Not-So-Urgent Care

Widely-known fact about me: I am a hypochondriac.

If I get a headache?  I go right past the "allergies" and "pinched nerves" options and straight on to the brain tumor diagnosis.  Once my massage therapist said that I had a knot in my back that she couldn't get to break up and I asked her if she thought it was cancer.  That would be a funnier story if it didn't happen recently.  Like, a few months ago.  My sister when I told her that story:

Her: You did not ask her that.
Me: Yes, I did.
Her: I literally hate you right now for asking her that.

This is why I'm really lucky to have Jen and Sara as friends, both of whom know that the right answer at any time is that I don't have a brain tumor- not "I don't think so" or, "you should go see your doctor", but straight up "No, you absolutely do not have cancer".  This is largely because they are both hypochondriacs, too.

Text message from Jen earlier this week:

"My eye is twitching.  WebMD says that's a sign of Parkinson's."

We all need therapy, but that's beside the point.

Earlier this week, I started feeling randomly dizzy.  So obviously it was cancer.
I have had a level of stress about it all week that it's completely unacceptable for any logical human being, so I went to the urgent care this morning.

In general, the scene in any given urgent care waiting room is what I imagine an apocalypse spurred by a zombie infestation would (will, eventually) be like.  It looks like this:

1. There are people sprawled all over the damn place, coughing up vital organs and spewing into potted plants.  

2. There are no doctors in sight.  Once I read a book called Blindness, where they bring all of these patients in to a "blindness treatment center", but there are no doctors there- because they're ACTUALLY BEING QUARANTINED AND LEFT FOR DEAD!  That's what urgent care is really for, as far as I'm concerned.  If I go, I locate all emergency exits immediately upon entering.  

That's a pretty scary scene, but what's even scarier is when you walk into an Urgent Care and there is... no one else in the waiting room?  Don't give me any BS about efficiency.  You know there are zombie people everywhere, and if no one else is in that room, even the brain-eating zombies are getting a bad vibe.

But whatever, I hate waiting.
Plus, I saw The Hunger Games.

I get in right away, and the nurse is nice enough, but as she's leaving, she says, "Okay.  I'll send Ray in."

Me (internally)... Ray?

Five minutes later, in walks a guy, smelling strongly of his last smoke break.

Him: Hi.  I'm Ray.

There is a time and a place for being laid back.  I think it's fun to tell funny stories to my classes.  But I teach English.  The most harm I'm going to do is misinterpret Hamlet.

Ray, are you a doctor?  

Ladies and gentleman, I have no idea if I saw an actual doctor today.

After he looked in my ears with the ear thing, he then shined the light from the very same instrument into my mouth.  

But the clincher moment- the moment when Ray the "doctor" fell out of favor with me?

Me: It's not a tumor, right?
Ray: I don't know- I can't see in there.

BOOOO, RAY!  YOU FAILLLLL!

He deigned to prescribe me an antibiotic, but- I swear to God- said this:

"So.  Which antibiotic do you like?"

I'm a WebMD regular, but- like Ray- I don't exactly have a medical license.

Me: Uh... a Zpack?
Ray: Yeah, those typically work pretty well.

Truth: If I get a bill for prescribing myself a Z-pack?  I'm going to flip the freak out.

On Stranger Danger

Last week, Ariel Castro, who imprisoned three teenage girls for a decade, hanged himself in prison after only 33 days of a lifetime sentence.  Also last week, Elizabeth Smart (also imprisoned as a teenager), released her book.  Long story short- it's pretty creepy out there for kids.

I was born in the 1980s, and I will freely admit that I tend to think of life in all decades before that as consisting of kids playing stickball in the street before coming home to their well-balanced dinners but, even though that's totally false, you have to admit that it was a lot easier to let your kid be gone for hours at a time, or even to let them out of your eyesight, back then.

But I feel like everyone knows that.  Which is why I can't figure out exactly how this happened yesterday:
B and I are in the train station and, as we're walking, a creep-o guy rips open a Twix package, and proceeds to hand half of it to B.  I stick my hand out and say, "He can't have that".  This guy though, shoves it in B's hand and walks away with this little smirk, like he thinks he's some sort of spoily grandpa.

So, I'm sure that Spoily Grandpa was sort of surprised when I grabbed the Twix out of B's hand and shoved it into the trash can.  Actually, I'm sure he was whispering "bitch" under his breath, but that's cool.  If you try to give my kid candy in a train station, I am going to kick you in the back of your fricking knees.

What.
Are.
You.
Thinking.

Do you know how much time I- and all parents, I imagine- spend trying to cultivate a balanced sense of stranger danger, while simultaneously trying to keep your kid from thinking the entire world is evil?  Because it sort of sucks.  But you definitely love your kid enough to do it.

I will admit that this guy seemed a little imbalanced.  Train stations aren't really filled with shining stars.  I get it.  Except that it happens ALL. THE. TIME.

Just one example: On Tuesday, we were in line at Meijer when a mom with several kids carts in behind us and immediately starts talking to B.  Which isn't a problem, except here's her immediate line of questioning:
Was today your first day of school?
What grade are you in?
What's your name?

A.  These are not appropriate questions to ask a child in line at Meijer.
B.  I do not understand this.  As a mom, would you want some random stranger asking your child questions like that?
C.  Exactly how am I supposed to explain to him that it is sometimes okay to talk to random strangers, but not other times.  He can't possibly have the discretion to tell the difference.

There are PLENTY of ways to acknowledge a child without being intrusive.  Here are a few.
Smile at the kid.
Wave at the kid.
Say, "I like your Cars shirt", then cart along on your merry way.

On the train ride home, drunkish guy on the way to the U of M game saw B's head pop up over the top of the seat.  Immediately: "Hey, Red!  What are you doing up there?"
He proceeded to do this for the rest of the freaking ride.

Sorry, my Amtrack-ing, friends.  But we don't live in that world anymore.  Maybe I am robbing B of all kinds of Tuesdays With Morrie moments, but I'm definitely saving him from a tell-all autobiography, and I'm cool with that.

After Twixgate, we had a big talk about strangers, and how we don't talk to people we don't know.

Did it work?
Not exactly.

A few minutes before the train came, we went outside and sat on the bench to wait.  On the bench, there was an empty Gatorade bottle and pack of cigarettes, and when B saw it, he very loudly stated, "MOM!  WE HAVE TO GET RID OF THESE THINGS!  THEY BELONG TO STRANGERS!!"

So at this point in time, he's just afraid of littering.  But it's a start.

Crap I Feel Needs to be Said: Mother's Day Edition

You all know that Pinterest is the love of my life.  Because one can never have too many different recipes for the WORLD'S GREATEST MASHED POTATOES, nor can they pin enough pieces of furniture that they will never make.

But, sometimes?  Pinterest pisses me right off.

A lot of times, it has to do with kids.

Here's a great example:

Listen.

Everyone I know loves their kids.

And everyone I know- myself ESPECIALLY- could occasionally stand to be reminded that maybe it's not so important to do the dishes or run errands or blahbity blah all Sunday.

But if this sign is meant to be inspirational?  It's not working for me.  What this does, instead, is make me feel immensely guilty for every second I spend not staring at my kid and meditating on the amazement of his very being.  Actually, it makes me nervous when I am hanging out with him.  Am I paying enough attention?  Doing enough fun things?? WILL I REGRET THIS LATER??

Basically, this sign makes me want to scream, "For CRAP'S SAKE, I'm doing the best that I can!"  Believe it or not, it is not news to moms that their kids will grow up and move away some day and that, more importantly, that moms are hugely responsible for the people those kids become, and that responsibility is tied to like, every friggin' thing they do, every single day.  

We all try to live in the present, and to appreciate and notice what we have.  But it is physically and mentally impossible to constantly give children your full and undivided attention, and to constantly create genuine enthusiasm for playing with them.

More importantly, I sometimes question if that's really even good for kids.

Being that it's the only real thing I have to compare it to, when I'm trying to decide how much I need to crawl on the floor and play cars, I try to remember my own childhood.  I use this as basis for my own actions because I have no complaints about my childhood.

I never felt like I had to fight for my parent's attention in any real way.  Sure, sometimes, especially during the summers, they told us to get out of the house and play outside, but that's because we were being fricking annoying, slothing around the house, draping ourselves over furniture and talking about how we were soooo booooored.

But, on a whole?  I don't remember feeling unloved, uncared for, or like I couldn't get enough attention.  Which is shocking, because I have always loved attention.

Which is why this conversation surprised me: maybe two or three months before my mom died, I was giving her this interview that I found at Real Simple (it's awesome- check it out here, and interview your mom).  When the question came up, "What's one thing you would have done differently as a mom?", her answer was, "I would play with you guys more".

Really? I said.

It didn't strike me as the "I really would have liked to play Legos more.  Because Legos are amazing." response; it felt a lot more like "I feel guilty that I didn't play Legos as much".

There are lots of things my parents never played with us.  For instance, I can't even begin to imagine my mom playing Barbies with us.  But who cares?  That's what Erin was around for, even though she never played right, probably because she was jealous that I had the prettier Barbie with the prettier dress.  Which is why she hacked off all of her Barbie's hair.  Psycho.

Despite a total lack of Barbie scenarios, my parents did plenty of things with us.  Things that I remember a lot more clearly than playing Barbies.  Exhibit A: Picking blueberries.  Picking blueberries was like THE thing to do in summer- we all went together and now, as an adult, it's the #1 thing I look forward to about summer.

We also went camping, all the time.  Erin and I shared the tent (ugh), and my parents slept in the camper and we (we = my mom) made dinner on the outdoor stove every night and, to this day, the smell of Ivory dish soap reminds me of washing dishes in big plastic tubs after dinner, using water we hauled over from the fountain in the expandable water jug.

My parents did things with us that they could do and enjoy without wanting to poke their eyes out.  We went to the drive-in, and camped.  We colored eggs and decorated the Christmas tree and watched Anne of Green Gables on the Disney Channel.  We helped plant the garden (against our will).  And for the rest of the stuff, we found friends to play with, or we played by ourselves, horror of horrors.  We had dinner together, as a family, nearly every night.  For years and years, we went to my Nana's house every Sunday, where we quickly abandoned our parents to play with our cousins.

This idea- finding a handful of mutually enjoyed "things" - is what I have started to do with Brady.  There are things that I love to do, and I do those things with him.  We've started reading Stuart Little, a chapter every night (and I can't WAIT until he's old enough for Harry Potter).  We play catch with the velcro ball thing in the back yard.  We cook things.  Last week, we flew a kite in the park.  At bedtime, we tell riddles, or clap out the syllables of things in his room (that one was his idea, guys).

And there are things that he obviously loves to do too, and I do some of those things with him.  I take him to the Nature Center to see the animals.  We go to the library, and parades, and fireworks.  We play Flashlight Dance Party to the radio.  We tell knock-knock jokes that make no damn sense.

And then there are things that I don't do with him.  I don't play Legos.  What do Lego people say to one another?  I have no idea.  I think I knew when I was four, but I've forgotten.  So I make him play by himself.  And when I do that, I might check my cell phone or look at Pinterest for a while.  And when I do, I resent seeing signs about how I'm wasting time with my child and will someday regret this moment.  When I was growing up, there wasn't a cell phone to stare at, but you know what my mom was doing while not gazing at us, filled with wonder?  She was watching Perry Mason.  Same damn thing, just in black and white.

And really, isn't that okay?
Honestly, if you actually lived up to what these signs are suggesting- cherishing every single moment and engaging with your child every single moment?  Is that good for him/her?  From my standpoint, I think that- beyond your intentional message- that you love him- you are also inadvertently teaching him these things:
1.  That he is the center of the universe
2.  That you are at his disposal
3.  That someone should always be there to entertain him
4.  That you are not a person too, with your own non-Lego interests

My worry would be that the shock of finding out that that isn't true is a rough one.

There is quality time.  And then there is all your time.
You do not owe ANYONE all of your time.  And- from my perspective- you owe it to your child to teach them some self-sufficiency.
If my mom had abandoned Perry Mason to do my bidding, I would not have had the chance to make up swingset routines with Erin.  Or hang upside down from the Edwards' swingset, or become the undefeated Fastest Runner on Second Street.  I would not have read all of the Babysitter's Club books.  I would not have fallen off of four different things and broken my arm four different times.

So listen, Pinterest.  Stop the Momma Shaming.

Obviously I can't ask her, but I think that my mom's response about playing with us more has to do with plain old nostalgia- you look back when something is over, and you wish just a little bit that it wasn't.  But wouldn't you do the exact same thing, regardless of how much you had played with your kids.  I don't believe there is any way of avoiding nostalgia.
I'll be forty-six when B graduates from high school (holy crap), and at that time, I'll probably feel really sad and wish for his childhood for a while, but that has nothing to do with not having played with him enough.

Brady W., Self-Esteem Advocate

B: Mom, what's that bump on your face?
Me: What? Oh, it's just a little zit.
B: Can I touch it?
Me: What?! No! Gross.
B: I'll scratch it for you!
Me: Brady! I don't want you to scratch it! Yuck.
B: ... but it's REALLY big!
Me: No it's not!!
B: Yes it is!  It's GIGANTIC!
Me: GET OUT OF MY ROOM!!!

Confessions of a Recovering Pushover

Approximately two months ago, Brady and I walked out of the city hall downtown after paying our water bill.  Thus began a bizarre chain of events, the likes of which have only been seen in really bad Will Ferrell movies, which went like this: 

Brady saw a plane. My child is obsessed with planes.  Whenever he sees one, he starts waving like a crazy person and yelling, "Hi! Hi!"  Is he just excited to see them?  Does he really believe that they can hear him?  I don't know.  I sometimes catch myself forgetting that Brady is three and thinking that he knows more than he really does.  In this situation I would assume that he realizes that they can't hear him but, then again, a few weeks back we had a LONG debate, which centered around Brady INSISTING that girls have a penis.  No, I said, they do not. 

Yes!, he yelled, Yes, they do! 

Not the case, I said

Then he said, Then what do they pee out of?

Just you wait.  You think you're so smart now, but wait until your kid asks you such questions.  On that occasion you will be presented with two important questions:
1. What was that called again? Urethra?

2. Do I really want to teach my kid that word?

Then you'll start doubting yourself, so you'll go online and Google "Women pee out of".

Go ahead, Google that.

Because it's going to make you feel better about yourself.

There are people in the world far, far dumber than you and me.

Number 1search result? "Women don't pee out of their vaginas and other things you might not know"

No. Shit.

Result #3 is even better

And, yes, it was the urethra.

So he's standing on the steps of City Hall, yelling "Hi! Hi!" and then...

A small group of homeless men walk by, directly beneath the path of the airplane.  City Hall is directly across the street from Bronson Park, which is a place where many homeless individuals frequent.  Naturally, this group of people walk by just as Brady is yelling, "Hi! Hi!" at the plane, and they turn and look, and- since yelling hi to a plane doesn't make any damn sense- they think that he's yelling hi  to them.  So they start waving at Brady, yelling "Hi", and walk toward us.  

Don't act like this isn't an awkward situation.

In true Brady style, he plays shy once they get over there, leaving me to carry the conversation.  Luckily, one of the men picks it right up.  

Let's be clear that I have zero problem with tattoos.

In fact, I like tattoos.

I have a tattoo.

I'd like another one.

But there are certain parts of the body that should never be tattooed.

Re: your face

This man has a sprinkling of random tattoos on his face, little symbols, and I am thinking to myself

Do you have the Louis Vuitton pattern tattooed on your face?

I swear to you, that's what it looked like.  

Louis says to Brady, "Hey, what's your mom's name?

I say, "Okay, let's go!"

Louis says, "Hey, what's your Mom's name?"

I say, "...Mary"

Brady says, "YOUR NAME'S NOT MARY!!!" and starts laughing hysterically, like me being named Mary is the best joke ever.

Then I say, "LET'S GO LOOK AT THE PLANE!" and walk the other way.

Granted, the first thing I think of when I hear that story is that Brady sold me out, but the second thing is, Why the hell would you even make up a name?  Why wouldn't you just walk away?

And the answer is Holy shit, I just can't.

Somewhere along the line, someone implanted in me a deep and unwavering fear of confrontation.

What's weird is, it comes and goes.

For example, it's not a problem with students.  I will take you down to Downtown Julie Brown if you try to argue your 6th absence with me.  

But strangers? No.

Most of the time, I want to blame this on being Midwestern, mostly because, when I lived in New York, absolutely no one seemed to have this affliction.  

But it isn't a Midwestern thing.  For instance, have you met my sister?

We grew up in the same house.  Same parents.  Same tv shows.  Same school district.

And yet, last week she walked into parent teacher conferences and more or less read my niece's science teacher the riot act.  I wasn't there, but I wouldn't be surprised to hear that she snapped her fingers as she was walking out.  

Also, there's Sara.  Sara's like the nicest person on earth, but if you try to screw her over?  Bad news.

One year we had really bad neighbors who stole our door mat.  She put this in its place, outside our door:

As far as I go, Homeless Louis is not the first, nor the worst case of this.

One year, when I lived in Ireland, a friend from home came to visit.  She went on a day trip to Galway, which I couldn't go on because I was in class.  While there, she met a boy.  Whom she invited to come back and sleep in my Irish house.  

Because he was from Colorado.

Interestingly enough, the friend neglected to mention that she had invited him.  He showed up at the door one day and said, "Oh! (Friend) invited me to stay!"  Also, "I'm from Colorado!"

In her defense, it was Thanksgiving.  

And really, how dangerous could it be?  It's not like there are any psychopaths in America.

Well.  Besides him.

Oh, yeah.  And him.

And that bath salts face-eating guy, I guess.

And Charles Manson.

I would like to tell you that I said, "No.  Some random guy from Colorado can NOT sleep on my floor, endangering the lives of myself and my roommates".  I did not say that. In my defense, Hostel and Hostel 2 had not yet come out.

What happened was, we all had Thanksgiving dinner together.  Me, my home friend, my American roommate, my four Irish roommates.... and a guy from Colorado.

In a stroke of sheer luck, he didn't eat us afterwards, but that was really a toss-up.

Probably the best example of this situation, though, is the cleaning lady saleswoman.  

It's important to know that this happened QUITE a long time ago and, now that I have a child, I would not do this.  Seriously.  I will shank you if you endanger my child.  Plus, anything you do in your 20s doesn't count.

One night, this lady shows up at my side door and she says "I'm selling cleaning solution! Best cleaning solution you've ever had!"  Then she took half of a green scrubby and sprayed some cleaner on it and set about scrubbing my counter.  Did it work?  Did it not work?

I don't remember

At that point in time, my kitchen was basically an explosion of dirt, so it's safe to say it did something.  

It wasn't as if I didn't know it was a scam.  It's just that, how do you look someone in the eye and say, "YOU.  Are an f'ing liar"?  When they're standing in your kitchen?!  Cleaning your counter?

Most people just do it.

But if you're me?

You don't.  You buy cleaning solution.

I keep this cleaning solution under my sink as a constant shameful reminder that I was once a crazy pushover.  If someone can photocopy a label and tape it to an empty Faygo bottle, and you buy it?

You have an effing problem.

I don't use it to clean things.  Because who knows what the crap is in there.  I called the number on the label.  In a surprise plot twist, they didn't know anything about someone selling door to door.  Didn't see that one coming.

But listen.

I'm recovering.  

Every day, I'm closer and closer to telling someone to eff off.

This summer, a guy was riding his bike around selling books, and when he came up to the door, he started talking really fast and dropping names of all the kids in the neighborhood.

I literally shut the door in his face.

Then I called the cops.

Which, in retrospect, may have been an overreaction.  But you can never be too careful of bookpushers.

Also, I hate literacy.

The number 1 key to my recovery has been this: I don't answer the door when solicitors come anymore.

A few months ago, a girl from Clean Water Somethingorother knocked on my door.  She had a quaint, down-homey Minnesotan accent that made you want to figure out a way to make her say "a-boot" without being obvious.  It was clear that they'd sent in the professionals.  I looked through the glass and saw her standing there, then ducked back down.

She yelled through the door, "I'm from Clean Water!"

I yelled, "GO AWAY!"

The trick is not to make eye contact.

A Quick Update and a Contest

Clearly I've been home and into the pictures...

A while back, I was telling you about the horror of my 8th Grade Going Away Dance, and recounted for you the nightmarish scenario where I got sunburn blisters a week before the dance.  Here's a pic of that:

Some questions you might be asking yourself upon seeing this picture:

1.  Nice hair.  Was the theme of the dance "Spirit of 1776" and, if so, shouldn't your wig be powdered?

2. Do you have a black eye?  Oh wait, that's a popped sun blister

3.  Did you arrange for the Unabomber to be there, or did he just happen to be walking by?  Are you sure you want to be standing so close to the mailbox?

4.  Is there a reason you chose to make your dress out of curtains from Downton Abbey? ( I DID choose that fabric, too!)

Also this:

On the left side of the pic, you'll notice that there are THREE white dresses, two of which were the exact same dress.  I assure you, the nails came out over that one.

I also mentioned, a while back, about Erin having her senior pictures taken by our neighbor, who posed her beside a duck pond with a tiny boat for no discernible reason.  Here's that picture.

I really enjoy the fact that the boat is angled in such a way that it appears as if it actually IS her hand.  Crazy Boat Hand Winther.  That's what we called her.

Here's the contest: If you come up with the best caption for this photo- possibly from the perspective of that pissed off duck floating by- I?  Will buy you a Kit Kat.

The One About Carnie Rejection

I was 19 in 2000- pre-9/11- which means that crossing the border really wasn't all that difficult, at least between the US and Canada.  To the point that I'm not even sure why the border existed.  Despite this, every year when we went camping for two weeks in Sarnia, we got to the Blue Water Bridge, and my dad became very serious about everyone shutting up and behaving as we were questioned by the border guard.  These border guards were no joke, asking such hard-hitting questions as "Where are you from?" and "Where are you going?", before waving us through, looking bored as hell.

I don't blame my dad though.  If anyone would have thought it would have been hilarious to say something smartass at the border, it would have been me.  But who doesn't love a full car search??

We grew up an hour from the border either way- Port Huron or Detroit- and so when we turned 19 what we did was we went to Canada.  To drink.  Obviously.  And when I say we, I mean people who grew up in that area, not my dad and I.  Although that might have been interesting..
It was June after our first year of college and Jenn was turning 19 and so we said, "Yeah!  We're going to go to Canada!  To drink!"

And we did.  And we felt very badass about it.  A carful of us- drove down to Detroit and took the Detroit-Windsor Tunnel over to Windsor.

WOOHOO!!  WINDSOR PAR-TAYYY!

Something that we had maybe neglected to consider was that it was a Tuesday.

While you all know that there ain't no party like a Windsor party, it turns out that a Windsor party does stop.  On Tuesdays.

We sat in an almost-entirely abandoned bar- five girls.  I cannot speak for the rest of us, but I know that I myself was sipping on the Seasoned Drinker's Drink of Choice, Amaretto Sours.

I am almost entirely sure that the sour mix I consumed for my first two years of college is 100% to blame for the ulcer I carry to this day.

So there we were, living it up in Windsor.

Five of us, pretty much the only customers in the bar.

Someone was rolling silverware in the corner.

This reminds me of a story where my baby brother gets a ticket in Windsor for flipping off a cop, but that is a story for a completely other time.

Anyhow, this is quite obviously a wasted trip right up until someone gets the idea that we should go to Danny's.

I know that you know what Danny's is but, if you're going to pretend like you don't, I will just go ahead and say that Danny's is a male strip club in Windsor.

And I will also go ahead and say that it was NOT my idea.

Let me tell you how I feel about strip clubs.  Like being forced to pretend to love sunsets, strip clubs make me want to cry.  Here's a short explanation about that:

Strip clubs remind me of Valentine's Day in elementary school.  Remember how it was so exciting, and you got to make your Valentine card box and pick out what sorts of Valentines you wanted to give out?  Except that the entire damn thing was ruined by the fact that you HAD to give out Valentines to EVERYONE in your class.  Even the people you didn't feel particularly Valentiney towards, and people whose names you could barely stand to scratch out on the "To" line.

Now, as an adult and a parent, I fully support the All-Or-Nothing Valentine Rule; but at the time it was a kill-joy.  How were you supposed to know if What's-His-Face totally had a crush on you, seeing as he had not choice but to give you a Valentine?

Spoiler Alert, 5th Grade Laura: He didn't.

But strip clubs are the same damn thing.  I cannot fathom why you would ever want someone to display any sort of interest in you/do whatever it is they do for you when you know that they are receiving a paycheck for and paying taxes on said interest.  That's horrifying to me.  And it's not a judgement of the strippers, who probably really need the money, it's a judgement of people who willingly go forward to pay for that fake Valentine.

Is it so, so awful to just want some genuineness??

So we went, the five of us.  To Danny's.

This would be a good place to talk about peer pressure.  But I'll skip it.

I'm sure that this is probably a false memory, but I remember the building being a lot like an abandoned Chinese restaurant.  Again, probably a lie.

What I know for sure is not a lie is that, beyond the five of us that came together, there were roughly 5-8 additional people in the audience.

1.  That's important later.

2.  I am not comfortable being 10% of this particular audience.  You know how when you go somewhere and there aren't a lot of people, you feel like you need to cheer twice as loud to make up for the lack of an audience?  Yeah.  I wasn't going to do that.

Knowing that we were all friends, I think it would have been interesting for you to see the different reactions to said establishment.  A few of us were pretty into it.  Like, dollar-waving into it.  And then at least two of us- that would be Sara and me in this particular scenario- spent about five minutes in the middle of that hot mess and then waited out the rest of the show in the lobby, leaving the remaining 80% to hold down the fort.  On top of the above objections to strip clubs, I have to tell you- this one was repulsive.  The damn mirrors were dirty.  All I'm saying is, the standards in a strip club aren't that high to begin with- don't you think you could clean the mirrors?

I also think this was a really depressing thing to do at 19.  At 19, you're still trying to figure out exactly what adult love/relationships/whatever look like.   So everything you take in is, consciously or not, asking the question, "is THIS what it looks like?"

Is it like Jennifer Gray in Dirty Dancing?

Is it your mom watching Law and Order while your dad sleeps in the recliner??

And then you walk in to Danny's and you're like.. oh, holy crap- don't let it be this...

So Sar and I waited it out in the lobby, and when everyone was ready to go, we got back in our car and headed back for the States.  At this point, though, something was wrong with my eye.  I couldn't tell you the point that it started, but all the sudden my right eye was watering like CRAZY.  I couldn't get it to stop, and so I rode home in the backseat the entire way with my hand covering my right eye, and my cheek completely soaked from the watering.  Do you ever have snapshot memories of your life?  I have a snapshot memory of that night, riding in the back right hand passengers side seat at 2am, watching the street lights go by, with my eye in horrible pain.

The next morning, it was just as bad, except now I could see that it was incredibly sensitive to light as well.  I tried to wait it out.  It didn't work.  So I called Sara.  She came and picked me up and we went and had lunch at Wendy's, and I wore a pair of the sunglasses the entire time and probably looked like Sara's crazy hungover sister whom she was attempting to talk into rehab over a Frosty.  Then Sara took me to the urgent care center, because I couldn't drive myself.

I would pay approximately 1 trillion dollars to have a picture of both myself and of Sara's reaction when I walked out of the urgent care office and into the waiting room.  Here's what I looked like: I had a massive patch over my eye.  Not like a pirate patch.  A huge wad of white gauze taped over my eye.

I said: "Yargh!" (true)

Sara's eyes got REAL big.

And then we both lost it.

What had happened was I scratched my cornea somehow.  I think it probably had to do with the nasty images of disgusting men being burned onto my retinas and my body rejecting that horrible image.  Whatever.  I was wearing a damn eyepatch, and I had to wear it for several days.

So naturally, all of my friends came over to see it.  We spent a few days- Sara, Jenn and I- lying around my living room talking.  Except, the patch and my eyelid weren't enough to keep the sun out, so I had to lie around with various pieces of cloth- blankets, clothing- draped over my face to keep it from burning.  So, in summary, I laid around my living room talking to my friends with a blanket over my face for a few days.  At one point, we decided to get ice cream, and I decided to ride along even though I obviously wasn't going in anywhere.  Danny came, too.  So the three of them- Sara, Jenn, and my brother- went into Ice Cream Junction.  My two closest friends- with my younger brother, who would have been 15 at that point.  I stayed in the car.  With a sweatshirt draped over my head.

Everyone in Davison knows everyone, and so they all knew that this particular arrangement of people was super weird.  One girl turned to Sara and said, "...do you guys usually hang out with Laura's little brother?"

Then they said, "Oh, Laura's out in the car."

While I can obviously never know this to be the truth, I can only imagine that she looked out of the windows of Ice Cream Junction and saw me sitting in the front seat of Sara's car with a sweatshirt over my face.

So that's normal.

A few days later I was either feeling better or couldn't stand my family's pirate jokes anymore, so I took off the patch.  But we were far from returning to contacts.

Also, I looked like hell.

Huge, swollen eye.

Glasses that were so old they were no longer my prescription, because I NEVER wore (wear) glasses.

And Sara said, "Let's go to the carnival!"

And I said.. okay?

I still don't get that.

1.  The carnival is not somewhere I want to be when I'm feeling my best

2.  Why in the world would we go to the carnival?

But we did.  We went to the carnival.  I can still see the exact outfit I was wearing

Me= wearing a huge neon-orange shirt that belonged to my much-larger-than-me boyfriend, swolley-face and glasses

Sara.  I don't know what Sara was wearing, but Sara always looks cute.

We walked around the carnival for a while.

Truthfully, I don't remember what we did.  It's all overshadowed by what is to come.  Probably we rode a ride and saw some creepiness.  The usual.

And then there were these two guys, and Sara kept saying, "Why do I know those two guys?"

"Huh," I said "no idea."

"Let's go talk to them and find out", she said.

Me: "Okay"

But before we got there, she figured it out.  Remember those five horrifying minutes we spent in the nast-o strip club room a few nights back?  Oh yeah, she recognized them from there.  They weren't strippers... they were there with their girlfriends?

That conversation went something like this:

Sara: "Hey, did I see you guys at a strip club in Windsor a few nights ago?"

Them:  Uhh....

Long story short, it WAS them.  They went to great lengths to explain exactly what they were doing in a Canadian male strip club.  And they weren't FROM Davison (where the fair was at), they were there because.. they were pseudo-carnies.  Their job was to travel from carnival to carnival in Michigan, filling up the moonwalks.  Which, it turns out, is a thing.

Perhaps you're thinking, "Well, that's not an OFFICIAL carnie...", but what I'm telling you is that you can take the moonwalk filler out of the carnival, but you can't take the carnival out of the moonwalk filler.

CARNIES.

One of the pseudo-carnies was REAL into Sara.

He said (to her), "Hey, do you, uh, want to go get something to eat or something?"

And she said... yes?

That's all fine and good except that:

1. I'm clearly not sending my best friend off with a strip club-going carnie

2.  There were two of them

You know how this goes.  There are two of them.  There are two of us.

Honestly, I'm not usually too down on myself.  I mean, I make FUN of myself, but mostly because I'm beyond that stage where I feel like I'm the Phantom of the Opera.

But on this Carnie Love occasion- swolley eye, big glasses, huge shirt- even I have to admit that I'm nothing to write home about.

We went to Archie's, which was the one and only 24 hour restaurant in town, and therefore the only thing open after 9pm.  We sat at a table and talked about carnie things.  I would tell you about it, except that Carnies are a lot like the Free Masons in terms of secrecy, and we've all read The DaVinci Code.

It was solid awkwardness.

You know that I'm a social weirdo to begin with, but I look like a crazy-face AND I'm out eating with carnies.

I ate cottage cheese.

I don't remember what Sara ate, but let me tell you what happened when her bill came.  Carnie Boy was totally into her, and apparently filling moonwalks gives you at least a little disposable cash.  When the waitress brought the checks, he reached his carnie arms across the table and said "I got this".

She also brought my check, but I guess the other carnie boy didn't make as much?  Maybe he was like a carnie apprentice or something?  I'm sure that was it.  I'm sure he was just saving his money for college, and that it had nothing to do with me.  Because no move was made to pay my bill.  It stayed there.  A grease spot grew from the size of a penny to that of a silver dollar while we wrapped up our carn-versation.

It's not that I can't pay for my own cottage cheese.  And it's not that I was into whoever #2 was.  It's that, here I am, mere days after getting rid of an eye patch, and I'm getting rejected by a carnie.

But I think that the real story here, 10 years later, is- wait... didn't those carnies have girlfriends!?

Exactly.

And when you put it that way, the whole perspective shifts.

I'm not going to be your carnie roadie girlfriend, carnie boy!

I'll buy my own damn cottage cheese.

My integrity is boundless.