This is How It Was in The Jungle

1988

No streetlights.

A dirt road.

Packed like sardines in a Dodge Caravan.

We’re on our final stretch towards our family’s summer getaway. It’s a trailer park but no one calls it that any more. Prescott’s Trailer Park has become just “Prescott’s” or “The Park.” But in 1988, we’re on our way to the trailer. My father is driving. It is late. The youngest of his children are asleep but the oldest three are awake listening to his story. It is brief. It is just a list of instruction. He slows down the car. We can feel the tires ride the pockmarked road. The sound of pebbles crunching under our weight becomes background noise. He rolls down his window and turns off the air conditioner and the radio. He says listen. And we do. He tells us to listen to the sounds of the outside. The wind he says. The leaves he says. The animals he says. We try to hear it all. He tells us to look through the dense woods. He tells us to looks up at the stars. We try. And then he turns off the headlights. The tires still surf the dirt road like a surfboard on a choppy wave – dropping in and out of craters. Our torsos bob sideways as our hips steady our pelvises. I imagine this is what horseback riding feels like. He does not push on the brakes. Our eyes adjust to the dark. We put our noses against the windows of the caravan, those windows that don’t roll down. We can see the outline of trees. We point at the shadows of trees against the night sky. He tells us to look straight ahead. In front of the moving car. Where he is looking. We can’t see anything. My mom says, please be careful Freddie. Yep he says. Imagine being in the jungle like this he tells us. Imagine the silence. Listen. Can you hear an animal stepping on branches? The crackle? Do you know how many animals are watching us drive down this road? They know we are here. You just can’t see them. But imagine if they lit a cigarette, he says. Way out there in front of us if someone lit a cigarette a mile away. You’d be able to see it. You might not be able to see your hand if you held it in front of your own face, he says, but if you lit a cigarette an animal could see you from a mile away. We wonder about animals and cigarettes and if smoking cigarettes provokes animals to attack. This is how it was in the jungle he tells us. This is how quiet it was. How dark it was. How hot it was. None of us breathe for several seconds. Well, he says, it was hotter than this. He doesn’t tell us that there were human beings in the jungle darkness - other people who were waiting. In New Hampshire, on this summer night, it is only about the animals. Freddie, turn the lights back on, my mom says. And he does. We all sit quietly and stare out into the beam of the headlights. We begin to see what he sees.

Reverse

My brother picked me up from Logan Airport in my parents' Nissan Pathfinder. While we were in the passing lane on 93, the car seemed to exhale and the sports announcer on WEEI went silent.

Before I uttered a word, my brother shifted the car into Neutral and re-started the car.

I was horrified. "What just happened?!"

He started laughing so hard that his eyes sparkled with tears. "Welcome, home."

Ten minutes later we are approaching my parents' driveway on Elm Street (a busy throughway in our town). We are about ten houses away when Tommy pulls into the lane of oncoming traffic and puts the hazards on.

"What the hell is happening right now?"

He laughs again, this time telling me not to worry about it and shifts his posture in the driver's seat to crane his neck in all directions - taking precautions to make this illegal move somewhat "safe". We are going slightly uphill and I see a car coming towards us. Tommy takes his foot off the gas pedal as we pass the driveway, throws the car into neutral and we sit there - his hands loose on the steering wheel, mine gripping the rubbery door handle and dashboard.

"TOMMY!"

"Relax. We're all set. I've done it a million times."

And just as I think we're going to have a head-on collision with the oncoming car, we start drifting backwards. In increments Tommy turns the wheel to the right and we make our way ass-first into our parents' driveway.

 My brother looks over at me and winks, "there is no Reverse." 

"What is their issue with fixing cars?"

"One car at a time, Erin. One car at a time."

Butter on His Shoes

I begged my mom to make another cake. It was the day after my little sister’s birthday and I had a brilliant revelation: every night should be cake night. So my master plan was to persuade my mom to let me help her make a chocolate cake. It was Friday night, after all. This meant “TV night”: The Twilight Zone and Dallas were typically on the agenda. It was quite clear to me that Duncan Hines chocolate cake was the perfect accompaniment.

At six years old, the kitchen counter remained an obstacle that was out of reach so I used the standby dining chair to prop myself up to my mom’s height. She rolled up my pajama sleeves and let me pour the heaping cup of water into the bowl of mix. She walked to the fridge and carried over three eggs in one hand – something I would attempt later that year and fail miserably – and a gallon of milk in the other.

“Oooooo! Can I break the eggs?”

“Erin, I don’t know. We don’t want the shells in the cake.”

“I know. I can do it. Please!!”

She reached into the drying rack and grabbed a clean bowl and cleared the counter in front of my chair. Setting two of the three eggs gently on the counter, out of reach of my arm’s length, she prepared for the worst. “Ok. Let’s try it. We’ll see how the first one goes.”

She stood behind me with her arms around my torso, her fingers wrapped around mine guiding the egg to the edge of the bowl, striking it against the glass and then slowly separating the two halves over the center of the brown mix. Her fingers pried mine apart and a perfect yolk slipped out with the white goo. I smiled over the bowl, like looking into a crystal ball and then turned to her, “Ok. Another!” And we repeated the process twice again.

In the adjacent living room, my dad was laying on the couch with Kirsten cuddled up by his chest and Tommy sipping on a bottle down by his feet. The television was getting louder, the background noise polluting our composed cooking lesson in the kitchen.

“Daddy, we are trying to bake a cake!” It seemed completely reasonable to me at the time, as it does still, that concentration is a challenge when the television is chattering in my ear.

“Erin, I think you should come see this. Priscilla, come here. This is that moonwalk thing!” My dad called to us from the living room and the atypical urgency in his voice convinced us that the trip to the next room was worthwhile. As I approached the scene, I saw my brother and sister rocking their torsos side to side. With a deranged kind of smile on his face, my brother’s teeth gripped his bottle and the milk sloshed around inside as he jiggled to the music.

“Erin, don’t eat that, you’ll get sick.” My mom walked behind me watching me lick the chocolate from my fingers. I stopped.

Standing between my horizontal dad and my vertical mom, I planted my two feet, pulled my fingers out of my mouth and held them in the air in mid-gesticulation. I recognized the music from the album that my parents recently bought me. It was Michael Jackson on the screen. He had a sparkly diamond glove on his left hand and wore matching socks. I looked from his hand to my hand, amazed that we were holding our hands in the exact same position. My eyes locked onto the figure gliding back and forth on the screen, not distracted by the snapping of my mom’s fingers next to me as she kept the beat.

“Do you think you can get onto your toes like that?” My dad asked me. “How does he do that?”

“I don’t know.”

“How can he just glide across the floor? He must have butter on his shoes.”

And then Michael Jackson moonwalked across the stage, across the screen, across my family’s heart.

Go Along to Get Along

I am sitting here quiet, reflective wondering why I feel unsettled. Perhaps it is the Facebook banter, the celebrity Tweets, the superficial distractions and the heavy political debates. I do not relish in conflict and expend what some might consider too much energy trying to avoid it. I may even consider it too much energy. I like when things run smoothly. I am, as my dad is known to describe me, a “go along to get along” type of gal. My dad also identifies his character under this category. But you know, Going Along to Get Along, takes a lot of hard work.

First, as a kid, I observed everything before I committed to verbal communication. I learned what was acceptable and what was forbidden by the way people interacted. Sugar cereal was not acceptable to my mom. When I was little, she worked in Downtown Boston at an insurance company on State Street (“the building with the blue door” I would say to my dad when he quizzed me about where she worked). My dad stayed home with my sister and me and we would eat an entire box of Sugar Pops in our underwear (me) and diaper (sister), standing on the kitchen chairs. Once we had a bowl or two, we would get into our oversized playpen and my dad would let us wear his oversized headphones and we would listen to Motown on the stereo. The pictures to prove it are fascinating. Kirsten was bald until she was three years old, meanwhile I came into this world wearing a shaggy brunette mop on the top of my head and by the time of playpen-palooza my hair was past my shoulder blades. We are only a year and half apart but if hair was any indication of our ages, it would appear that there were several years separating us. The Sugar Pops and Motown were a regular weekday combination (and now that I think about it, could reveal my passion for dancing: Motown on a sugar high) and it was a secret between me, my sister and my dad. Weekends were not nearly as raucous. Sometimes my mom let us have fluffernutter sandwiches, but that was pretty much the extent of sugary snacks. So, weekdays and weekends were structured quite differently and I understood that that was just how things were. I also was aware that my parents were totally happy with us regardless of the day or activity. And so my “go along to get along” attitude commenced. If they are happy, I am happy. Early on, I recognized their differences in parenting (sugar v. no sugar) but relished in my special understanding of each one.

Discovering that a thought can commit itself to verbal communication and be considered socializing was a revelation to me. I was in the backseat of a station wagon during a carpool ride from Boston Ballet to various North Shore towns where all of us little bunheads were dropped off in the driveways of our suburban homes. I happened to be the last girl dropped off this particular day. And being the last one was always stressful: it demanded that I interact with the other mom and her daughter in a more proactive, intimate way. When the car had two other girls in it, I could just stare out the window and not socialize (which is my tendency, a strong introversion bias). So, I got nervous. And it was during this five minute ride with mother and daughter that I had a revelation which has stuck with me through my life. In all honesty, I do not remember what she said. But that is not important. It is that whatever it is she did say, I had already thought it for months. It was some typical nine year old bullshit discovery – like “Can you always see the sun and the moon in the sky at the same time?” It was something inconsequential, or at least it seemed so, until I realized that she had started a conversation. The three of us started having a conversation because this girl did not just keep the thought in her head. It was amazing to me. Extroversion suddenly made sense which allowed me to understand some people in my life much better: my mom, being number one.

In a household of seven people, six of us were introverts. When my mom ever stated the obvious, which is sometimes what extroverts do (often used as a communication strategy), we would get frustrated and say things like, “are you serious?” or “no kidding.” We would take it at face value instead of recognizing her comment as a desire to communicate with us. The Clan of Introverts communicated telepathically. Magically. This socializing, this talking was overrated. But I began to understand her needs and felt compelled to bridge the gap. I had a conscious thought: I may be an introvert, but I understand these silly extroverts. I can translate. I can smooth things out. Things will run better with me as the representative for The Clan of Introverts.

The Clan of Introverts were not interested in representation, however. My efforts were solitary on the home front and in many ways have remained solitary. Diplomacy, tolerance and understanding are pillars of our familial structure but the one thing I lack, which everyone else seems to have embraced, is a strong dosage of stubbornness. A lack of stubbornness mixed with a heavy sense of guilt makes for a rather dysfunctional combination internally. Externally, however, the combo projects a “Go Along to Get Along” easy-going attitude.

So, I have hosted some political banter on my Facebook page and I am participating in it on others’ pages. Friends and family who have never met are debating the John Edwards Tragedy, the State of the Union address, the ridiculous Chris Matthews statement and I am coming to terms with minor conflict. I desperately try to channel the general consensus that I am Going Along to Get Along and not let the conflict-averting introvert get in the way of healthy (or unhealthy) debate.

Baptism

My dad just told me that when he was born his parents named him Gerard. He left the hospital as Gerard, spent the first month of his life as Gerard and then was brought by his father and uncle to his Catholic baptism. My father's name is Fred.

“Do women go to baptisms now?” He asks me as though he has not been to five of his children’s baptisms.

Well, four of his children’s baptisms. He missed my youngest brother’s baptism due to a work conflict. He was scheduled to meet us at the church after his shift at the Boston Police Department. During the pre-ceremonial hubbub inside St. Patrick Church, my mom asked me to run outside to see if he was here yet. I went to the main doors of the church and stood at the top of the long string of concrete stairs and scanned Central Street. There was his car. And he was sitting in the driver’s seat. I saw him lean over the middle console to roll down the passenger-side window and wave me over with his right arm. He has never been one for honking the horn to get someone’s attention, unlike my mother who would do sets of beeping push-ups as she beckoned us out of the house on school day mornings. I let go of the church door and place my hand on the iron banister for assurance as I skitter down the steps. I run to the car prepared to relay my mom’s message verbatim. I stand at the passenger side window, looking down at my dad as he bends toward me. He lowers his aviator sunglasses down his nose and I see it. I ask him what happened and he tells me that he was called to a house where a husband and wife were fighting and the husband clocked him in the face. I can barely see my dad’s left eye, it seems that all the skin from his cheek to his hairline is puffy and purple with little splotches of red. He smiles at me. He says he is fine. He tells me to tell Mommy that he will just meet us at the party at home, that he can’t go into church like that. I say ok and turn around to ascend the stairs back into the church. He watches me go back in. I tell my mom that a husband punched Daddy in the eye when he tried to help the wife. She looks at me, hands me my baby brother and walks down the church aisle to get the story for herself. A few minutes later she returns and the baptism goes on without my father. At the post-christening party I overhear all the adults talking about right hooks and Roxbury.

“Um, yes, women go to Baptisms.”

“Oh, ok, well they didn’t before. So, anyway, my father and uncle took me to the church as Gerard and I came back to the house as Fredrick.”

“Why?”

“At the church they decided it was a better name: it was their father’s name.”

“What did Nani think about that?”

“Oh she didn’t care. She thought it was a good name. I mean she had to think that, right? I mean it was Mad Men time. You know what I am sayin’?” And I do know what he means. I have finished the third season of Mad Men and he has just started watching Season One. “So, I went from Gerard to Fredrick. How’s that?”

“That is unbelievable,” I say. But it’s not unbelievable. Actually, it’s so totally, perfectly believable that it dawns on me: my blog needs a baptism of sorts.

The Movie Mogul

Chris and I went to a Saturday matinee of “The Dark Knight” last weekend. My favorite super-hero is Batman and I had been looking forward to it for quite awhile. Opening night was July 18th and I really wanted to part of the NYC audience for several reasons: I have a crush on Christian Bale, I was intrigued to see Heath Ledger’s ‘oscar-worthy’ performance as the Joker, and it was as hot as all get out in New York.

I really need to take a moment to emphasize the heat factor in New York City for the past week. If I am standing for more than 30 minutes, my legs start to swell. I woke up on Saturday with a heat rash on my right arm stretching from my wrist to my elbow. Chris and I both had middle-of-the-night hemorrhoid visits to the bathroom. The streets of New York smell like a dumpster, the rats are moving slower than their normal scurrying pace. The teeny tiny ants, who are the bane of my existence, are all over my kitchen and clearly confused about the humidity: “It’s going to rain, let’s get inside. Wait, wait, it’s not raining – everybody back out. Hold on, everybody back in. Let’s just camp in here until there is rain.” Fine with me, they gather naively around my patches of boric acid. I’m a terrible person who can’t think straight in this heat. Supposedly, it’s going to thunderstorm tonight. I have little faith that it will change a thing. It’s the "Dog Days of Summer"…which reminds me that this week Stephen King (via The Stand) taught me that the Dog Day time period ranges ranges from July 18-Aug 28 when dogs are more rabid than during any other time of year. I don’t know why that resonated so deeply, perhaps we behave like rabid dogs in New York during this time.

I digress.

After treating my rash, we made our way to Chelsea to park ourselves in frigid theater with a bucket of popcorn and a 2000 calorie Coke (always with two straws – note to self: is there a blog entry there? 9 years/2 straws…do my parents share a straw? Fascinating…need to poll). The movie rocked. This blog entry is not a film review, so let me skip to 2 ½ hours later. Chris and I stand up from our seats and make our way out of the auditorium and upstairs to the bathrooms. While on the escalator, we share some of our thoughts:

Chris:“So, was it all you had hoped?”

Erin: (nodding) “Awesome. Best movie I have seen in awhile.”

Chris: “After the last Batman, you said you felt like flying around taking care of business in Gotham. Do you feel like that now?”

Erin: (shrugging) “Little bit.”

Chris: “Yep, I thought it was ok.” (looking at Erin's crinkled up face, a confused and disappointed response) “Kidding. It was really good.”

Erin: “It was such a great cast. I mean, everyone is just talking about Heath Ledger, but that is really a fantastic cast. I think Christian Bale is a fabulous Batman and I find it really interesting that…”


***pause as Chris and Erin go their separate ways to the bathrooms***

5 minutes later

***descending the escalator and walking out onto 23rd street***

Chris: “OK. So, what were you saying?”

Erin: “Well, its just kind of ironic…I don’t know, I mean life imitating art or whatever, but I was watching some footage from the premiere – when the actors were walking the red carpet and giving interviews. And, all the reporters would ask Christian Bale things like, ‘So, what about Heath’ and he would say something to the effect of, ‘yeah, he was an incredible actor’. And it just reminds me of their Batman and Joker characters in the movie. You know, Batman doesn’t get much of the glory and the Joker gets all the attention.’

Chris: “Hmm. Yeah, I see what you’re saying.”

Erin: (takes a deep breath, recognizing his response as a Chrisism indicating that he’s not so into the topic of discussion) “I would have loved to see him in more movies…he has played such different roles.”

Chris: “He was the dude in Gayback Mountain, right? What else has he been in?”

Erin: “His first big one was The Patriot with Mel Gibson. And he was in a lot of other period movies – as a knight, etc.”

Chris: “Yeah, I haven’t seen any of them. But I guess that’s a testament to his work: that he is in movies that I won’t ever see and then he is the Joker. He was pretty awesome.”

Erin: “I wonder what his daughter is aware of – I mean, she’s too young to see the movie now, but I am sure she must see some of the posters and stuff. That must be kind of haunting.”

Chris: “Well, I mean how old is she? 3? She’s old enough to separate life from movies, right?”

Erin: “I guess..but, I still think it’s got to be traumatic for her on some level.”

Chris: “I guess.” (he doesn’t really, but wants to veer the conversation a bit) “So, what city do you think Gotham is supposed to be?”

Erin: (looking at him like he’s placing his finger into an electrical outlet) “Ummm.” Long pause “New York. Are you serious?”

Chris: “Well, I don’t know. Why do you think it’s New York.”

Erin: “Well, you see all the references: the same orange Staten Island Ferry is digitally enhanced to read Gotham City Ferry. And, it’s just something everyone knows.”

Chris: “What do you mean?”

Erin: “Lots of New York guide books refer to it as Gotham.”

Chris: “Hunh. Spiderman, Batman, Superman – they are all in New York.’

Erin: “Yep.” (intrigued by her boyfriend’s ceaselessly fluctuating IQ) “So, what do you think will happen to the Joker?”

Chris: “What do you mean? He didn’t die. He’ll be back.”

Erin: “Yes, I know. Who will play him?”

Chris: “What do you mean? That actor will.”

Erin: “You mean they filmed two sequels during filming?”

Chris: “No.”

Erin: “Then I’m confused.”

Chris: “Why?”

***30 second pause as Erin realizes that Chris’s social IQ may live in the basement permanently***

Erin: “Chris, you do realize that actor is dead.”

Chris: “No shit. OH! Is that the dude who O.D.-ed?”

Erin: “…”

Chris: (looking at Erin and beginning to laugh) “What?!”

Erin: “What do you think I have been talking about for the past 20 minutes – the red carpet, his talent, his daughter? Why do you think all the shows were sold out in New York for the past week? Why do you think the news is covering all this Heath Ledger Academy Award buzz?”

Chris: (cracking himself up) “Well, I think it was sold out because it was Batman not because what’s-his-face was in it.”

Erin: “Ok.”

Chris: (cracking himself up more) “It’s funny that I’m in the movie business and I am just figuring this out.”

Erin: “Not really. But, it’s a blog entry for shoa.”

Initiation

The maintenance man at my gym calls me “kiddo” and “buddy”: “Hey kiddo, how’s it going?”, “Hiya, buddy.” I know that sometimes I am paranoid that people think that I am 15 years old, but clearly he does not think I am 31. He reminds me of my dad, who still calls his 40 year old co-workers “kids”. So maybe the maintenance guy actually knows that I am 31 but is sympathetic to the fact that he is 20 years older. Or maybe, and here’s where my paranoia settles in, maybe he feels bad for me because he sees me at the gym every day: in the middle of the day. I imagine he wonders if I am lonely and unemployed and have an unhealthy self-perception of my body since I am at the gym so much more often than the 9-5ers. When I see him now, I can hear his thoughts: “Here comes the compulsive one. She doesn’t really need to lose weight. But she’s trying so hard. She’s been here for three years and hasn’t lost a pound. Actually, the winter hasn’t treated her well.” Little does he know that he should feel bad because his pre-occupation with my lifestyle has interfered with his ability to satisfactorily perform his maintenance work at the gym. Well, it may not be solely his job but work with me...

His gym attacked my leg with fungus.

About 3 weeks ago, I noticed a rash on my inner left thigh. Thinking it was excema, or some sort of allergic reaction, I applied hydrocortisone cream hoping it would clear up. After a few days, it didn’t change. It was incredibly itchy and took up an area about the size of my palm. I showed it to Chris and his mouth watered as he said, “I think you have poison ivy.” Chris is extremely allergic to poison ivy and was slightly disgusted with me. I tried convincing him that I had been nowhere near a climate that harbored plant life in March. He was skeptical. He pointed at the bumps without touching me (“now, don’t move, I don’t want to touch it”) and shook his head with disappointment.

A few days later, I happened to have my annual OB/GYN exam and decided that I could just ask her about the rash instead of making a separate appointment with my primary care doctor. It was itchy, it was mysterious, and I was far more interested in getting it checked out than my reproductive organs. Sitting in the pre-exam one-on-one consultation with the doctor, the OB/GYN asked me if “there was anything else” and I told her about this “weird rash thing on my leg”. So she said would take a look when she performed her exam.

She left the room and I changed into the paper outfit (“front open”). When she returned, she invited me to place my heels up into the stirrups. Then, with her head between my legs, she looked at my left leg and I could feel her hands applying pressure to my skin. She made a couple incoherent sounds and then turned on the light, at which point she said:

“OH! I know what this is. You have pets.”

At that moment I panicked and tried to respond calmly, “Um, nope. No pets.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“Hmmmm. Well, it’s fungus.”

I sighed, groaned , rolled my eyes and she gently reprimanded me by saying, “oh, there is no reason to be upset. We live in New York City. We share the same germs. We live all over each other.”

I had a surge of conflicting thoughts:

1. So, now I am officially a New Yorker because I have a mysterious fungus growing on my leg? Is this like an initiation to a collegiate sportsteam? I would rather have a party thrown in my honor now that I was a true New Yorker.

2. Well, it’s not meningitis. But, it sounds like that will come in my next stage of being a New Yorker. And I shouldn’t panic.

3. Bird Flu. It’s a just a matter of time. I need to store up on dry goods and an escape route from this island.

But the overwhelming question mark floating through my brain was: “Where did I get this?” I always wear pants at the gym, so her suggestion that I got it on the bike didn’t really make sense. She was perplexed as well. I asked her if I could have gotten it from a toilet at the gym and she said, “No, that’s not likely.” She patted my right leg and said, “I’m surprised you don’t have it on this leg.” She was not concerned about the origin of the fungus, but I was obsessed with it.

By that night, I was sitting on the couch grimacing from the sting of the prescription cream as I chased my prescription steroid with a tall glass of water.

So maintenance man gave me fungus.

Unless it was homeless man.

Recently Chris and I were riding on our subway line (the F train) from Manhattan to Brooklyn. It was a packed train, standing room only at 9pm on a Thursday. We were standing toward the back of our car and could see into the subway car behind us. Our view was priceless: a homeless man, taking up five seats with his body (torso on two, legs outstretched on three). He had the zipper to the crotch of his pants undone and had his right hand conveniently placed inside the opening. One of his laceless combat boots was about three feet from the seats, in the middle of the aisle, and ten minutes later, the other fell off and landed close by. At each subway stop between 14^th Street and 7^th Avenue, approximately eight people would jump out his subway car and leap into ours. No wonder there was standing room only. By the time we reached the first stop in Brooklyn, the folks in our car were asking me and Chris (the people with a view through the back window) for a play-by-play:

“Oh, ok. Now, he’s switching hands. No….wait. Both hands. Both hands are down the pants!”

“Man! It stunk so bad in there. Still one shoe off?

“No, both shoes on floor.”

“Wow, I can’t imagine how those people are still standing in there.”

A transplant passenger from that car was standing near us and I could see him pursing his lips, squinting his eyes, scraping his tongue with his teeth, stretching out kinks in his neck by rolling his head around. It was like he had been attacked by a skunk.

So, here I am three weeks later wondering how I caught that homeless man’s fungus. Evidently, I shouldn’t worry about it though.

We live all over each other.