Gypsy

I love writing. 

The act of creating something from nothing, of making up entire people with histories and quirks, of fictionalizing parts of my life and rewriting the endings-- it's powerful.  So from time to time I hope you don't mind if I post some of my work for you. 

Today I'd like to share my version of a Thanksgiving story.  I wrote this in one afternoon in 2006, while sitting out on my deck in Houston.  Like most of my short stories (and rest assured, this one is quite short), it sprang almost fully-formed from my head.  This is both a blessing and a curse because to me, editing is kind of like getting plastic surgery for a newborn baby.  "Yes doctor, she's beautiful-- but I was hoping she'd have more pronounced cheek bones."

So is it perfect?  Nah.  My old writing professors would criticize me for telling you the story versus showing it to you.  I did try to weave a little symbolism into it and some of you will get it.  But perhaps most interesting of all is that when I wrote this particular one, I didn't think it was about me.

That being said, I think you'll recognize the storyteller.

So get comfy...and enjoy "Gypsy."

He had a gypsy soul.

She knew it well before he did… and moved in with him anyway. The knowledge that the day would come when the wanderlust would overcome the regular lust… well, let's just say she wasn't interested in being alone.

And that was always her undoing—she just wasn't much good at keeping her own company. Never had been. Attracting them was never the problem, hell, any fool with a reasonably good rack and a smart mouth can cast a net. Keeping them proved to be a bit more difficult. Time after time.

His brother had a place on the lake that they liked to visit on the weekends, especially in the winter. The starkness of the bare trees scratching the sullen sky… the wistful call of the loons who also wintered there… the homes shuttered for the season… it was perfect for them. Sufficiently broody, if you get my drift. And they always had it to themselves—no summer wave runners, no pervasive smell of roasting burgers and dogs, no happy shouts and laughter. Just them, and the obvious distance growing between them.

He kept asking her what was wrong and she wouldn't tell him. She couldn't explain how she always knew the axe was about to fall, could damn near hear the thing dangling above her head. He would never understand that she mourned the endings before they came so that she could walk away unscathed. So they sat out at night, bundled in store-bought quilts, drinking homemade White Lightning and naming the stars. And when he slept, she cried.

Thanksgiving weekend was the loneliest weekend of all on the lake, so it was no surprise that they both loved to spend it there. They did it up right, baking a turkey and mashing a huge pot of potatoes. They laughed when they sliced into their beautiful golden bird to find it still pink and raw on the inside. Both were content to eat the trimmings instead and then gorge themselves on pumpkin pie. As they pushed back from the table, he dabbed a bit of whipped cream on the end of her nose and said "I love you." She thought of suitcases and boxes, bare walls and empty rooms... but gave him a smile anyway.

On Sunday morning, she awoke to the sound of him playing his sax at the end of the pier. The notes hung in the air like fog, drawing her out of the warm bed they had shared and into the grey light of the morning. She didn't recognize the tune and realized it was something he had been working on, hiding from her, the way he always did with the new ones. He must have heard her bare feet on the deck because he didn't start when she placed her hand on his shoulder. He played on, filling the sky with music and as she walked around him, she wasn't surprised to see his tears.

With the last note hanging in the still morning air, he held her stare and said simply "I'm sorry."

She smiled, swept the hair from his forehead and said "Don't be."

Defrost: The Saga of Pudge Gazelle

It's Halloween.  And to be honest, I truly dislike handing out candy.

I like buying candy.  I like eating candy.  And if we were at the movies together (and we totally should go, by the way), I wouldn't mind sharing my candy with you.

I just don't like handing it out on Halloween.  And because of that, this year I simply dumped my candy in an orange plastic bowl and set it on a plant stand on my front porch.  Come n get it, kiddos!

So it's 8:00 p.m. and I'm crouching in my dark upstairs bedroom alone, watching the same ridiculously bad "Ghost Adventures" special I watched last year and eating a mini box of Milk Duds because I apparently really like my dentist and want to buy him a place in Aspen.  And I think it's about time that I used the bully pulpit of my blog to rip on the "Twilight" series.

Don't get me wrong, I've never read any of the books or seen any of the movies.  But this will not stop me from mocking them.  Oh, no.  I do this in the grand tradition of my Dad dismissing "Sex & The City" (which he has never seen) with a disgusted wave of his hand and the horribly inaccurate statement:  "Single women in their 30's don't have sex with that many men or talk about it like that."  In fact, SATC is among life's most repugnant things to my Dad...and I know this because he refers to it as "that Sex & The City."  In the way that he refers to its star as "that Sarah Jessica Parker," or to any black actor other than Morgan Freeman as "that Will Smith."

So, that "Twilight." 

Look, I totally get that pre-pubescent schoolgirls are going to get breathlessly caught up in the idea of loving a handsome and misunderstood outcast who can and will love them forever.  What I don't get is how sophisticated and normally rational women that I respect fall for it.  I once found myself sitting at a table with four female colleagues, all very accomplished, successful women.  At some point, the conversation turned to "Twilight" and these ladies spent the next twenty minutes arguing the merits of vampire over werewolf and werewolf over vampire as boyfriend material.  I was aghast.  When I had heard enough, I simply asked "Why not a leprechaun?  I mean, there would always be gold."  And they all laughed, of course, and then politely informed me that there aren't any leprechauns.  To which I replied, "For God's sake, there aren't any vampires or werewolves either!"

Which brings me to the actress cast as Bella:  Kristen Stewart. 

Was this some kind of brother-in-law deal?  Is she the Director's niece?  Does she have naked photos of Spielberg and she's not afraid to use them?

She's a somewhat pretty girl...but good GOD, she has negative charisma. It's like watching a young and less homely Barefoot Contessa trying to emote.  Take, for example, this comparison of her emotions to that of the much-superior Emma Watson:

And seriously... the dude that plays Edward...Is this that whole "we like him because his masculinity doesn't frighten us" thing?  I personally could never be with a man (alive, dead or undead) who spends more time on his hair than I do.  And how does he do it if he has no reflection??

And the neanderthal that plays Jacob-- with that massively protuding brow, wouldn't he be better suited for Frankenstein?

And really?  Bella Swan?  Jacob Black?  I can't even mock these names because they are such phenomenally delightful examples of character names that will get you kicked out of the Creative Writing program down at the local JuCo.  Or leisure learning annex.  Or daycare.

Which actually got me to thinking:  With all the new ghost hunting shows popping up on TV, I think ghosts are the new vampires.  And now that food shows have surpassed design shows in popularity, I think I'm on to something.  I'm going to write a book called "Defrost" about a ghost chef.  I'll name him Christopher Phantom and give him a chubby but preternaturally graceful heroine named Pudge Gazelle. 

I'm going to be a gazillionaire.  And you can say you knew me when I came up with the idea while hiding from candy-seeking missiles on Halloween.

And for the record, it's now 8:35 p.m. and those greedy little candy-grubbing bastards have cleaned me out. 

Ugh, I hate giving out that candy.