The Chronicles of Marge

For Biggi

Jason and I recently spent a week in Hamburg, Germany, visiting his family. Because I have a two-night limit with my own family, I thought a week with relatives I've met only once or never at all might be pushing it. In addition, if you're going to have to suffer through an Away-Toilet Situation, best not to have to share that Away Toilet with four other people. So Jason and I rented an apartment from airbnb to guarantee a place of refuge for our souls (and our bowels). It turned out to be a great studio space in a renovated factory building close to Jason's Oma's apartment. We rented it from a woman named Biggi. She wrote the following review of us:

"Here in my Hamburg factory apartment I got to know a very friendly and reliable young man with his cute girl. I was very pleased about the lovely message they left, even a few sweets. :) So tidy and clean was my apartment after that week, even the fridge was still full - I can only recommend those lovely people, always welcome again!"

Dear Biggi: VIELEN DANK! You have figured out a way to make sure that we will rent from you—and only you—the next time we come to Hamburg. And I'm not referring to the part about us being clean—we already knew that. Rather, there comes a time in every woman's life when she realizes that middle age is right around the corner, and when she rounds that corner, her ass will migrate three inches south and the skin around her jawline will  head in that direction too, and no one will reference her appearance ever again. So I'll take "cute girl" for as long as I can. (And Jason will just have to be satisfied with "reliable.")

Public Service Announcement From Marge: Look Into Your Kidneys

So I totally dropped off the Face of the Internet for a while there. Herein I shall attempt to get back on it with the following explanation of what derailed the month of January. Actually, the reason is two-fold.

(1) I participated in a church musical production of Amahl and the Night Visitors. When they asked for volunteers for members of the chorus, I held out as long as possible, but the guilt that comes from being one of only a few altos eventually caught up to me, and so there I was, in shepherd garb on a stage in front of a church full of people. Jason said I managed one look the entire performance: The Look of Fear. Although the production was quite impressive, my feelings on the subject are thus: NEVER THE HELL AGAIN. I was not meant for the stage. Or memorizing music. Or being able to control how much I sweat.

(2) I got a kidney infection. So let me provide you all with a helpful Public Service Announcement: the next time you run a high fever for a few days and experience pain radiating from your lower back, look into your kidneys. I thought I just had the flu after 3 days of a high fever and feeling like shit. But I couldn’t sleep because I had what I assumed was a pulled muscle in my back that didn’t allow any position of comfort, and I was convinced that every time I rolled over, I was damaging my back and I would end up with chronic back pain just like Elizabeth Taylor (minus the diamonds, multiple husbands, and friendship with Michael Jackson).

So Sunday morning rolled around and I made Jason take me to urgent care where I begged the doctor for a muscle relaxer, which is something I have never done before but made me feel very much like I was turning into my mother. After the doctor looked me over and made me pee in a cup, he was all, girl, this is not the flu: you have a kidney infection. To which I said, so would this have anything to do with the fact that back in December I went through a period in which I had to urinate all of the time and it kind of burned, you know, down there? And it did.

The doctor then hooked me up with some Cipro, and I was all excited about my road to recovery until I read all 12 pages of the Cipro prescribing information. Side effects of this medication are many, one of which any Nice Southern Girl never has: gas. Or what is a more proper word to use? Wind? Flatulence? Regardless, I am my father's daughter, and my mother, much to her dismay, gave birth to three girls none of whom is qualified to be a Nice Southern Girl based on this criterion. So take the normal and add more to it, and dear God in Heaven, where did all the wind come from? And the burping? It was like my entire chest cavity was full of air. But at the end of the day, the wind was the least of my concerns. Other side effects of this drug included tendinitis, yeast infection, diarrhea, and death. And you can just guess right now which one of those I got because nothing says, “Congratulations, your kidneys are all better,” quite like getting a yeast infection.

Aren't you all glad I decided to write again?

 

Notes from Christmas 2011

You know it’s Christmas when...

• Your husband makes a Jell-O mold in the shape of a fish and everyone is too scared to touch it. Luckily, that shit disappears down the sink when you run hot water over it.
• You are at a party wearing an ugly holiday shirt and the man you are talking to compliments your shirt and then his eyes never leave the shirt and you realize he’s trying to check out your boobs but struggling to find them because you were never blessed with boobs, but the guy keeps looking nonetheless because he’s too drunk to do anything else and he still thinks that Christmas Miracles happen. (They do not—at least not this year.)
• The Christmas Eve dinner at your in-law’s house looks like this: tabbouleh, bean salad, brie, fine European chocolates, German cookies, red wine, and beer.
• The Christmas day dinner with your mother’s family includes the following: baked pineapple casserole with cheddar cheese and Ritz crackers (I know); ham rolled with cream cheese (no, seriously, these still exist); a seven-layer salad that contains both mayonnaise and sour cream (don’t even); a congealed salad that contains nuts, pineapple, and shredded cheddar cheese (I wouldn’t); and a ham salad (just plain wtf? man).
• And nothing really says Merry Christmas like hitting your 5-year-old niece in the face with a Frisbee on the first day of Special Family Time Together With the In-laws. During the ensuing tears and repeated exclamations reminding me of what I had done to her, I finally said, “I know what I did to your face, so don’t tell me again because all you are doing is making me feel bad about myself.” You know, because it is all about me. And for those of you who think I am a heartless, childless bitch: my niece was just fine. In addition, I’ve held a total of three small children over the last week and I didn’t break any of them.

In Search of The Tacky

Tomorrow is the Ugly Holiday Jumper Day at work. After we did this 2 years ago, I returned my ugly jumper to the K-Mart because I felt the $15 I spent on the sweater could go to better use. So when this year rolled around, I was without an ugly jumper but felt confident that the K-Mart would not let me down. Boy, was I wrong. There I was at 7:30 tonight wondering why the hell the merchandise at K-Mart had made such a drastic change as of late because there were no ugly sweaters to be found. So I decided I needed to go into a store in which I had not stepped in 8 years: Wal-Mart. Surely Wal-Mart would have some tacky shit.

Apparently not.

I was getting nervous, and Jason I and were carting around perishable groceries in the car, so I dropped him off at home and headed to one of the worst places in the world during the week before Christmas: The Mall. Y'all, I hit every department store in that joint. And you know when JCPenny doesn't carry a single ugly holiday jumper that there is a problem—a problem called People Apparently Buy This Crazy Shit and Wear it WITHOUT IRONY. In near despair, I stopped in at the Target and ended up crying in the parking lot. When I got home, I busted in the door all anger and noise. Jason, God bless him, had a candle burning and was playing some George Winston in anticipation of my mood. Of course, I yelled at him anyway and then went to the closet and pulled out my sewing machine.

One hour and many nasty things said later, I had put together this piece of work:

It's definitely no jumper, but it is ugly and it may fall apart as tomorrow progresses. I hope I at least get an A for effort. Fredo, our bathroom flamingo, thinks I should.

In Case This Comes in Handy One Day

Jason told me this morning that he dreamt of zombies last night, and I was not surprised. You see, we recently plowed through the first season of The Walking Dead like the end of the world was upon us. And sometimes I wonder if it is. I know, nothing like The Chronicles to add a nice dose of Anti-Optimism to your holiday season. But whatever. I’m thinking that possessing a certain amount of preparedness on the subject of zombies or any other post-apocalyptic event might not be a bad idea. Actually, just consider this a Christmas present from me to you titled “What I’ve Learned From The Walking Dead and What May Come in Handy at the End of Times If You Manage to Survive.”

1. Leave the sheriff’s hat behind. No one cares about any authority you might have had back when the world was populated by 7 billion humans. Also, you will look like a fool.
2. Don’t move toward past civilizations, and for the love of God, don’t go there more than once. Move away from civilization as you once knew it.
3. In the words of the Starks of Winterfell: winter is coming. So maybe think about preparing for what future you hope to have. Find a place with a good water source. Hunker down. Plant a garden. And by all means, start working on that wood pile for winter. You’ll be thankful you did when it’s 30 degrees outside; you’ll also have some really good-looking biceps and abdominal muscles.
4. Finally, listen to the redneck. He’s the only one who knows how to hunt and has any sense on matters of survival; he is also kind of hot if you look at him in a certain light, but heck, I’ve always had a thing for a man who looks like he’s been chopping wood versus one who looks like he deploys hair gel on a regular basis. 

And although I did not marry a redneck, and you may think I’m shit out of luck on point 4, I’ve got the next best thing: a Chatham County boy who grew up in a log cabin that didn’t have any indoor plumbing and who knows how to fell a tree. Also, my father taught be how to haul wood with the best of them, so I think Jason and I will be just fine when the zombies come.

The Via Alpina: Part 5

Thirteen miles in the rain was both sensational and horrible at the same time. Actually, I exaggerate. It was probably only 9 miles in the rain, but we might as well pretend it was the whole way because once you are wet, you are wet.

We started our morning under a cloudy sky. At the top of the first pass, which was less than an hour into our hike, a cool but light rain began falling. This was just in time for us to make it down a bed of scree, but, lucky for us, the path was built with a series of metal footholds, large rock steps, and a metal cable for most of the way down. It sounds tricky, but it was one of the safest and calmest parts of the trail.

Then we hit a stretch that snaked along the grassy slope of the mountain. It was raining but it was quick going, except for some amateur sheep herding on our part, and we were confident that the estimated time of 5 hours and 45 minutes from Prinz-Luitpold Haus to Tannheim, Austria, was accurate.

It was not. Somebody lied.

Nine hours later we rolled into the village looking like two strung out crazy people hell bent on finding a hot shower and a hot meal. And then a bed, a bed in which you decide never to leave because after 13 miles in the rain, you decide you will never go Out There again.

So back to the trail...the easy grassy part ended like it was going out of style, and we encountered a section where the trail just kind of hung to the side of the mountain, and thus we hung onto the trail via several secured areas with cables and handholds. Also known as Tough Slippery Shit in the rain. And then the rain started coming DOWN, at which point Jason decided that he needed to put on his thermal underwear shirt and I was all, Dude, it’s called underwear for a reason. So there he was shirtless in the pouring rain, and I’m trying to help him pull his shirt down because clothes often curl up when they come in contact with wet skin, but then I was firmly reprimanded because my freezing cold hand accidentally touched his back and it pained him to the core. Obviously, I’m never helping with that again.

We continued on but we became very cold, so we started walking quickly. And then I really needed to pee, but there was no flat land and there were no trees. So World, I did something every hiker knows goes against code: I pulled my pants down and peed right there in the middle of the trail. And for a split second I thought about getting out the toilet paper and wiping but then I said screw that because there is nothing worse than wiping yourself with already wet toilet paper. And I won’t speak about that subject any more.

We then got to a section about 30 yards long that was secured by a cable because one side of the trail dropped off steeply. And at that moment in my life, I realized a fear greater than my fear of heights: it was the fear of dying in the freezing cold rain on the side of a mountain. So I went forward without giving a shit about falling to my death, and when I got to the end, Jason said, “You took that like a boss.” And I was all, “On a sunny day, I would have peed in my pants, but today, not a chance.”

Shortly thereafter, we entered a whiteout zone as we descended to the Schrecksee, which roughly translates to “frightening lake” in German.

The lake was only the halfway point of our day, and to add to the frightening nature of this fact, we were then introduced to the true elements of hell: mud—as in slippery, soul-sucking mud. Sometimes we had to go up it, but mostly we ended up sliding down it. It was slow going to say the least.

Finally, we saw something that looked like civilization: Vialpsee, a long lake in the valley way below—and let me stress the way below part. Because the worst part of the trail was to come: the part of the trail where you can see freedom in your future, but you just can’t get to it yet. On this part of the trail, Jason and I had to use our hands to crawl down a rock face while praying to God that our feet would hold as we moved one leg at a time in giant stretches. I think I about blew a hamstring, and it’s possible that I cried then because I was tired and hungry and wet and had been unable to sit down all day and was forced to urinate for the second time on a human foot path. But a hot meal and a warm bed were in my future—you know, just 2 more miles down the road.

Thanksgiving 2011

It is 6:30 a.m. Thanksgiving morning. I write this from the darkness of my living room, which pretty much sums up the way I feel about Thanksgiving this year. My family—the core six of us—had planned to spend the holiday in New Orleans, and for a family whose holiday motto is Same Time Next Year, Y'all, this was a big deal. But then those plans went away at the last minute for reasons I won't explain on the Internet but which can be summed up in the following two words: Family Drama. 

I spent most of the weekend crying, more for the disappointment of not going to New Orleans with my family and less for the drama. Jason and I also tried to come up with a fun family alternative, but no one seemed willing, able, or excited. In a nutshell: I have lost all motivation toward the holiday this year...except toward thoughts about food.

So yesterday, I decided to make a cheesecake, and whatever Jason and I decided to do today would involve that cheesecake. Thus, we ventured to the Whole Foods on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, and Y'all, it was getting real in the Whole Foods parking lot if you know what I mean; in addition, they were out of the special little buggies that I so love, but Jason graciously offered to carry a basket for me instead. 

I needed to buy some graham crakers to make the crust of the cheesecake, and of course the entire selection at the Whole Foods was in excess of $4 a box and I also wasn't sure if any of them would actually taste like a food product, so I went with the cheapest box.

A mistake.

I got home and opened up that package of graham crakers and it was like looking at a box of square cow chips, and then I put one in my mouth it tasted like a cow chip too. I was not sure that butter and brown sugar could remedy the situation, but I was too tired to go back out into the world to buy some cheap and highly processed and preserved graham crakers that didn't taste like shit, so I carried on and made the cheesecake.

While the cake was in the oven, my grandmother called to invite us to her house for Thanksgiving dinner. Secretly, Jason and I had already planned on attending, but we had not told anyone because I felt like maybe the family needed to try something new for the holiday, something called Uncertainty, but obviously no one in my family is capable of dealing with that so they have to preempt any surprise with a phone call. I swear not less than 5 minutes later, my mother called to say that she was not going to my grandmother's house but would be having Thanksgiving at her house and we were invited and that was okay with my grandmother, but of course whatever we deciced to do would be fine with everyone and no feelings would be hurt. And if you are from a Southern family you know what that means: anything you decide will be fine as long as it is what your mother wants.

I went to bed last night not telling anyone where Jason and I would end up today. But trust me, we will arrive at someone's house carrying a pumpkin cheesecake with a cow dung crust, and I will tell folks that my feelings won't be hurt if they don't eat the cheesecake. So of course they will eat it to avoid feeling guilty because that is just how these things work.

Happy Thanksgiving!