Suburban Goddess

While on a photo assignment today, I found myself on the Southwest side of Houston in the Brazos Bend State Park. My co-worker & I were in search of the perfect photo of a small wooden bridge found near an observation tower overlooking the swamp.

We arrived around 10am, and were directed to the Nature Center in the middle of the park. When we walked in, I knew I was in trouble. Aquariums of live snakes were everywhere; in a large glass case there were hundreds of species of bugs pinned down with their Latin names. Around the corner a tank housed four baby alligators. I immediately got the heebie-jeebies. I love a nature hike as much as the next person, but this is the side of nature I have NO desire to see. Stay under your rocks, in your holes, where EVER you live, and I promise to stay on the well worn path, far from your creepy little abode. The ranger was amused by my creeped-outedness.

We showed her the photo of the bridge we were looking for, and of course she knew exactly where it was.

“Take the path behind here,” she said, pointing to a map. “It’s about 1 mile back. Now, when you pass the alligators, we have a few rules.”

Pass the alligators? Like, LIVE?

“If the tail is pointing toward the trail, you’re good to go. If they’re lying parallel to the trail, that’s okay too. You only have to worry if the business end is facing the trail, and then, you don’t have to worry unless they’re larger than four feet. If you find yourself in that situation, call this number and a park ranger will come out and scare it off for you.”

WHAT??? FOUR FEET?

“Yeah, where you guys are going, you’ll definately see them.”

WHAT WHAT???

So my co-worker (from the midwest, NOT Louisiana) and I head out in search of the bridge. As we round a bend, we pass a beautiful field of wildflowers on the left, and a wooded area to the right. So far, so good. I can handle this. But then we round another corner and directly ahead, there is a pathway, about six feet wide, that is surrounded on either side by murky black water.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I mumble, adjusting the ten pounds of camera equipment I’m holding. I extended the legs of the tripod, just in case I needed to bop an alligator on the nose. We take a few steps up the pathway & sure enough… four foot alligator directly off the right bank. But it was just the tail, and he quickly slipped into the water. I breathed a sigh of relief, thinking that our odds were good we probably wouldn’t run into another one.

WRONG.

About ten yards later, another one. Ten yards after that, still another one. The fourth one snuck up on us; he was so close to the bank we didn’t see him until he was directly next to us, which caused my co-worker to jump and shriek, which of course has a chain reaction on anyone else around when you’re surrounded by four foot long reptiles.

By this point, my adreniline gland was working overtime while my mind was feverishly going through my last will and testament. I could see the observation tower ahead, about thirty yards, when my co-worker grabbed my arm.

“Oh my GOD. Look at THAT ONE.” Directly ahead sat a seven-footer, and his head was within chomping distance of my feet. Now, I feel the need to tell you, as a girl from Louisiana, I’ve had run-ins with gators before. So I know a thing or two about them. I know that even though they appear to be sleeping, they’re NOT. I know that they can run just as fast as me if they want to. And I know that if it DID manage to get me, I should bop it on the nose, because they HATE that. But right now, I was assessing the speed of my co-worker because honestly, I didn’t have to be faster than the alligator.

I just had to be faster than HER.

But considering I had all the camera equipment, I realized I was at a distinct disadvantage. So we sat for a moment, the prize directly beyond the obstacle. At this point, I was scared to turn back, too. I mean, there was only ONE in front of us (albeit a BIG one), but I knew there were at least FOUR behind us.

“What should we do?” she asked.

“Call the ranger,” I answered quickly. “They said over four feet, call them!” So she fished out her cell phone while we both kept a wary eye on the monster ahead. A moment later, I listened with trepidition to her side of the conversation…”

“Uh huh, they said over four feet with the head facing the trail that we should call…no, he’s not moving…it looks like he’s sleeping…no, wait, his eyes just opened…. throw pebbles? Where?… in the water…okay…” She put her hand over the reciever and whispered loudly, “She said throw pebbles in the water behind him. He’ll think it’s BAIT.”

BAIT? As in, I’m hungry and I’d like to eat? So I picked up a few pebbles and chunked them in the water. He didn’t move.

“He’s not moving… try again??” I threw another one. No response. She leaned down and picked up one, throwing it off slightly. I watched in horror as the rock landed squarely on the alligator’s back. Prepared to sacrifice my camera equipment (as well as my co-worker), I waited for the attack, but it still sat…like a statue. “He’s still not moving… that should work??…no, it didn’t…okay, thank you.” She clicked her cell phone shut. “They’re sending a ranger.”

So I breathed a sigh of relief and waited for the knight in shining armor… and waited… and waited… the ten pounds of camera crap cutting into my shoulder… the mosquitoes starting to call all their buddies over for the flesh buffet…. I glared at the alligator with annoyance.

“Go away!” I whispered. Surprisingly, he ignored me. We waited some more… and a little longer… and still a little longer… until I grew aggrivated. “Hell, we could be at the bottom of the damn swamp by now!” I huffed. “That’s it. I’m going!” My co-worker’s eyes grew wide.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes I’m sure, dammit. Are you with me or not?”

“Well, YEAH. You’re not LEAVING ME HERE.”

So I gathered up all the equipment and moved as far to the left hand side of the path that I could. I realized as I walked past the giant that I wasn’t looking at him, as if making eye contact would provoke him, and I wondered about the intellegence of that decision. If he was gonna pounce, I don’t think I really wanted to know.

Once I was about three steps in front of him, I picked up the pace, almost running for the steps of the tower. I reached them breathlessly, went up about two flights, dropped my equipment and proceeded to shake uncontrollably.

I have no future with National Geographic, and I am perfectly okay with that.

The ranger showed up about five minutes later. Seeing that I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown, he offered us a ride back to the car, which we quickly and graciously accepted. On the way back, we spotted six more, one over ten feet long.

“Oh, he’s mad…” said the ranger with a grin. “See how his back and tail are all puffed up in the water? Something’s upsetting him.”

Good to know. If you’re ever wandering around the swamp and see an alligator puff up, be prepared to run. Or at least be prepared to run faster than who ever you’ve got with you. That’s my lesson of the day. It could save your life.

In the process of learning to let go or die, I have accepted the inevitable. But an interesting by-product of letting go is discovering that sometimes, things do go your way. After spending years in a self-imposed pit of negativity, I’ve learned that smiling can come effortlessly when you stop worrying about things you can’t control and just appreciate the things that are right in front of you…

Start with a verb. Any verb will do. Insert parental figure, repeat verb.

Now repeat it, over and over and over and over again…

I’m not really. It just makes me feel better about myself to say that. But on the other side of this, my yoga instructor told our class last week that the American Heart Association recommends 60-70 minutes of cardio a day for women my age. EVERY. SINGLE. DAY.

To add insult to injury, a particularly fit friend of mine told me that for every ten years we age, you need to subtract 100 calories from your daily intake just to MAINTAIN your current weight.

Seriously, is there a pill yet? For all the havoc the damn drug companies wreak on our society, the least they can do is get us a “get skinny quick” pill that won’t give us a heart attack or make hair grow out of inconspicous places… haven’t we EARNED THAT?

Honestly, I don’t work out for the fun of it. I don’t enjoy it. Any of it. Yoga, kickboxing, running, step aerobics, TAE-BO, circuit training, weight-lifting… all part of my weekly fitness routine. And given the choice between either of these activites or sitting my happy fat butt on the sofa, the sofa will triumph EVERY SINGLE TIME.

I hear fitness freaks talk about the elusive “endorphin-high,” and I have to tell you; I still haven’t had one. Perhaps if I had, I wouldn’t want to chuck my alarm clock out of the window at 4:45 am. Maybe I would be more motivated to put down the Twinkies. Maybe I wouldn’t mind being sore EVERY SINGLE DAY.

It’s a conspiracy, I tell you.

Vote For The Worst

If you don’t know about this site, you should. I think it’s AWESOME that bloggers can totally f-up a juggernaut like American Idol. I’m even ashamed to admit that I have been sucked in for a second season, despite my best efforts to shun all pop culture trends…

Cause I’m just stone-cold cool like that. Word to my peeps.

Go Sanjaya!

Every morning on my way to work, I listen to The Buzz. At the same time every day, a 30-second spot runs for a local church, and it usually consists of the preacher relaying his daily message.

As much as I dislike organized religion, he’s almost made a believer out of me.

His name is Jim Jackson, and he relays messages about life through funny stories, quotes, and little jokes. But what I appreciate the most about him, is he actually acknowledges all the hypocrisies that I’ve encountered in religion. And unlike many fire & brimstone preachers, his message is one of hope & self-realization. I can relate to that. It’s something I struggle with every day. I can’t get into the Thees & Thys and Thou Shalts. I mean, I get the message, and it’s a good one, but this guy puts it in every day perspective, and how it all effects the little things. And he’s FUNNY.

So my mother will be proud. I go to church every day for 30 seconds.

I don’t have a glamourous advertising job; what I do is equivalent to digging trenches in the advertising world. I have to get my creative shot by freelancing, and even then, it’s not the free-thinking-tree-hugging-happy-out-of-the-box creative experience that everyone thinks is associated with graphic design. I design logos for subdivisions, I create direct mail for lawyers, I make a t-shirt or two. Yawn.

Every year, I cruise over to the the ADDY awards site. In my industry, it’s the equivalent of an Oscar. I dream the unattainable dream that someday I will be recognized for my unlimited creative ability. It’s a fantasy of mine.

A couple of years ago, I was going through the entry list when a name stuck out like a glaring red neon sign. I will not write that name here for fear he may Google himself & find this page, as I know the egotistical bastard used to do. That would be the name of my FIRST ex-husband, who does not even deserve mention. But there he was, a COPYWRITER no less, receiving advertising’s highest honor.

I wanted to throw up.

To this day, I’m STILL paying for HIS master’s degree (”Let’s just borrow more from YOUR student loans and we’ll use mine to go to Europe!”). And while I’m toiling away in the hell of retail advertising, he’s living the glamourous life. Well, I made the mistake of heading over to the ADDY site again this week, and lo & behold, there he was again. TWO TIMES.

Now, I’ve said it before, I believe in karma. I really do. I have to believe in it, because if it doesn’t exist, I’ve been nice to people I hate for NOTHING when I could have been kicking them in the knees years ago. So I stopped for a moment to think, “What have I done?”

1.) Made fun of my mother-in-law. (I meant no harm in it, and I feel really bad about hurting her feelings, but I wasn’t lying or intentionally trying to be spiteful. I just thought it would make a funny story.)

2.) Said mean things about a drunk friend. (But he’s always drunk, and I felt that someone needed to point it out to him for his own good before he does something stupid.)

3.) Screamed at people while driving. (In my passive aggressive way, of course, with the windows up and mumbling like a crazy person. If you get bad karma for this, then that explains EVERYTHING.)

But I honestly can’t think of anything to deserve this level of misery. Unless it was retro-karma, that karma that stores up over the years that you thought you’d escaped. If that’s the case, I would think by now I would have suffered enough and there has to be an end to this soon. I mean, I’d have to murder someone to get this much unhappiness all at once. (Sometimes I wish I had… no… just kidding….no….not really…)

Seriously, when it rains, it pours. I need a little sunshine.

In all my rants of late, I failed to mention that Little Bit has made it to the 2-year milestone. The very first thing she did the day after her birthday was wake up and promptly threw one of the biggest temper tantrums I’ve ever seen her throw.

Hello, two.

She has learned how to get my attention, a cute move where she walks up and pats my thigh in an urgent manner, “Mommy, mommy, mommy, mommy…..” It was precious for about a week. As I do with all noise, eventually, I started to tune it out, since her urgency usually involved something like her sock being crooked. But something happens when they turn two; they discover the concept of persistance. If you can’t get something by asking nicely, try brute force. So when I don’t pay attention IMMEDIATELY, the patting becomes more frantic as the decibels climb exponentially, “Mommy, mommy, MOMMY, MOMMY! MMOOOMMMYYYYYYYY!”

“What, baby?”

“SOCK!”

The other thing I’ve learned rather quickly is that her mind is a sponge. I watch with amusement as she talks to the dog in the same tone that I talk to him.(”No, no, Bubby, HUSH!”) And I love when she mimics my every move; her morning routine is in perfect sync with mine. Brush our teeth, comb our hair, spritz the perfume, “Me, MOMMY, me!” (which is two-speak for LET ME DO IT!) And God forbid you try to change that routine…. “NO MOMMY, NO! DORA!” (her Dora toothbrush, which must have the appropriately-sized dollop of Barbie-Bubble-Gum-Toothpaste, “More, Mommy, MORE!” or my obsessive compulsive daughter will throw herself into a complete and total meltdown.)

I have no idea where she gets it from.

The downside of monkey-see-monkey-do is that I’ve discovered I curse like a sailor. One morning while we were going through the routine, I spilled my coffee & an expletive inadvertently tumbled from my lips.

“Chit, Mommy, chit.”

“Crap, baby, don’t say that. That’s a bad word.”

“Cap, Mommy, cap.”

And so it goes; the education of a mother. I have so much to learn.

No, not the site, but with the comment from earlier… On “Just Say Okay,” Jef pointed out that Americans can’t handle the responsibility of using drugs properly. And suddenly, this light bulb (BLINK) went off in my head and I realized that that COMPLETELY sums up my entire irritation with every issue in my life at the moment.

Nobody is choosing to do the responsible thing anymore.

It’s so much easier to whine, cry, bitch & moan. Blame, blame, blame, but don’t turn the mircoscope on yourself, because THE TRUTH HURTS. This is exactly the point I could not find words to express. The epiphany was so astounding that I felt the need to share with some people, who looked at me (BLINK) with vacant eyes as if to say, “I don’t get it.” (BLINK BLINK.)

I used to tease Chip that for every action he made, there was a consequence. But it seems to me that we aren’t holding people responsible for their actions anymore; the consequences can be manipulated, or worse, ignored. In my day, when I was growing up, the consequences were clear and concise. Eat your dinner or you won’t get anything else tonight. Be home at midnight or you can’t drive the car anymore. Pass your classes or no more tuition money. Embezzle from the company and you will not only be fired, but prosecuted.

It was simple. It was clear. But as I looked around, I noticed that others were not held to the high standards that I was held to. And quite frankly, it pissed me off. Case in point, while attending The University of Memphis (ACK), I had a class with a budding NBA star. He never showed up to class, despite the professor’s strict attendance rule. I struggled with the course matter; I often had to stay after and try to have the professor explain the principles again, much to his irritation. But I stuck with it, and despite my best efforts, I made a D in his class. I sucked it up, prepared to take the class again, when I found out Mr. NBA got an A.

Now, I know what you’re thinking; maybe he had a schedule worked out with the professor. Maybe he turned his work in on a different schedule. But I knew one thing about Mr. NBA from another class (a group project) that made it really hard for me to believe that he passed that philospophy class on his own merit.

He couldn’t read.

And it PISSED ME OFF that I busted my butt for a D, and Mr. NBA (who COULD NOT READ), got an A so the Memphis Tigers could make it to the NCAA finals… at that point, I began to realize that life was not going to be fair.

It truly sucks that people who try to to the right thing, who work hard, who have integrity, who have morals and principles, are made to suffer at the hands of people who refuse to take responsibility for the choices they have made in their lives. It sucks that we can’t legalize drugs because there are those who cannot be responsible, and the responsible ones will have to foot the bills for their medical care when they overdose. It sucks that crooked CEOs & politicians get their “Get Out Of Jail Free” cards while a small time pot-smoker is doing hard time in an overcrowded prison.

The rich are getting richer, the poor are getting poorer, and the middle class is carrying the burden of a broken democracy that is drowning in bureaucracy and being strangled by red tape.

And I am becoming more cynical with each passing day. (BLINK. BLINK.) MacLaughlin OUT.