just one, and he probably went back to retrieve them. It's the notion of one truly abandoned shoe that makes my skin crawl. 

Then there's the multitude of instances where I've strolled by, minding my own business only to look up and see a pair of shoes that have been tied together by their laces and tossed up onto overhead wires. Seeing that has always stymied me so I've done a little research on why shoes are left to hang from wires and it turns out there can be a number of reasons, again, none of them all that good.

According to UrbanDictionary.com, shoes on wires indicate the close proximity of a drug house. Somewhere else I read that they indicate gang presence and marked territory. But urban settings aren't the only places you can find these shoes; often they're found in rural areas. Curiouser and curiouser.

Still other sources say that shoes on wires act as markers for murdered or otherwise fallen gang members and according to some people, they have to do with ghosts. Finally, one source said that shoes are thrown up there like that by men on the eve of their weddings as a last act of defiance. Now that one is good.

There are other possible reasons depending on what you read. Bullying is one. Shoes taken from a hapless victim and tossed into overhead wires aren't easy to retrieve, and when the person de-shoed is also drunk, even less so. 

So, now I know more about the possible whys of shoes on wires but I'm still totally stumped by empty shoes by the side of the road. 

At least I think they're empty. 

Embracing the Eccentric Within

Alright, what I'd like to know is where that strip of toilet paper came from - the one I pulled out through the neck of my sweater this morning. And how does toilet paper get into a sweater neck in the first place? 

Yes, this is me a couple of Halloweens
ago in my "cereal killer" costume.

These are questions from way up there in the treetops of philosophical thought like why are grapes bad for dogs and why did John Lennon ever let Yoko Ono sing? 

At least I noticed right away, not like the day I went to work with my pants on backwards. But it makes me wonder what kinds of things have been poking out of my clothes, sticking to my shoe and hitchhiking around between my teeth that I wasn't aware of - and that no one mentioned to me.

You know what, though? I think I'll just embrace the screw-up within. This way I won't be mortified if someone does point something out because my response: "And that would surprise you because?" will put the entire issue to rest while shielding me from embarrassment. 

But I'll replace the word "screw-up" with "eccentric" and bamboozle myself into buying in to a phony-baloney aura of respectability. 

The more I think about it, the better I like the idea. Imagine the shortcuts I can take through my morning routine. No more wondering if my mismatched socks are similar enough to go unnoticed. No more dabbing nail polish on the runs in my stockings. No more brushing over that cowlick in the back of my head that looks like a bald spot if I don't cover it up.

No more any of the things I do just because they're the proper thing, the expected thing, the everybody-else-does-it thing, the normal thing.

Philosopher Albert Camus said: "Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal." I am one of those people and frankly, I'm sick of it.

I've already had a glimpse of the eccentric life and it wasn't bad. For Halloween two years ago, I was a cereal killer and that's me in the picture up there. But the jury's still out as to whether my costume, a cereal box "hat" with a knife rammed through it, marked me as eccentric or just cheap.

History books are peppered throughout with people who marched to a different beat and failed to give a rip what others thought about it. 

Benjamin Franklin advocated "air baths," and stood before an open window naked for a half-hour every day. And let's not forget Oscar Wilde who is said to have walked around in public with a lobster. I just read that the offbeat, off key and off-kilter singer and recording artist, Mrs. Miller was initially unaware that she was the butt of jokes. Once she caught on, she decided to roll with it, releasing a number of albums and enjoying a good deal of celebrity due to her wretched singing. 

Maybe people won't think I'm an eccentric; maybe they'll bypass eccentric altogether and go straight to genius! Maybe they'll think I'm the next Oscar Wilde, Albert Camus  or . . . Mrs. Miller.

As I said: Maybe they'll think I'm an eccentric!  

Michael Jackson's Toilet

At first I thought it was because I'm getting old, but then it occurred to me that I've always been like this. I misunderstand things. By things I mean lyrics, people in noisy settings and British actors on BBC sitcoms.

As to the latter, I'm convinced the Brits produce sitcoms specially for the U.S. market, in which every fifth word is replaced by a jabberwocky-inspired nonsense word and then they laugh at us for laughing at it and pretending we understood. Charming though they may be, I think the Brits never forgave us for high-tailing it out of there before the Revolution. If we could have understood you, we might have stayed! Lousy, stinkin' Brits.

But it's lyrics that trip me up the most. When singing along with my kids to bebop, hip hop and in some cases, pig slop playing on the radio, I hardly ever get things right. There's a song which alludes to Michael Jackson's Thriller which for the longest time I sang as Michael Jackson's toilet - and wondered why.

There's also a song in which the singer ponders why her lover is her clarity, which for months on end I sang as therapy - and didn't wonder why because therapy makes just as much bloody sense as clarity. Lousy, stinkin' singers.

And it wasn't until recently, when I read it online, that I fully understood a Jimi Hendrix lyric from Purple Haze, "Excuse me while I kiss the sky." From the first time I ever heard it until I read the actual lyric, I thought it said, "Excuse me while I kiss this guy."

Then there's the Elton John standard, Daniel. One line in the chorus actually says, "Daniel you're a star in the face of the sky." Until a few years ago I thought it was, "Daniel you're a star in a faithful disguise." Even though I knew it didn't make any sense, I was too lazy to Google it, so I don't mind owning that one. But I think anyone could have been confused by the others. 

As I say all the time, the nut doesn't fall far from the tree. When my daughter was about three and sang You Are My Sunshine, she would invariably warble, "You make me happy when skies are grape." Maybe there's a genetic component.

And really, it's a little like the old saws (that's old sayings for those of you under a hundred) that baffled me for years because I was misunderstanding them. Take for instance: He who laughs last, laughs best. I always thought it was he who laughs last, laughs last. Well of course he does; it's obvious that he does. 

Lousy, stinkin' old saw sayers.

Baby Boom

I nearly met my end twice by the time I was four, each time as the result of an explosion. 

Me no doubt asking a firefighter
to help me blow this pop-stand
before it blows again. 

I don't recall either event, but according to my mother, both blasts were real doozies. 

The first happened in our basement before I was two years-old. The furnace blew, the explosion so powerful, the kitchen floor heaved up and the cast iron door on the unit's face flew off.

Firefighters traipsed through the house where I sat in a rocking chair calmly watching. 

"Why didn't anyone carry me out?" I recently asked my mother.

"Well, we looked at you and you seemed fine," she said.

A couple of years later I had a second brush with a blast. My father was a building engineer. Every day, I went with my mother to pick him up from work. My routine: open the boiler room door, scamper over an iron catwalk, bear right onto another catwalk, then run into the tiny office where my father waited.

One day I was sick and my mother's timing was off, getting her to my father's job later than usual. At precisely the time I would have been running up that first catwalk, a boiler exploded. Had I been there, I'd have been killed, with 40 pounds of ragamuffin meat hurled to the cold, hard floor. 

My mother was uninjured due in part to the shift in her arrival time. My father survived because he was far enough away in his office. 

Had I been closer to the basement that one day, or calumphing my fanny up that catwalk on the other, I wouldn't be here now and my children wouldn't exist. 

My ex-husband would never have met me, making him and his mother the only ones to gain anything.

Similar subject matter has been explored before, of course. Consult your television viewing guide during the holidays and you'll see some channel somewhere is airing It's a Wonderful Life, the story of downhearted George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart) shown by a fledgling angel how barren others' lives would be had he not been around.

We see that theme of altered existence in the story, A Christmas Carol, too, when Ebineezer Scrooge is shown the bleak fate set to befall that sickeningly chipper Cratchett clan should he not change his ways.  

But what about the good things that never happen to us because we zigged instead of zagged, or worse, the good things that never happen to us because others zigged? We are all the sum total, not only of our own decisions, but of others'. 

What windfalls, career boosts and loves have I missed due to my decisions? Last-second impulses to turn right and not left, polite rejections of would-be suitors, or not sending a resume to that hot little start-up are choices. Those choices, once escorts to alternate futures, stand as vague and shadowed sentries, barring gates they would otherwise open. 

And when things happen . . . or don't happen . . . is it fate, good luck, bad luck, a higher power or merely the simple order of things?

Before I decide that it's all a mess of randomness, I will give this notion more thought. 

I just won't expect any conclusions. 

If You Can't Stand the Heat, Get Out of My Kitchen

We haven't had a kitchen fire in my home for almost a week. I know that's not much of an accomplishment for most families, but in my household, kitchen fires are such frequent occurrences that not having one for six days is a reason to celebrate. In fact, kitchen fires happen so often in my home that these days they hardly faze the kids.


The last time we had a kitchen fire was when my sandwich burst into flames. I was pitching it in the sink just as my son strolled by.

"Hey, Mom, what happened?" he asked in the same tone he also says, "Hey, Mom, how are you?"

"My sandwich caught on fire," I explained in the same tone I also say, "Not bad. How are you?"

He looked at the sandwich and said, "Maybe your sandwich took one look at you and you were so hot, it combusted."

When a friend of mine who shall remain nameless heard that, she suggested I get the boy's eyes checked. At first I took that as a crack about my cooking then realized it was a crack about my looks. Not all of us can age as gracefully as you, PATTY!

Another time I was on the phone with someone while attempting the death-defying feat of cooking while talking. A wall of flames shot up off the stove-top, across the microwave and over four of the cabinet fronts. On the other end my friend heard the whoosh of the fire, followed by rapidly repeating clanking noises as I rearranged the pans on the burners and doused the flames with baking soda.

"Holy mother of God!" he yelled. "What happened?"

"Oh, it's fine," I said. "I just had a little fire on the stove. Speaking of mothers, how's yours?"

I recently learned that my own mother had similar challenges. Our circa 1940 "state-of-the-art" stove had a temperamental broiler that set dinner on fire on a regular basis. My father was always at work when this happened and since dousing fires was not my mother's forte, she would scream for our neighbor, Ray who would rush over and knock out the flames.

I'm not sure what it says about my mother that another man had to put her fires out while my father was at work. Come to think of it, I'm not sure what it says about my father. Oh wait - yes I am.

At construction sites they sometimes post a sign heralding their safety record. The signs say things like: 137 days without an accident! I'm going to do something similar in my kitchen. If I posted a sign tonight, it would read: Six days without a fire!

I know what the root cause of my kitchen fires is: multitasking - cooking while breathing, cooking while blinking, and as in my earlier example, cooking while talking. Cooking while not a cook sums them all up, I think.

I should be embarrassed about all this, but instead, I'll stand proudly by my sign: Six days without a fire! 

Actually, it's not going to be a sign exactly; it's going to be a dry erase board I can update every day, and any day now, reset to zero.