Dead Dad Club: Car doors, cheap metaphors

I have a blue Toyota Yaris. It's a little two door hatchback that looks like a space capsule. Against all my protests it has become known as "The Blueberry," thanks to my boyfriend's persistent efforts. It's the second car I've ever owned, and I'd owned it for less than a month when I put the first dent in it. It's not a big dent, I guess the technical term for this would be, rather, a "ding", and it's certainly not big enough to warrant looking into repair. But it's prominent enough, right in the center of the driver's side door, and I see it every time I drive the car, which for the past year has been nearly every day, as up until last week, I've been commuting to work.

I'm not sure if I've told anyone about the dent, or how I got it. It's not a very interesting story at face value. I was in a bit of a rush, I parked on Pratt Street, right next to a Potbelly Sandwich shop. I wasn't quite used to the car yet, and didn't anticipate how, when opening the door from inside, it swung open so wide and so easily. And so I swung my car door at full force into a parking meter. I didn't have time to dwell on it.

It only took me maybe three or four minutes from the time I got out of my car until the time I made it up the block, and then across- nodded hello to the hospital receptionist, and then signed in (yet another wrist band), mashed some elevator buttons, and DING- fourth floor (or was it the fifth?) and then a security buzz, the slow, mechanical opening of automated double doors, the shift in the air as you pass through the doors- on the outside, anticipation, on the inside, the main event- my boot heels click click click click clicking on the linoleum, stand up straight, fix your face, don't let your body betray how terrified you feel every time you cross this threshold.

It had only taken me maybe three or four minutes to get there from the car, but four or five minutes ago my dad had been officially declared dead. This is the lede I have been burying in this, and every story. When my father had a heart attack I told my friends it was not a big deal - we're not close, he hasn't been a part of my life since I was a child, I grieved the loss of my father long ago - my standard lines.

He stayed sick all summer, flirting with both death and recovery- one, and then the other, back and forth, over twelve weeks that felt like a mobius strip.

And all twelve weeks I'd made light of it, I'd avoided talking about it, I'd stuck my toe into examining my emotions and then quickly taken it out and walked away, deciding those waters were far too cold and deep.

I don't think I wanted to be there at the moment he stopped being alive. My brother was there and it was so upsetting that he got sick afterward, when the initial shock had worn off. I walked in right after my father had been unplugged, so I missed the worst of it. Though his eyes were still open. They stayed open.

I don't think I wanted to be there for the moment he stopped being alive but I still think about it a lot. Every time I get in my car I think about it. The length of a red light could have changed everything. The time it took me to find a pair of socks because I'd been set on wearing those dumb boots- boots in August, in Baltimore, for some reason. (Psychoanalyzing myself a year later: boots with shorts, a dumb, signature look of mine- trying to show my father, a near stranger, who I am? This is me, your adult daughter, (pretending to) confidently stride to your deathbed, this is me, and you missed it all.)  The split second I spent looking at my car door after I slammed it into that parking meter, the timing of the elevator. I don't think I even wanted to be there, but I think about it.

It was a year ago on Thursday. I'm just starting to realize it's not not a big deal.

On my last day of work, a rock hit my windshield on my way in. It cracked the glass immediately. Overnight the crack got even bigger. It had started out barely the length of my hand but within 24 hours, the fracture had begun to snake its way across the glass. It was a foot long when I had my windshield replaced yesterday. This is my cheap and contrived metaphor. This is me trying to repair my cracks.

There's really nothing to be done about the dent, but I wouldn't remove it if given the option. It happened. All these things happened. I'm learning how to accept them.

The room you die in

When I graduated from college, you were not there. A week later your heart stopped working.
Your kidneys stopped working. Your liver stopped working. Your bowels stopped working. You became permanently paralyzed. For months you’ve slowly teased us with death. Today, the medical team called us in for a family meeting.

I sit quietly while your wife talks about what a good man you are. Your wife, who has never had the decency to so much as ask for my phone number. Your wife sits in the meeting today with her back to me. I sit quietly while the doctor refers to her as my mother. She does not once make eye contact with me.
I sit quietly while everyone discusses your dogs- your “pride and joy.” I sit quietly and look away and do not show this hurts me. I sit quietly and pretend the medical team did not, up until I emailed them, think you had only two children.

I think that maybe it’s my fault. My sister is here at your bedside nearly every day. You have consumed her. My brother calls frequently. He dropped everything and flew in at the beginning.
I have come only a handful of times. I’ve only stayed briefly. I’ve spoken to you once since you’ve been awake.

I cannot expect them to understand why I don’t come. I can't explain how every time I enter the Cardiovascular Intensive Care Unit I feel like I’m having a part of myself taken away. I’m forced to lie about who I am and I’m forced to lie about who you are. I lose part of myself. My story is erased. I must bite my tongue. I must play a role.
And I'm good at that. You groomed me for it.

It’s not appropriate, my sister says, to correct them, when the medical team refers to your wife as my mother.

It would not be appropriate for me to correct the doctor when she says “your poor father,” and say something like, “I think he deserves this.”

I let them say these things. I don’t say, “My father was abusive, he terrorized my family for years.” I  stare at the ground. I shrink into myself.

I don’t say, “My father hadn’t spoken to me in almost three years.”

You are such a good and selfless man, your wife says. You never did anything to deserve what has happened to you.

If someone really believes something is true, in a way, does that make it true?

I continue to bite my tongue. I try to be a better person. I try to find a way to make peace on your deathbed. I visited you after you woke up. Your room was covered with photos of my brother and sister, and, of course, your dogs. There were photos of me, but only as an infant. There were many photos of my sister’s college graduation.
I told you I graduated from college very recently. You were surprised. You asked what my degree was in.
I thought you were dying. I hugged you and kissed your forehead in what I thought was an act of kindness and mercy for a broken, dying man.

Today the medical team tells us they are cautiously optimistic. They think you are doing well. They are telling us you are not dying. I imagine smothering you with a pillow instead.

I drive home and break. I cry in the car. I sit on a brick wall in the park on the phone with my mom. My actual mother. I tell her about all the petty ways your wife has slighted me today. I tell her about how the medical team knows more about your dogs than your children. She tells me I need to let these things go.
I find myself doubled over sobbing. I thought you would die. I thought I could be free.


The last time I went to see you, I studied the room. This is the room you will die in, I thought. I left and I bought a plant at the grocery store. It sat on my kitchen table while I wavered. I expected you to slip away soon. I thought I could give you a piece of outside life for the room you die in.

They say kindness costs nothing. I’ve seen it on bumper stickers and billboards and coffee mugs. I am starting to believe, however, this is not always true.

The plant is still in my house. I’ve already given you so much. I don’t think I can give anything else to you.

Five Unique Gender Reveals that Will Really Knock Their Socks Off And Also Be Impossible for Jessica to Upstage

So you’re having a baby and it’s time to find an ostentatious way to start enforcing gender roles on your unborn child! There’s just one problem- your sister in law, Jessica is CONSTANTLY stealing the spotlight. Can’t she let you have just this one thing? No. No she cannot. Go with one of these Gender Reveal Party ideas and really show Jessica a thing or two!!

Beet Juice or Methylene? Only time will tell. 

(ONE) If you’re having a bouncing baby girl, inject all food and drink at the party with large amounts of concentrated beet juice. Boys are a tad more difficult, so hopefully you’re not having one of those little life-ruiners. For a baby boy you’ll need to dose your guests with Methylene Blue, a drug used to treat carbon monoxide poisoning.

Get your guests hyped, encourage them to eat and drink their fill- and then tell them the party is over. The surprise? The gender reveal will occur the next time they pee. Pink beet juice pee for a girl and blue chemical pee for a boy! How original and quirky! What a little sneak you are!

I swear to God if I shell out five hundred bucks for this enchanted fantasy and it's a boy I'm going to lose my shit

(TWO) If you believe what so-called ANIMAL RIGHTS ACTIVISTS say, dove releases are cruel. But if you believe in FUN, they’re awesome! A mid-range rental of a crate of white doves will only set you back about $200-500, but it will be worth every penny when you see the look on Jessica’s face when she finds out that your gender reveal party is going to be a GODDAMN DOVE RELEASE!!!!

Have a friend dust the doves with a few packets of pink or blue Kool-Aid the morning of the party and you’re all set for a un-SPCA approved but more importantly ABSOLUTELY unforgettable, un-fuck-with-able gender reveal fit for a TRUE PRINCESS who, much like the 1% class she occupies, doesn’t believe in any kind of welfare- including ANIMAL WELFARE. Go scrub the floors, cinder-Jessica!

If Jessica complains just tell her to think about how good this will look on her resume

(THREE) This idea could get a little pricey but it’s definitely worth it. Pay for all the special people in your life to become certified ultrasound technicians. When they are done, send them an unlabeled ultrasound and let them use their newly learned skills to identify your baby’s junk! Not only will this be a gender reveal that your loved ones will NEVER forget, they will come away will some marketable skills, and JESSICA will never be able to top it.    

If anyone gets really upset just blame it on the hormones

(FOUR) I would expect that by the year 2017 all of your friends have severe food allergies. If so, invite them over and plan the menu to include something to induce anaphylactic shock in each guest. Here’s the fun part- beforehand an accomplice will covertly pickpocket each person, wrap their EpiPens in a pink or blue ribbon, and then during a strategic diversion, return the devices back to your friends. When they realize they’ve consumed tree nuts or shellfish or whatever other food that so-called natural selection has somehow made hazardous, (honestly, Jessica, you’re allergic to SESAME SEEDS? Are you shitting me???)  they’ll scramble to find their EpiPen (HOPEFULLY THEY CAN STILL AFFORD ONE, LOL, BIG PHARMA, AMIRITE?) and discover if you’re expecting sugar and spice or A DUMB BOY.  Hopefully no one will die.

Jessica looks happy, but I can tell she is SO PISSED

(FIVE) If you’re into long cons, this is the gender reveal for you. Invite all your friends and loved ones into the delivery room and the shape of your child’s genitals will let them know if they should be buying pink or blue! Bonus: Dragging it out this long will really grind Jessica’s gears!

big bear FREE

“Please!” Teng cried, “Please just calm down!”

It was no use. The only thing to do was to get out of the way and wait for the bear to wear itself out from its temper tantrum, like had happened so many times before.

It hadn’t always been like this. When Teng first brought the bear home from the carnival that hot summer evening a year before, the bear was so sweet- shy, even. She remembered stumbling through the door, carrying the bear, who had been too frightened to get out of the car. Teng, barely 5 feet tall herself, was only slightly bigger than the bear. She struggled into the building with the bear in her arms, finally making it into the apartment and tumbling to the floor in a heap, descending into a fit of laughter. The trill of Teng’s giggle and the bear’s amused snort blended into a happy harmony that would fill the apartment time and time again for the next few months.

But things had changed. Although already fully grown, the bear had only been a baby at that time. No one warned Teng about the sharp and sudden change in personality that stuffed carnival bears displayed as they matured. Teng wasn’t prepared for the moodiness, the fits, the destructive tantrums like the one the bear was in the midst of right now.

I should have known, Teng thought to herself, time and time again. She couldn’t think of a single person she knew who had kept a carnival bear for an extended period of time. She didn’t know anyone, in fact, who had an oversized stuffed bear like hers at all. True, not many people were as skilled at ring tossing as Teng was, but there were other ways to acquire such beasts. Arcade games, for example. And yard sales, if you weren’t the sporting type. Those poor bears were always turning up at yard sales.

Yard sales. Teng felt a pang. She replayed the conversation she’d had with the bear earlier, the one that had started his current rampage. Teng was moving out of the apartment into a new one- one that didn’t allow bears.

“I know, I should have checked first before I signed the lease,” she’d said fretfully. The lie felt obvious and cruel. Teng hadn’t checked on purpose. She had half hoped that the new building didn’t allow bears. It was an easy out. This couldn’t go on.

“We’ll find some place great for you, I promise” Teng had said, “We can find someone on…” She’d trailed off. She was going to say “Hampden Yard Sale,” but the words caught in her throat. Putting the bear up on Hampden Yard Sale? Like a piece of old Ikea furniture? She didn’t even blame him when he began growling at her. I deserve this, she thought to herself, as the bear began tearing through the apartment.

But this fit hadn’t been like the ones before. The bear, hurt, angry, and scared, had been at it for going on a full twenty minutes now. Teng was getting nervous. Being a stuffed bear, he could only do so much damage- mostly knocking things off of tables and tossing around throw pillows- but it was hard to watch and loud besides.

“Please” Teng tried again, “Please, I’m sorry.” At this the bear stopped. He turned his head and glared at her reproachfully, then slowly skulked away, collapsing on the steps. Moments later Teng heard the bear snoring. She peeked around the corner and over the balustrade. In his exhaustion, the bear had passed out with his eyes wide open. Teng surreptitiously snapped a picture with her phone and crept away into the kitchen. Tears streaming down her face, Teng began typing her post.

“Please take this bear from me…”  

Free Coloring Page- Kim Kardashian

If you love the Magnetic Fields and also have a strange, sick fascination with vapid pop culture like I do because you are a person who does not exist, this is the coloring page for you!

 Download here

I drew this this evening. Unfortunately when I scanned it some imperfections in my ~art~ that were not visible in an unscanned copy became visible, but honestly, I really doubt anyone is going to download this anyway so that's just how things are going to be right now. 

If you do happen to print this out and color it, please share it under the hashtag #enjoygunny so I can see it!

 

I've been experimenting with Canva this evening and this is something I made.

There is a version set up to be a Facebook banner available for download here

Free Printable Coloring Page

When I first saw some clips from My Cat From Hell online, I was, to say the least, perplexed by Jackson Galaxy. The facial hair. The guitar case full of cat toys. The... everything. I started watching the show kind of as a joke, but it BECAME REAL.

I love Jackson.

This [janky looking, low quality] coloring page is for him, and all he taught me. Slow blinks to you, man.

Click here to download

In the future I'd like to experiment with trying to made and upload actual good coloring pages and printables, but we all have to start somewhere.