I just saw the most disturbing scene of my whole life, and I hope never to repeat it.

It was shopping day. I went to a repair shop and got my “dress up” Mickey Mouse watch I’ve been meaning to fix for three years patched up. I got my old glasses fixed at the place where I got my new glasses that won’t be ready for two weeks so I’m not blind my whole “vacation.” I went to Dollar Tree and got enough food to last me a few days, including mini chocolate bars and bubble gum for the plane… disappointed they didn’t have the smoothie packs I use every morning… If I’m not allowed through security with mini chocolate bars, TSA can have some fun on me.

So, after this incredible feeling of “I’m gettin’ shit handled,” I’m driving home, cruising down University and slowing down for a red light. All of the sudden, a young Indian woman starts running across the street between cars, about 100 feet behind the crosswalk- against the green turn light- and is bulldozed over by a car that was going toward the left turn lane.

Luckily, she was just hit by the front of the car and the tires did not run over her body. She was able to get up and walk to the median, as people start running from the far side of the street to help her. Someone runs up to the car that hit her to make sure he doesn’t get away, and my light was green before I got to see whether he just rolled up his window and drove off, or whether he actually turned around to call the police.

I’ve heard of people getting hit by cars my whole life, but this is the first time I’ve actually seen it happen. In the state of Maryland, the driver has, at best, only partial responsibility for the accident because he hit a jaywalker. The law says that the driver only need pay medical bills, etc., if he or she was the cause of the accident. I just hope the driver was a good Samaritan and waited until the police and ambulance arrived.

I was terrified for the girl, because whether it was her fault or not, it was excruciating to watch. She was carrying lots of stuff, and, on impact, dropped all of it. In skiing, we call that a “yard sale,” and the description was apt in this case as well. Hair ties, her hat, and her shopping bags all crashed to the ground, and the contents spilled into several lanes.

Possibly for the first time in my life, I got intense road rage, because all these people are picking up stuff in front of my car and the cars behind me are honking at me to go. I suppose I can’t really be mad- they weren’t aware of what had just happened and couldn’t see the pedestrians in front of me. Wait, that’s not true at all. The car behind me must have seen what happened, and was still just a giant dickhead to me.

Surely they could’ve seen that a full-size sedan did not have enough feet in front of him to brake to a full stop as the girl was running, trying to make it before my light turned green.

In the nanosecond after the accident, I wondered if she was dead. It took her a minute to get up, and I audibly sighed with relief. I’ve never been hit by that many pounds of metal, so it was shocking in a good way to see that she didn’t seem permanently injured…. although it’s probably too early to tell. She may have been walking on adrenaline and imagination, and could conceivably have a brain bleed as well.

It’s hard when you see something like that and say to yourself, “she should have known better,” because you know you’ve let your judgment impede your compassion, at least for a second…. It was hard to tell how old she was, though. She could have been anywhere from 15-30. Perhaps she was just naive, and perhaps she was distracted by seeing people she knew on the other side of the street. Whatever it was, I am sure that we will both be mindful of properly using crosswalks from now on.

I have to admit that when I bought a ticket to go see the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs play the Sugar Land Skeeters, it was a circuitous route. Apparently, there is a new baseball team in Portland called “The Pickles,” and because I knew I wouldn’t be in Portland long enough to see a game, I wondered if they would come east.  They, in fact, will not. It’s not even the same league. So, I’m looking through the Blue Crabs’ schedule and notice that my home town team (though put in long after I left) is going to be in Maryland the weekend after I get home from Bryn’s wedding. The ticket was less than $20 ($13 plus all the fees they seem to make up), a great price to see my two of my three favorite states duke it out.

For those that are unfamiliar with the area, Sugar Land is a suburb of Houston to the southwest, in one of the country’s fastest growing counties, Fort Bend. It’s called “Sugar Land” because it was the home of the original Imperial sugar factory. My family moved there the summer before I started 11th grade, and I ended up going to school there for a not so small reason- Houston traffic. The rule that you had to live in HISD to attend HSPVA was put in action when I was in 10th grade, so I was grandfathered in if I wanted to stay. However, the thought of commuting 45 minutes (more if the traffic was bad) to school seemed daunting since I’d just gotten my driver’s license.

It was not a small decision to switch schools, because back then I didn’t know that the symphonic band at Clements was actually better than the one I was currently in. They didn’t have a jazz band, so I auditioned for choir, instead. My two claims to fame from those years are that I was the first student to be in the top band and the top choir at the same time, and the first student to be openly gay.

I didn’t know that I was the first to be out, though. I learned it when Lindsay was a freshman at Clements, the year I was a freshman in college. Apparently, there were a bunch of kids with rainbow ribbons on their backpacks and Lindsay asked them about it. She told me that they said, “we do it in honor of this kid, Leslie.” You could have knocked me over with a feather. In retrospect, I’m not sure I’ll ever do anything more important in my life than pave the way for others to be brave in a conservative Republican suburb.

During my 11th grade year, I went back into a very large closet and told no one, because in a magnet school like ‘PVA, none of my church friends and school friends crossed over (as if it wasn’t obvious just by looking at me….). My senior year, my dad left the ministry and all bets were off. I wore my pride rings every single day, I flirted with girls (one in particular), and to my surprise, no one thought anything of it. The reason I was so surprised is that HSPVA was a nightmare (this is a link to a paper I wrote my senior year about my time at ‘PVA) some days. On others, it was fine.

I owe Sugar Land a lot in terms of my growth and development, but not sure I owe it enough that I automatically believe the Skeeters should win. 😉

It’s a little before 1300, and I’ve already had a day and a half. I lost my glasses this morning, and somehow I knew I was going to find them with my shoes. I was, in fact, correct. I’d put them on my laptop’s side of the bed and they’d fallen off. I’m looking for them frantically when all of the sudden, I hear a crunch.

I got in touch with Zenni, and they’re sending me new frames and a tool to pop the lenses out of my old ones for free. But then I thought I might be able to get new glasses quicker at the local shop. So, I go and their next appointment is Wednesday at 3:00. I go ahead and make the appointment, because I need a spare pair, anyway, and I have vision insurance. I can only hope that they are better quality than Zenni… and probably will be, because I can try them on in the store, rather than having to guess. The keyhole bridge glasses I have kind of make me look like that guy you avoid because you think he might be a perv. Such a disappointment, because online they looked so cute and timeless. Instead, they take up my whole face. If my hair was really long, they might be acceptable. Right now I look like a Marine recruit without even meaning to…. my hairapist got a little scissor happy.

My hair grows fast, though, so I really don’t have anything to worry about. And I still have prescription sunglasses for driving. I’ll just have to look like a perv at night. God, doesn’t that sound appealing….

Despite my hair being that short, it actually is really cute on me, as long as my glasses are small & cute as well. At least I only have to wait 7-10 days to get them back. Though my appointment at my local shop isn’t far away, my lenses take a while to make (I’m guessing) because they’re prisms. It usually takes three or four weeks for me to get them online.

But the real anxiety was hearing the crunch under my feet and knowing I hadn’t stepped on recycling.

I have one last shot at getting glasses sooner, and I’m about to leave to go see if it works out. I had my eye exam at LensCrafters in the mall, and I think my prescription is valid. I just need to see if they’ll take my insurance for frames. This is not how I wanted to spend my day, but it’s a necessary evil.

When I said a prayer asking for relief from grief, I suppose I should have been more specific.

It seems as if there is no limit to the amount of grieving I can do, and it’s not for lack of wanting to stop. I listen to peppy music, I go for walks, I do everything I’ve been taught to change my mood, and yet, my mind still wanders back to the days I lost Dana, Argo, and my mother. No one ever dies conveniently, but it was a body blow to lose my mother when I was still so lost in the throes of grieving the loss of my wife and my friend, and in Dana’s case, both.

Dana was my best friend in the entire world the whole time we were together, but officially for almost four years before we admitted we were in love with each other and didn’t just love each other. The rumor mill started long before that, but when I met Dana and we first started hanging out, my heart had been marinated, grilled, and handed to me on a platter. I didn’t have room for that kind of love in my life, and a best friend fit the bill nicely. I didn’t realize until probably two years had gone by that I was stopping myself from dating because I’d rather hang out with her. There were too many things to explore, like hiking and endless amounts of Trivial Pursuit in every genus imaginable, and in various states of sobriety.

In terms of driving out The Gorge, we called it “hiking o’clock” and “beer-thirty.” McMenamin’s Edgefield was halfway between Portland and Multnomah Falls, so generally we’d stop there on the way home for a pint. Multnomah, though, was only our starting point because there was an easy parking lot. We’d start there, then end up

The One Where Dana Holds My Ankles So I Don’t Die

somewhere over Wahkeena Falls or Angel’s Rest. At Angel’s Rest, I laid down on the rock and Dana held onto my ankles as I tried to get the perfect shot, because the rock pointed downward at a steep angle… and I can’t remember how we came up with it or when, but it was repeated that day. The setup is either one of us having to call our fathers. “Steve (or David)? Dana (or Leslie) was bein’ a dumbass and got herself killed.” The colors in the photos I took that day aren’t nearly as rich as they were in person, because back in those days, camera phones took quick and dirty pictures, not semi-professional quality like they do now. Although I will say that for a two megapixel camera and 640×480 resolution, this shot isn’t terrible. You know why I don’t have a better one? That was the longest, shittiest hike I’ve been on to date, and I am reticent to do it again. First of all, from Multnomah Falls, it’s about a mile and a half to the trail head to go up to Angel’s Rest. Second of all, it’s about an 11 mile hike round trip. On the way back, it started raining cats and dogs. Soaked to the skin, we almost cried when we got back to the trail head and realized it was still another one and a half miles to the car.

But, no pain, no gain, right?

There are too many funny stories between Dana and me, but right now the ones on my mind are about taking pictures. The setup on the first is that you have to know Dana loves genealogy, and I, to put it succinctly, do not. To me, it’s kind of boring. I let my grandfathers do all the work and just listen when they’re done. Dana will do things like call up historical societies. She did so and found out that one of her ancestors was buried at Beth Israel cemetery in Portland. So I had this bright idea that we should go and take pictures of the headstones with a “light dusting of snow.”

Headstones with a “Light Dusting of Snow”

I’m laughing so hard I can barely breathe now…

We start driving and I forget that SW Portland is at a much higher elevation than SE, and when we get there, we are fuckin’ KNEE DEEP. We pull up in front of the caretaker’s house and Dana rings the doorbell to see if he can help her locate her ancestor’s headstone. He says, “where were you four hours ago?” It’s starting to get dark and the snow is falling even harder.

Tears are starting to roll down my cheeks now.

She asks if he has a map, and he says, “not one that you can read.” Dana gets all indignant thinking he’s just being shitty to her and tells me as such when she gets back in the car. I said, “it’s probably because it’s in Hebrew.” A light dawns in her brain that we’re at BETH ISRAEL CEMETERY. We decide that it’s getting too dark to see anything, anyway, and start home. We end up having to pull off to the side of the road to CHAIN UP due to my brilliance. It was a nice idea, anyway.

Another of my brilliant ideas turned dumbass attack was in Sacramento, California. Counselor, Dana’s sister, lives there, and we’d gone to visit her and the parents. We used to have code words that meant “get me the hell out of here” when being with family became too much for either of us (introvert and ambivert that we are). I said the code words and off we went for a drive. I think we went to a liquor store because as the resident mixologist, I was usually the one that made drinks for everyone in the afternoon. On the way home, we saw this field of sunflowers, and I told Dana to stop the car. Since we were on the highway, she knew I’d found something I wanted to take a picture of…. something I did often. To Dana’s credit, she ALWAYS stopped…. and didn’t leave me there, not even once. 🙂

To get the highway out of the picture, I crawled down into the gulch and before I knew it, I was past my

My Shoes are Probably Still There

ankles in mud. It didn’t bother me, because I’d learned early that if you wanted a great shot, sometimes you had to pay for it. How much did I pay, you ask? Well, once I was that deep in the mud, I couldn’t get back out. I tried everything I could to struggle upward, because I’d just gotten new running shoes fairly recently and they needed to last me for a while. After about ten minutes, I finally realized that the only way I was ever going to see Dana again was to untie them and try to get my feet out that way. I managed to successfully get my feet out, but when I reached down for my sneakers, they were stuck as if superglued. Dana saw me walking across the highway in my socks to the convenience store where she parked. I opened the door and she looked at me knowingly. “…but I got the shot,” I said. I can’t remember whether she said anything or just sighed. If she just sighed, I promise I knew exactly what she meant.

One of my birthday presents came early; it’s an American Giant rugby jacket… basically a hoodie without the hoodie part. I chose the rugby jacket over the hoodie because I, in short, wanted to. Yes, AG is known for “the perfect hoodie,” but I already have several and my Irish national team rugby jacket is on its last legs. Plus, the black puffy jacket I already own is also rugby style, so I won’t have the hood poking over it, which I have found in falls/winters past that it doesn’t look that great. I’m going to be wearing it a lot, what with the Maryland fanatical devotion to air conditioning and it’s supposed to be down into the 60’s tomorrow because of a HUGE storm that’s already here. Flash flooding is already happening, and I’m glad I got out early this AM to go to the pharmacy.

There are always people who think they can drive in this kind of weather without being able to see the street. That way, they drive into three feet deep water, hoping against hope that their little Ford Damnits survive… #dumbassattack

Getting home before the storm really picked up was a smart decision, because I can’t go without my medication. Withdrawal is nothing short of craptastic… headaches, nausea, chills, the WORKS. Oh, and I had to pick up some shampoo. So there’s that.

I also went to see Dunkirk a few nights ago, and though there’s not much character development, the cinematography is exactly what it feels like to have been there. It was as if there was a sand filter on the lens, adding to the tension. You’re literally on the edge of your seat with fear as people get shot, drown, pilots overhead making crash landings into the water and onto the beach. It’s sort of a summer blockbuster, but it feels more like a documentary, because it doesn’t seem like liberties are taken with the story. There’s no made-up romance, no fictional backstory. Just the horror of war, and plenty of it.

My favorite line in the whole thing comes from this exchange:

-Is it going to work?
-We’ll know in six hours.
-I thought the tides came every three hours.
–Well, it’s a good thing you’re Army and I’m Navy.

…and that’s pretty much all the comic relief you’ll get. Good luck. God bless.

Although I will tell you that I was way less terrified than in the first 20 minutes of Saving Private Ryan… so there’s that.

Also reading several good books- the rest of the Jane Whitefield series and Al Franken’s new book, Giant of the Senate. All are fascinating in their own way. Jane is a guide who gets people off the grid. Al Franken is a guy that gets you fired up about saving the country.

Haven’t written for the blog since Sunday because I’m trying to flesh out Sarah Silverman from the time she blows chunks into the class fish tank. The book itself is called Fish Ralph, what her class calls her the rest of the year.

Other writers say to “write what you know.” I remember middle school. All of it. But Sarah is not a reflection of me, she’s her own person, and I like spending time with her.

Since I don’t have an agent, I may try to get it into Amazon on my own… but that’s putting the cart before the horse, because only Chapter One is complete.

It has a Harry Potter sort of arc, because even though it’s not fantasy, if the first book takes off, there is every bit the chance that the books will grow up as she does. But don’t think for a moment that her nickname will ever change. Kids don’t forget. Anything. I just don’t want to, again, put the cart before the horse and publish a complete series before I know if it resonates with people or not.

I write my blog for me. Novels, on the other hand, are, in an ideal world, supposed to make money.

Lindsay has been bugging me to work on this novel forever, because she genuinely wants to see what happens to Sarah. Now THAT is a compliment, my friends.

And on that note, Sarah is calling me. I better get back to her. You know how middle school kids are…..