under, "Hilarious."

I called the press line at DEA headquarters in Washington DC because...ehh long story. Meth, Chinese plants, gardening.

 And a sweet southern lady answered, on a Sunday afternoon! Who wouldn't talk with me! So I asked her (politely, curiously) how come she was even there.
"We're a 24 hour operation."
"But if you can't talk to me what are you doing there?"
"We're here to assist...certain people." 
"Is it a secret?"
"Yes."
"Government secret?"
"Y...we....could you call back tomorrow?"
"Do you know anything about Ephedra sinica?"
"No."
"Then I guess I'll have to."


If I'm on a government list now, I hope it's under, "Hilarious."

Ephedra. So evil even the DEA won't talk about it.

Troop

I explained who it should be.

"All right. So, I'd nominate Jessica, because she has the most energy."

Jessica is 27, is known to do old high school cheers to warm up when she is cold, has six children and a full time job. She's not taking this on too.

"And there's Autumn!"

Autumn is gracious and nice, but quiet, tends toward the back of the room. And she has a real job, too.

The rest of the women around the picnic bench looked at me.

"Okay. Yes...I do work from home. So I might have more time...but..."
"And you're so creative!" someone urges.
"When I'm being paid to be!" The anxiety in me rises, "Have any of you noticed that after the Pledge of Allegiance I find a spot to curl up on the floor until it's over unless I get bored then I disrupt the meeting making you play games with me? Is this what you want for your children?"

Also, it was my first time bringing the snacks, too, and hardly any of the girls were eating that strawberry yogurt with sprinkles. Must have been a reason they were on sale.

After ten more minutes of talking I said, "I feel like the only thing we've concluded is that we don't know what's we're going to do!"

I was corrected. "No. We concluded you're going to be co-leader next year; you'll get the Daisies while Trina takes the Brownies."

And so it was decided.

Troop 100129 has earned the Golden Honey Bee Patch. There were no survivors. 

"And the second seal was opened, I heard the beast say, Come and see. And lo, it was decided that Therese would be the new Daisy Girl Scout Troop Leader in the Fall, by women who apparently haven't noticed that she is the crankiest, laziest, and most inappropriate mother in the whole troop. And Heck followed behind her."

Impostor

I was trying to stay cool, "no big thing," professional. I was counseled to be this way. After all, editors might read this blog, you don't want to look like an amateur. But my attempts to completely sanitize this blog and keep readers from seeing the big mess I actually am is not going to work.

My latest article, at The Week, has 2.6k Facebook shares so far, my most successful work yet. I count the success of my work in FB shares because it's the only information available to me; the editors seldom tell me how many actual hits the article has gotten. How many people have dropped by and read it. Many of my perfectly lovely pieces have netted no more than 70 shares. But 2600 FB shares indicates tens of thousands of readers, if not hundreds.

I saw on Twitter that the editor of the New Yorker tweeted my article to his followers. For a writer, that's like....arg I can't even think of an analogy. It involves God, tho. And the Gates of Heaven.

I can't be cool anymore. I need to vent the pressure.

This is happening SO FAST. I have been at this (writing for national publications) for THREE MONTHS. In three months I've gotten a regular contributor post at ultra-cool Mental Floss, the front page of Digg, The highest read article on The Week, mentioned in Time (sorta...close enough!) tweeted by celebrities and new aggregates and the editor of The New Yorker, and published a well received piece in The ( mudderfreakin') Atlantic.

The thing is, because it's happened so fast, I'm still Therese of four months ago. Highly medicated, usually sitting still, constantly irritated by life, refusing to do basic housework and watching Netflix. Except now the dreams of my entire life are piecing together. I'm astonished. I'm gobsmacked. I'm dumbfounded. I have Impostor Syndrome.

I don't know what to think or what to do.

I need to ask for a raise, I think. I don't know how to. My mentor is still on his honeymoon.

I'll finish the article on my desktop. It's an easy, fun little thing.

Yes. Good. I'll start there.

Crap I still have to feed my kids, too. I ought not forget them in the flurry.

Right then. Here we go.

phantom limb

My mom tended to make things up. Not lie. Fill in gaps. Pad. Fabricate.

People said more passionate, endearing things in her memory. I was near enough to hear her meet a boy she used to help as a school-aid 20 years ago. She was tired, they only talked a bit, politely. But her recount of meeting him was rich and meaningful, where he thanked her deeply for helping him learn to read. He hadn't said any of that. But he might have been thinking it.

She'd overhear my husband, who is encyclopedic, talking about the harm done the nation by Woodrow Wilson, and remark, "Really? That's funny, he's always been my favorite!"
Everyone in that room knew she had no idea who he was, including her. The irritation, the temptation to turn on her, to spit, "Really mom? Can you tell me one thing he did that makes him your favorite?" was buried by the desire not to hurt such a sweet and guileless woman.

Mom was soft and pliable. She was persuaded by the loudest voice in the room. If that happened to belong to a vacuum salesman trying to sell her a $2000 deep pile cleaner for her house, which was wall to wall hardwood, well. She'd buy the vacuum unless someone stopped her.

She didn't like sad things. Bad things, angst things, troubled things. Me things. I have always been beating back the black dog, and she could not help me at any point in my life. She had no advice for any struggle I brought to her, not related to housework. Just a taut, uncomfortable helplessness. When I went to hospitals for breakdowns she did not visit me. It was too much for her to bear. She said I needed to put all my bad thoughts in my pocket and zip it up. And think of flowers. That's what she did.

And, she didn't stop my father times when she should have. But how could she. If she were strong enough to do that, they likely wouldn't have been together in the first place.

I mention those four things, because they're the only things I can think of that bothered me. It's Mother's Day, and we remember our mothers, the sweet and strong things about them. I'm doing that, just by different route. Except for those traits, my mother was perfect to me. Unshockable, endlessly forgiving, full of excitement and praise, self-sacrificing.  Love. Love in human form. Soft, touchable love. She is a part of me. She's a phantom limb I still want to caress.

She died in my arms a year and a half ago. I had published that story here, but took it down when the blog became linked to my professional name. But I was kidding myself to think I could ever write a widely palatable, appropriate blog. I'll edit the story and put it back someday.

Happy Mother's Day.

Over Rated Disney Movies

Now, I'm not even counting the seventy or so Disney movies you've forgotten ever existed, like Davy Crockett and the River Pirates or Squanto: A Warrior's Tale. I'm also not touching on those dismal live-action debacles that somehow sustained Disney through the 60's and 70's (excluding the masterpieces Escape to Witch Mountain, Freaky Friday, and The Parent Trap, which were genius, perfect, and should never have been remade.) I could go on for pages about how unfulfilling that damn Apple Dumpling Gang or Herbie was. Friday afternoon movies at school were so depressing when it was Herbie related. Almost as bad as those nature movies when African animals stand, sleep, and drink from mud the end.

 No. I'm just focusing on the ones that are "classic!"

Disney's Fantasia
Prepare yourself for sacrilege. This film nearly has the engrossing plot and thrill of an episode of The Lawrence Welk Show, except the colors aren't as hallucinogenic. Kids actually sat through this back in the day? I guess it was more entertaining than milking the family cow, although I don't see how. The only part that sticks is when the brooms keep multiplying and become murderous. And I kind of wish I could forget that.

Mary Poppins
Mary Poppins is good, yes. When it is good. But there are HUGE swaths of the film that are unconscionably boring. What's the deal with the Bird Lady? The good parts will stick with you forever, and the songs, damn they're good. And Julie Andrews is so freakishly beautiful it's hard to look directly at her. But none of that excuses how long we have so spend with all those old geezers at the bank being funny in a way that makes no sense to children and is utter cheese for grown ups.

Sleeping Beauty
I can't really blame them. I mean...how do you sustain a feature length film when the biggest plot point is that the heroine is asleep? The fairies were cute, true dat. But everything else was forest dancing and old men drinking. Bleah.

Bambi
So tell me. Here are five things that happened in Bambi. Bambi, one the oldest, most beloved of all Disney films. Bambi's mother is shot, Thumper and Flower say one diabetic line each ("if ya can't say nuthin' nice"...and..."you can call me Flower, if ya want to"), some fire, and Bambi's dad is an important buck or something. Now..what else happened in Bambi? Can you remember ANY other scenes? Well there is a lot of frolicking. That's it. I hate frolicking.

Not Disney I know...Disney keeps disappearing. This is close enough.

The Sword in the Stone/The Black Cauldron
I'm not sure these count as overrated because I don't hear much clamoring  for them. But they're on the list because I cannot distinguish between the two. I have pictures of Dark Ages skinny boys and kooky wizards and castles and I have no idea what belongs where. I do remember both were really boring.

BRAAGGGGG!!!!

BRAGGGGG!!!! Time Magazine declared Mental Floss one of the 50 best websites. And they linked to one of MY articles (about impotence! Woot!) in the article. So I'm just so damn tickled and am shamelessly bragging in every venue I can find. Because I ROCK. I am kinda in Time Magazine, sorta! WOOT.

Therese's rockin' TIME MAGAZINE link.

Starting pistol

Last night, after drinking gallons of watered down apple juice and milk, LE pushed her small belly against the fabric of her nightgown. It rounded out and sloshed.
"Mama," she said, with true sadness, "I look fat."

It has the effect of a starting pistol, cleaving the uneasy anticipation and sending me on a marathon run that will last at least the next 20 years. The race is on. The next thing I say matters, oh it matters.

"Nah, your belly is just full cuz you drank so much. And besides, so what if you did look fat? You'd still be the cutest girl in town."

She looks unconvinced and confused. I push on, thinking of my own mother's constant, quiet disgust with herself throughout my childhood. And her even quieter, sadder disappointment that I turned out fat, too.

"Mama's fat!" I say, rubbing my belly in an affectionate manner. "And I'm still really pretty."
"You're not fat Mama," she says, because she is a gentle sweet girl and doesn't ever want to hurt or disappoint me.
"Sure I am!" I smile at her. "But so what? I wear pretty clothes, kiss a handsome man, and have lots of  friends! It's ok for people to be fat."

In the next second she is distracted and wanders away, and I am left, my mind bent over at the knees, panting for air. Did I do it right? Are her little synapses processing like I want them to? Is the connection between fat and disgust dissolving while her confidence calcifies, gaining strength to support whatever body flaws she will invariably have?

When I tell her being fat doesn't matter, I know I'm lying. It doesn't matter to me, safely tucked into my 30's, with true love, sex, and popularity secured. But when she's 13 it will matter. When she's 20 it will matter. It will always be in her mind, even if she never actually gets fat.

I don't pretend that my body love indoctrination will be much competition for the world she's going to face. But god it's something, a tiny bit of comfort to clutch when the assault begins. No, when the assault continues. It's already started.