Quint

This past Saturday was a year since I lost Quint. Luckily, I was at the beach, I shed a little tear and moved on. But i have been thinking a ton about him this week. I love Brody, but they are not the same dog. Quint was smart and funny, and the biggest waggie butt I ever saw. His whole body wagged when he saw me. I still miss him every single day.

I am still going through my old photos to pull some out and post them. It’s taken me this year just to be able to look at them. Also went through some old videos that had him in it. This is one I took of him with Todd and the kids, the first time the kids saw snow. We were still in EAV then. Quint was so spazzed out by the snow.

We had Q for 12 years. 8 of those years, i worked from home, and he was right at my side the whole time. It doesn’t feel like someone ripped a limb off anymore, but damn, i still miss my buddy every day.

F*cksock

This morning, I miraculously got the kids up and ready for school today with time to spare. I sat sipping my coffee on the couch until time to get the kids in the car, with Tiller, Rollie, and Brody (the dog) all sitting beside me. I checked my email while the kids read Rollie’s Encyclopedia of Immaturity, Vol. II. (Because Vol. I was not enough.)

I admit, I pretty much block everything out, especially before 8 a.m., but they were reading entries like, “How To Make a Fart Sound With Your Hands,” “How To Make a Fart Sound With Your Arm,” and “Frozen Underpants.”

And then I hear:

R: “How to make a fucksock.”

I choked on my coffee.

Me: “WHAT DID YOU SAY?!”

R: “How to make a fucksock.”

T: “What’s a fucksock?”

Me: “Give me that book.”

Rollie hands me the book. I look down at the page. The heading reads, “How to Make a Fauxhawk.”

Kids are awesome.

My Memories as Fairy Tale, or Once Upon A Time I May Have Touched Curt Cobain

I was laid out on the couch today, with strep throat. Todd took the kids to R’s baseball game, and I was flipping through Netflix, trying to find something interesting. The good thing about being sick is that I can watch tv that I wouldn’t normally watch. Guilt free. Because i’m sick. I can watch four episodes of British teen dramas. (Skins. I can’t quit you.) Then, I can totally decide to switch over and watch music documentaries, which I used to watch all the time, but never seem to find time for these days. Because of the aforementioned guilt.

And yeah, the music is early 90s. Got all nostalgic after seeing facebook photos posted by college pal Jasonaut. Black and white photos, fresh faces, wrinkled, lived-in clothes that didn’t really fit, Athens porches. Beautiful photos that make me think of the past with wistfulness, even as I realize that photos don’t capture heartbreak, heat, humidity, night breezes, the smell of smoke, or the feel of old couches, or what it feels like to have so. much. time. to. think. About everything. To death.

So, there i was, laid out on the couch, watching a documentary about Nevermind, and the kids walk in from post-game pizza at Felini’s and Tiller is looking all cute, with a pony tail on her head, wearing mary janes, polka-dot leggings, a madras plaid patchwork skirt, and a shirt that can only be described as “riotous” (it had a zebra print, at least five colors, including hot pink, and sequins) - she is Belinda Carlisle on acid. And she walks in, puts her hand on hip, and says definitively, “This is my favorite song.”

It’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” And i though to myself, “novice.”

And then I said, “Really? I didn’t know you liked this song.”

And she said, “Yes,” her hands out to me, palms up, making a point, and cocked her head to the right, nodding. “We listened to the Nirvana in the car with Daddy.” Weird. Synchronicity. Also, this is good, because it means he might have been actually listening to me when I was saying that it was sad the kids don’t hear full albums more often.

“Oh. Okay, well, would you like to watch a documentary about the album?” And I totally thought they would say no, while giving me that “fuck no, i want to play. Why would I want to watch this boring shit?” look, but instead, they both said, “Sure!” in unison, and curled up on the chairs, and there wasn’t even a fight about who would sit where.

And then they started asking questions:

Tiller: “Who’s that? Is he the dead one?”
Me: “Uh, did daddy tell you he died?
Tiller: “Yeah. How did he die?”
Rollie: “He got old, Tiller.”
Me: “Well, actually, no, it’s sad. He killed himself. Have you heard of that?”
In unison: “No.”
Oh. shit.
Me: “Well, he did. It was v. sad. Always remember that no matter how bad it might get, Mama and daddy are here, and you can always talk to us, and it’s never bad enough to kill yourself. It is a selfish, terrible, heartbreaking, sad thing.”
Rollie: “How did he do it?”
Me: “Uh, i don’t remember.” Total lie.
Tiller: “Why?” Uh, shit. Too early to discuss drugs and depression.
Me: “Sometimes people are in pain, physically, or they are so sad that it hurts, and they don’t know what else to do.” SHIT.
Rollie: “Was it a gun?” Shit.
Me: “I don’t know baby. Let’s watch. maybe they will tell us what happened.”

And then, my stomach kind of clenched, because they had Butch Vig talking about recording the song “Something in the Way,” which is just depressing-as-hell, a haunting song, and i was thinking, why am i letting them watch this? Crap!

Rollie: “This one is not so loud.” He says this, not with distaste, but with thoughtfulness.

Butch Vig talks about how he recorded it with Kurt Cobain laying on a couch in the room with the soundboard, and he was just lying on the couch, playing the guitar, and singing, and it was so quiet, and so moving. I was waiting for the kids to get bored and start fidgeting, but they are both staring at Butch Vig, talking about doubling up vocal tracks, like Lennon did, and i see R. jerk his head towards me, like, “Lennon! I know him!” but he turns back to the tv. And they just . . . listen.

Rollie whispers, eyes not leaving the screen: “I like that song.”
Tiller: “Me too.”

And then they start talking about Smells Like Teen Spirit and how they made the video, which, well, you know. You’ve seen it. And Tiller says, in a Barbara Walters-gonna-get-you-to-fess-up-voice: “Mom, were you there?” And I laugh and say no.

And then the documentary starts talking about Nirvana playing live. They show all sorts of footage that makes me smile: Cobain wearing a white coat, beating his head into his amp, and Novoselic throwing his bass in the air, and Cobain leaping into the drum set. I am smiling and I look over at my kids, and they are looking at me, like, “Why are you smiling? Aren’t they gonna get in trouble? Isn’t that bad?”

Tiller: “Why are they making that mess?
Me, smiling a HUGE, guilty grin: “For fun. For entertainment.”
R: “Are those people on stage dancing in the band?
I laugh. “No,” more laughter, “they are people in the crowd stage diving.”
R: “What’s that?”
Me, with a lot more laughter. “It’s stupid. People got so excited and they would jump on stage and dance with bands, and then they would jump into the crowd, and the crowd would catch them, usually, and then they might carry them around. And that’s “crowd surfing.”

Complete silence in the room, as they both sit watching this footage of . . . what i remember going to see bands like that was like. And i realized that they are watching people at a Nirvana show, and it must seem like a fairy tale to them, like my dad telling me he met the Rolling Stones, or if my mom up and told me she was at Woodstock.

Tiller: “Were you there, mom?”
Me, more laughter. Laugh out loud laughter. A happy laughter. “Not there, baby. But i saw them twice. One time in a really big place, like the Georgia Dome, but it was called the Omni. But the first time I saw them, i was in Athens and I saw them in a little small place, smaller than the place where we took you to see They Might Be Giants.” The crowd on TV is pushing and shoving.
Tiller: “Was Daddy there?
Me: “No, baby, i didn’t know Daddy yet. I was there with my roommate and another friend.”
Rollie: “Did you get pushed down?”
Me: “No!”
Rollie: “Did you get pushed?”
Me: “yes.”
Tiller: “Were you scared?”
Me: “No. It was fun.”
Rollie: “Did you get up on stage and jump off?”
Me: “Oh, no, baby. Not my style. Remember I don’t like heights or being the center of attention.”
Rollie: “Did anyone jump off?”
Me: “Yes, Curt Cobain did! But not with his guitar like that.” On the TV, Curt is jumping off a huge stage, with his guitar, at some festival into a sea of people. “And there were not that many people there.”
Tiller: “did you catch him?”
Me: “Yes, everyone caught him. He jumped off, and people caught him, and he grabbed a hold of this movie screen, you know the kind they set up for movies at school? That pull out of the ceiling? And he grabbed hold of it, and he pulled it down, while the crowd was holding him, and it came right out of the ceiling and he wrapped himself up in the screen while the people held him up.”
Tiller, eyes as big as saucers: “Did you touch him?”
Me: “Uh, yeah, i guess so.”

And they both just stared at me.

And I gotta admit . . . I felt like a complete and total bad ass. I really did have a life. Back in the day. And what’s more? I’m pretty sure they thought i was a badass. That will probably never happen again. At least until they have children of their own. And then they will know that keeping a kid alive for 8 years is pretty badass in and of itself.

p.s. Mom? Dad? Y’all aren’t perfect, but I do think you’re pretty badass.

post-post script: Interestingly, i found this site, because I was curious if anyone else had written about the show online. I would have keeled over in happiness to find a photo of that night. Not even a complete setlist.

10/05/91 - 40 Watt Club, Athens, GA
Set (incomplete)
Smells Like Teen Spirit • Breed • Endless, Nameless
Notes
The band was drunk and out of tune, but the show was apparently incredible, according to attendees.
During “Endless, Nameless,” Kurt vaulted up to the movie projection screen and ripped it out of the ceiling, inciting the crowd to get onstage with the band and trash everything. Meanwhile, Dave kicked his drums over, then piled them up in no particular order and played them with microphones. After the noise and destruction, the band piled their instruments onto the drums, wished the crowd a good night, and left the stage, according to an attendee.
Other Performers
Das Damen

So, yeah. . . i guess i didn’t totally dream it.

Tills Slays Me

I just love her little bones. Not sure how I forgot to post the St. Patty’s one back in March. . .

And my personal favorite. It is hard to see in the scan, but the girl is saying ‘it’s a Lepercon:’

Spring Break 2012

We did the Spring Break thing. A few days on Hilton Head (Todd had a shoot this week: Bad advertising world! Bad!) and then we did the lake for Easter with the whole family. About 24 hours of my family in one small 2BR lakehouse is all I can take, no matter how much I love them. I think this is normal?

So busy after being gone - work, laundry, trying to get back into a diet and exercise happy place. I feel like a train that derailed in a fiery crash of fried, fat, beer and excess!

Highlights of the week, not in photos: Fishing with my kiddos at dusk. Morning kids swimming with dog while I drink coffee at lake. Watching Brody revel in lake life. Puttering around with my dad for a day at the lake, fixing stuff, for once not snapping at each other. A rarity. Mom’s potato salad. My kids’ awesome manners while out to eat in HHI. I almost cried. Watching Venus in the Pleiades (spelling?) from the dock on a clear night. On the water at the beach. Seeing kids’ faces when they saw dolphins up close. Hearing their contagious laughter in the car on 441 - They had a “make each other laugh contest” and were killing Todd and I with their laughter. Such sweet music. Driving home on a sunny, perfectly-warm Easter afternoon with only Rollie and Brody in the car. Windows down, listening to an old mix CD of some of my all-time favorite songs, discussing them with Rollie: He asks a lot of questions, like “who is it by? What is it called? What is it about? Why do you like it?” Memorable discussions of songs - “Mayonnaise” by Smashing Pumpkins, “This Must Be The Place” by Talking Heads, and “Tempted” by Squeeze. R. thought it was so funny that I used to sing it to him as a lullaby when he would cry as a baby. Teaching kids to jump rope in the driveway last night. “Cinderella, dressed in yellow. . . ” (What are your favorite jump rope rhymes?)

Hope you all had a great Easter, Seder, spring break, etc.

Something New, Something Me

Todd gave me a Kindle Fire about a month ago. I already had a Kindle and loved it. I was hesitant about the Kindle Fire. I still have mixed feelings about giving up my old one. I kind of liked having a device just for reading, with no distractions. I also miss the standard Kindle electronic ink technology, which has no glare. Unfortunately, reading on a Fire is not as easy in sunlight, but it is still a nice device, easy to carry, etc. And a damn sight cheaper than an iPad, although no where as great as in iPad. Still, it allows me to watch and read and check facebook and all that Jazz. Nifty little tablet, and really. . . we live in the future, people. Why am I complaining about a lightweight book-sized computer? Because I am a spoiled American, that’s why.

I digress. So, i had this nice little green cover for my old Kindle. (Which, by the way, went to a good home already.)

I loved it. I could even read in bed when Todd was sleeping, because it had a light. Brilliantly awesome. (I know i could have read in bed with a real book and a book light, but aren’t those just for old people in movies?) I loved the green color.

So, when Todd gave me the Kindle Fire, i bought a similar cover, but since i might be watching video, i wanted to make sure that I could set it up to view streaming movies and tv. (Okay, Vampire Diaries, mostly.)

I bought this one, in purple.

So, I liked it and all, but it was. . . kind of boring. This cover said nothing about how funny, smart, awesome, and modest I am. It just said, “I like purple.” Or, at least, “I like purple more than the other colors offered.”

So, I started looking for handmade and original covers on Etsy.

BLACK HOLE.

OMG, there are so many cute ones, and I would post them all here for you to see, (Plus, my kitchen choice ideas, too!) if only Pinterest wasn’t really, really slow about developing a widget for embedding Pinterest boards on websites. You can post a Pin to a website, but not a board. I mean, come on, Pinterest. This seems like a really obvious choice for something to finish up. The people want it.

So, go stalk the cute pins on my Kindle Fire Covers Pinterest board. You can follow my pins, too. I have a Pinterest problem, i think. There were so many great options, but really, i knew it when i saw it. I ordered it.

It came in the mail yesterday. Wrapped in this:

And, uh, take note folks. She spelled my name correctly.

TREE Kindle Fire Cover - ARTsy Covers by Clevelandgirlie

So, the only problem? I might have to have a summery version made. Also considering a waterproof one for the pool. I feel a new Pinterest board coming on. . . .

Oh, and do you have a custom cover for yours? Post a link! I want to see them! What is your “Something Me?”

p.s. Yes, those are pictures of my desk. Where the magic happens, so to speak. Note that I shoved all the shitpiles out of the way so that it looks neat. Perhaps tomorrow a peek at the pile. . . I am sure you are all on the edge of your seats.

Girls Gone Mild 2012: Tybee Island

This time last week, I was on Tybee. Gawd, I love that place. Reminds me of everything that is awesome in life: Beach, warm sun, sand, marshes and birds, beer, kids and “yes, Ma’am,” and fresh seafood, and my grandparents, and being a Georgian. Say what you will (and leave politics out of it), but I live in one of the most beautiful states ever. Cities and beaches and swamps and Piedmont farm fields, and pine forests and hardwood forests and wilderness and lakes and mountains. (Seriously. Name another state with both the Appalachians and a monstrously-huge swamp. Alabama, maybe?)

Georgia is who I am. I feel Georgia in my bones.

So, I was excited to spend a few days on Tybee, with my little sister and my dear friends Robin and Vanessa. They’re my “newer” college friends. You know, I’ve only known them for a little over 20 years now. [gulp] Even more exciting was the fact that neither Robin or Vanessa had ever been to Savannah or Tybee. I wish we had more time - they barely got to scratch the surface. Pretty sure they caught the bug, though. They will return. I know it.

We got in on Sunday, after an enjoyable ride down 16, the world’s most boring drive (if you don’t happen to have three of your best friends with you, doing godawful Irish brogues in Dublin, and performing their best machine gun sounds - it’s true, girls really can’t do them - which make your stomach hurt from laughing, and which put everyone’s lives in peril as you struggle to keep the car on the road because you can’t see through the tears of laughter).

Got there, and checked into our condo. (We considered a house, which i would have preferred, but the condo had a heated pool and in early March, heated pool wins out.) Then we had drinks, hit the IGA for provisions. (I could write a whole blog post on just the IGA - awesomely strange people-watching. People drink while shopping for groceries. Hysterical. Oh, and did I mention awesome? They will deliver your groceries to your door, or stock your place before you even get there.) Then we went to Sting Ray’s for dinner. It was good, and they had decent beer and they were open on Sunday and god, i was starving. This is also the moment where our trip catchphrase was born. You know: Every trip with friends has one. Todd went to Tybee a couple of years ago and came back with “Release the Kracken!” They even had their own logo:

Ours? “I don’t know about you whores, but. . . ”

As in: I don’t know about you whores, but yes. We are that classy. And then we went back to our place, drank tequila, watched The Walking Dead, and made bird statues do weird things to each other.

On Monday, we rented bikes from Fat Tire Bikes. They were so sweet, gave us an “off-season” discount, and we made friends with Joey, a former science teacher, who now works part-time at the bike shop. They also traded out my bike for me when I had an overnight slow leak. Good people.

Lisa and Robin decided to head straight back to the pool, so they piled their bikes in the back of my van, while Vanessa and I readied for a ride, by spending about an hour adjusting our bike seats (I have long legs people!) and she practiced riding in a parking lot next to the bike shop. While we did that, we heard a crash and looked out in the middle of Butler (main st. on Tybee) and there is Robin running in the middle of the road picking up a bike basket that fell out of the back of the van. Yes, my sister likes to floor it. Even when there are bikes, not tied down, in the back of my open van. This happened right in front of the bike shop, which made me laugh my ass off. *No bikes were harmed in the course of this trip. Not sure when Nessie last rode a bike, but i think it had been a while. But, you know, riding a bike is, um, just like riding a bike. It came back to her and then we hit the road and explored and looked at houses and it was fucking awesome.

Then we hit the pool! Not much better than a day sitting around a pool with friends. We also tormented my husband by texting him at work and asking him to be our cabana boy. He is a good egg, my husband. I finished The Scottish Prisoner and started reading Ready Player One.

That night, we had dinner at North Beach Bar and Grill (unassuming building near the lighthouse, but great food and great servers!) And then we went to Huca Poo’s for beer. No link because damn, they need a new website. OMG, i loved this place. Not for those sensitive to smoke (you can still smoke in public places there, which is so weird, even though it wasn’t so long ago that everywhere was like that.) First of all, great bartender, Al. For the Auburn folks, he was a cross between Jared Pearce and my Mama. I don’t know how else to describe him. Red leather barstools, just like they had at The Georgia Bar, back in the day, when that was actually the place to be in Athens. Sweet seats! Pinball. People playing poker at a corner table. That ring toss game that I need to install at the lakehouse. Great people-watching. And DOGS AT THE BAR. There was an actual dog, named Zoe, wearing a plaid scarf, sitting on a barstool at the bar. God bless bars like this. I could live in one. Not kidding when I say i could put it in my top 20 bars of all time. (No, I haven’t really made this list, but i might some day.)

Tuesday, we had planned to spend the day in Savannah, but for some reason, everyone slept late and we bailed on that. So, instead, we rode bikes in the a.m. Okay, i had to get my damn tire fixed, and then i rode bikes. We ate lunch at Fannie’s On the Beach. Their onion rings are the best thing since beer. And then the girls went back to the pool and I rode my bike all by myself for a while. No pictures of that. It’s all in my head, though, and it’s all mine. And no one can take it away.

And then i think we had more time at the pool, and then we were tired and we ordered pizza in and drank some more that night. They don’t call us Girls Gone Mild for nothing.

Wednesday morning, Leelee and i got up bright and early and went for a bike ride. It was one of the best mornings I can remember having with my sweet sister. When was the last time you rode bikes with your sibling? There is a magic to it, like you are six years old again. We looked at houses, and talked, and did fashion shoots and action shots (see below) and walked on the pier and laughed.

And on the way back home, i rode past a house and saw my friend Lisa standing out in the front yard! Lisa is friends with my friend Donnie, from college. They live in Savannah, but Lisa has a landscaping company, Plan It Green Design, and she was working on one of the Mermaid Cottages on the island. She is awesome, even though I don’t know her that well. But you know, when you go skinny dipping at a downtown Atlanta hotel’s rooftop pool at 1 am on a Monday night after a Pixies show, you’re pretty fast friends. Anyway, it is a small world and it was nice to hug her neck and say hello.

Let’s see, what else? Robin and i walked on the beach a bit, and then we took Nessa and Robbie to The Crab Shack. I can’t really explain the crab shack. You will just have to go there on your own. Suffice it to say that it is extremely touristy, located down a weird mobile-home/awesome backriver home street, and it has cats, raccoons, parrots, and real live gators. Kids adore it, and adults lie if they don’t kind of like it too. Except for Robin, who doesn’t really eat seafood and was quite unimpressed. I felt a little sorry for her as I sucked crawfish heads and the eyes stared at her as she ate her ribs. I cracked shells and and slurped mussels and pretty much gave into the thrill of killing my own food as i ate it. I am a sucker for a food with a carapace or a shell or an exoskeleton. They are so fun to eat! And then we took photos with the fake gator. Fake gators are always a good time.

And on our last night, we went to the pier and it was a full moon and you could see Venus and Jupiter, i think, and the moon shined on the river. I stood on the end of the pier, looking down, watching the flow of the river make it’s way back out to the ocean. I thought about how good it feels to go with the flow of your heart and your desires, to be like the river, ebbing and flowing with the pull of the moon, and I knew that it is okay to be me, even if I change directions at the damnedest times, and with no apparent reason. I have my reasons, like the tides have the moon.

And then we went back and packed up and planned for a Kamikaze tour of Savannah the next morning. We got up, returned out bikes and said our goodbyes to Joey, and hit the road. I hate to leave Tybee - it pulls at my heartstrings so. The girls wanted to see Bonaventure, so we went there first, and spent a delightful morning walking the cemetery. It is truly beautiful, even if touristy.

And then we got REAL hangry and decided to eat on River Street, which I would normally avoid, but I thought if we had such a short time, they would want to see its cobblestone and the preparations for St. Patty’s that were already underway, and the sweet shops. OHGODTHESWEETS. There does exist, by the way, a peanut butter cup that is too big for me to finish. I didn’t think it was possible, but it is true.

The sad part is that we had to hit the road, and they never even got the chance to walk the squares, which is the true beauty of Savannah, but i am sure they will come back. I know I will. Maybe Girls Gone Mild 2013?

Real Life and Writing

Real life is so so so so in the way of my other life: The one in my head, that I imagine living, and that I actually do live every once in a while. The one where I ride bikes with my sister, walk on the beach, read a lot, and laugh til my stomach hurts. I got to live it for a few days last week, with the girls, on Tybee. Pics of that to come, maybe later today, maybe tomorrow. I have told myself I will get back to writing on my blog daily, but sometimes I have big ideas, and then don’t have the time to put them down on the page. I used to fill those spaces with the little gems - pictures of the kids, the dog, a link to something I love. Now those things invariable get tweeted or Facebook-posted. I am going to try to make sure they go on the blog again, because they are also part of who I am, and I’d like to see them categorized and archived. I miss them being in “my place.”

Today’s gem is an interview with Diana Gabaldon, via Authors Road. (Embedding disabled, so you will have to follow the link if you want to see it. Note: it’s 30 minutes! Poor Todd had to listen over my shoulder this morning. Also, this video is really only for those interested in the writing craft, Diana Gabaldon novels, or raven sculptures. (That last one is really just myself and Vanessa.)) She is one of my favorite writers, mostly because she created a crazy series that defies categorization, but also because she reminds me a bit of myself.

My favorite part of the interview, other than the awesome parts about how she actually writes? The fact that she loved Trixie Belden books as a girl. I <3 Trixie Belden.

“Don’t you wish that the Bob-Whites could just go on and on as we are now, just the same age as we are now?”

Trixie Belden, The Mystery of the Missing Heiress

Wow. I should really write about Trixie Belden one day.

Back to real life!

Love,
Dogwood Girl

What are you gonna do when you’re dead?

The kids and I were driving home from QT (Yes, Todd, i returned the movie!) and we had the following discussion:

Rollie: “Mom, what are you going to do when you’re dead?”

Me: “Um. . what?”

Rollie: “Like, are you going to go under a tombstone in the ground. Or are you going to let your family burn your skin, so they can keep your ashes? Or are you going to give your body to scientists to use?”

Me: “Uh, I don’t really know yet, baby. Daddy and I have talked about it a little.”

Rollie: “Daddy wants to have his family burn his skin and keep the ashes.”

Me: “You realize that they burn the entire body? But the body is just a vessel for the soul while it is on earth, so it isn’t in the body anymore, so it doesn’t hurt. Because you’re dead.”

I look in the rear view mirror: Rollie and Tiller are staring back at me in the mirror.

Tiller: “So, what does Mr. Poole* do with the bodies?”

Rollie: “He plays with the skulls.”

Now, there’s a comforting thought.

*Mr. Poole is the school science teacher.

Mean Girls in Full Effect

So, the mean girls are evidently in full effect in kindergarten these days. I wouldn’t believe it, if I hadn’t seen with my own eyes the drastic change in my own girl. She pouts. She whines. She tosses out ultimatums. She’s all, “I won’t be your friend unless/if” and “so and so says she doesn’t want to be my friend any more. Now she and so and so are BFFS.”

I say, “What is a BFF?” She rolls her eyes at me.

Where did my sweet little girl go? She sure as hell didn’t learn this bullshit from me. This shit is why I always had more male friends than girl friends. (Once I was old enough to realize that girls generally suck and are more trouble than they’re worth). I’m not surprised that it’s happening. Just surprised that it’s happening so early. I thought for sure that I would have until fourth or fifth grade, at least, until i dealt with Queen Bees, Heathers, and Mean Girls.

So, where is it coming from? Have little girls always been this way, this early? Is it too much TV, with the bratty, self-centered, smart-mouthed girls? Is it my generation’s fault? As a girl, if you sassed your Mama, that was frowned upon. Were we completely misguided, misappropriating the term, reading our Sassy Magazines, and reveling in our own sassy attitudes? Have our girls just learned from us? What happened to true friendship, or at least the old adage, “Treat others as you would like to be treated?” I fear we have lost it in a whirlwind (an ill girlwind?) of iCarly and Miley and Serena. This is not what i had in mind when I reveled in the awesome women in music of my youth: Joan Jett, Madonna, Sinead O’Connor, Chrissie Hinde, Debby Harry, Terry Nunn, and Johnette Napolitano. What the fuck happened?

So, I’ve been a bit bewildered, dealing with the tears and the tantrums, the stomping and the mirror-smashing door slamming. To say that I am in fear of the age of 13 is putting it lightly. But she’s only six. And worse than the tears over her own hurt feelings? The knowledge that she is picking up the same tactics and using them on others, in some sort of Lord of the Flies scenario. She is not treating others as she wants to be treated, but as they are treating her. And so it is that we have reached the advent of The Mean Girl Note.

Be frightened. Be very, very frightened.

Or if you are me, be very disgusted, a little sickened, and a whole lot disappointed.

We had friends over the other night. They have a girl about T’s age. The kids all play well together and almost never fight. But they fought this evening. Something about not all wanting to play the same game, which was some kind of running club game. (I am of course in total support of this game, as any game that involves them wearing their little asses out is always my first choice. “Here, baby. Tie this rope, the one attached to the cement block, around your waist. Good. Now run back and forth in the back yard, dragging the cement block behind you. Yes, that’s right. Now do it as many times as you can. Y’all have fun!”)

So, the girls disagreed and one of them quit and played with R (the only boy), having become fed up with the arguing. (Girl after my own heart.) After they left, and our kids were in bed, Todd and I came across the mean girl note. It read something along the lines of, “I will be your friend, if you will play the game with me. If not, you are not my friend.”

GRRRRRRRR. This is it. This is the fucking bullshit that girls do that made me want to BLOW UP MY FUCKING MIDDLE SCHOOL. That’s a bit of a lie. I didn’t always daydream about blowing up the middle school. I actually would have been more happy if there was some kind of disfiguring virus that attacked all the mean, superficial girls. They would contract the disease (spread by lip gloss and notes, of course), suffer a deathly illness for weeks, and then come back to school with hair fallen out, a few pounds piled on, complete pizza face acne, and wearing clothes from [GASP] Goodwill. You know who else would get hit? The social climbing brown nosing types. You know the ones: Not really ugly, but not exactly pretty either. Kind of plain, but with a layer of too much makeup that said, I’m trying too hard. They usually still had some baby fat. They did just what the popular girls wanted them to do, and followed them around like god damn puppets. They also threw their also-not-so-popular brethren under the bus in an attempt to impress the popular girls. In my eyes, they were always the absolute sorriest pieces of shit of them all. Because they wanted to be popular so. very. badly.

Oh, wait. This post isn’t about me? My bad.

So, we found the note. The next morning, Todd talked to Tills about it, and about all the ways in which it was wrong to write it, and they decided together that the next day, she would write a letter apologizing to her friend. I would help her write it after school. It was bedtime when Todd came home the next night. He asked if Tiller had written her letter. I did the deer in headlights - Because I am such a stellar parent, I had completely forgotten about it, what with all the Bonbons I was eating, and Facebook and my soap operas. I promised that I would help her with it the next day, and told him the kids were in bed, but not asleep, and they wanted him to come and tuck them in.

He went upstairs. A few minutes, he came back down, with a funny look on his face, holding a piece of paper. This piece of paper:

She wrote it some time after school, of her own accord. It is so sweet I could cry. Yeah, she misspelled some stuff, but SHE PUT A PAIR OF SUNGLASSES ON THE SUN, for heaven’s sake. How can there be a mean girl in a child who thinks the sun wears shades?

I would be happier if it said “I’m sorry for hurting your feelings.” I would prefer it dropped the “best friends” language all together, as the premise of Best Friends seems exclusionary by its very nature. But the essence of it, of two girls, holding hands so sweetly together, so full of love and light that the very sun is blinded by it. . . I’ll take it.

Hell, I’ll cling to it. Allwase.

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